This will have to be a brief post because I'm stuck using the Davao hotel's outrageously priced and time-limited business center computer; our Manila hotel had some convoluted Internet hookup, and now our laptop refuses to connect to the Internet.
But enough about our woes! We arrived in Davao around noon today, and to our surprise Leah May was waiting for us at the airport along with her social worker. She seemed very excited to see us, and the social worker said she'd been up early and dressed since 8 a.m. in anticipation of picking us up.
Once we got to our hotel room, though, she got cold feet and became quite emotional. She kept saying that she wanted the social worker to come live with us too! After about an hour she calmed down and was pretty content for the rest of the day. We went to lunch, took a tour of the center where she lives, and dropped by a mall briefly to buy her a few clothes since her orphanage needs her clothes for the other girls.
She's been more friendly with me than with David and Rene, but Rene's been a real trouper about it. He's heeded our warnings to not smother her or come on too strong, and by the end of the evening she was more sociable with him. She even seems to have picked up one of Rene's favorite phrases: "Mom, watch me!" Great--now I'll hear it in stereo!
Right now all three are upstairs snoring away. Tomorrow there will be a party for her at the center, and we'll visit the regional child welfare office to meet with some officials there. Hopefully she'll continue to do well with us by the time we head for Cebu on Saturday!
Sorry I can't post pictures since this isn't my computer, but David and I are going to continue working on (read: screaming at) the laptop to see if we can get it to behave. If anyone can tell me in language that a 5-year-old would understand why our laptop shows a wireless network at full strength and connected but no Internet browsers will work, send me an e-mail!
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Kathy--if you haven't thought of this already, I'm almost willing to bet money it's a protected network and you need a WEP key or something similar to get onto it. Ask at the front desk if the hotel network is password-protected and if it is, get the password. Beware, they may charge you for it..
ReplyDeleteThanks Jeff. The problem first came up at the airport, and it was definitely an open network. We think the way the hotel had to set up our Internet has changed our preferences, and we can't figure out how to undo whatever they did...
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