Several people have asked about this, so here’s the skinny on the girls’ hometowns…

When we began planning for this “trip” one of the first things we considered was hometown visits for the girls.  They were both born in cities far from Beijing, and when we adopted them, we did so not in their birth cities, but in the provincial capitals (Nanchang and Wuhan) which were also far from the cities where they spent their earliest days…

So there was this big opportunity looking us in the eye.  We’ll be in China.  For five months.  Our kids were born in China.  Let’s go check it all out.  Let’s get to Nanchang and Wuhan and travel by bus or train to those other cities and SEE IT ALL…

But a hometown visit requires (I think) some sort of focus that just wasn’t there for this trip.  I want to let them to decide how we’ll contact their SWI’s, what we’ll do when we get there, what we’ll want to see, what questions we’ll have, and what we’ll do if (read: when) we don’t get answers.  With none of this being necessarily the same for the two of them.  This time (I think), our time in China was simply about taking a “dip” in the motherland: to see it, smell it, breathe it and maybe understand a little more of it… at least more than five weeks worth of adoption trips we’d had 8 and 6 years ago.

And neither of them has been ready yet (I think) – nor have they been clamoring – to go back to the place where the biggest mysteries of their lives are buried.

A few months ago, we did discuss a change of plan, and the possibility of heading to Wuhan and Nanchang.  Gosh, we’re here… maybe we should just DO this?  Go poke around and see where they were born and not make it such a big deal…

The girls were “fine” with the idea, but honestly, not really enthusiastic.  So those trips have been put on hold for the next time we’re in China: maybe a 2-week trip three years from now when Cece is 11 and Elle is 10… and ideally, accompanied by some of the families who were here with us in 2003 and 2005…

There is so much changing in the realm of China adoptions that I’m not sure what might be in store for us in this regard: what policies might change between now and then, what might be gone or erased when we finally do get back to those birth cities, what we might miss by not getting there now.  But now was simply not the time for us.