Bella's birthplace...."Found" area

It is about 5:30 in the afteroon.....we just got back from a long van ride to see the area where Bella was born (and where she was abandonded). We are in Nanning City, which is very close to the border of Viet Nam, and is Southeast China. We drove with Jim and Nancy (and Laina) to Laibin City, which is about 2 hours north of Nanning. Going through Nanning, we noticed that there is very well to do areas, where they are building luxury condos...high rises......one thing we noticed, that due to the humid climate, it is very very green here.......once we got out of nanning and on the expressway, we were completely in farm/rural country.....We went for about 2 hours, not seeing too much....In my mind, I expected Laibin to be a VERY rural farm village....but, when we got off the exit for Laibin, we were surprised that it was very well built up....fairly large city (maybe size of Worcester???).....and seemed to be expanding.....Yes, there were VERY poor sections, but was not what I expected....It seemed to be similar to Nanning, but on smaller scale, and less populated...(and more low income)........We went to the 'found' place of Bella first......She was left outside the Emergency Area of the People of Laibin Hospital.....we were 'pleased' to see the abandonment spot....VERY high traffic......safe........Small grass area.....right in front of the ER....They said that she was left under an umbrella.....that she was 'about a half day old', so she was born and basically abandonded......It was nice to get some 'closure' as to where she came from......We then moved onto where Laina was 'found'....All Jim and Nancy had for info was that she was left by a Furniture Mart by the train station.....We drove there, and it was in a VERY poor...run down section...there were housing that was very low income......the Furniture mart was beautiful, and Jim and Nancy are taking comfort in the idea that she was born in one of the low income 'project's'..the mother knew she couldn't take care of her, and thus, dropped her off at the highly travelled Furniture Mart (which seemed geared to middle to upper class)......It was nice to see this for both of families, even if it was a long day..We also drove past Laibin Social Welfare Institute (the orphange)....we were not allowed to go inside, nor could we take pictures from OUTSIDE of the van....had to take pictures from inside the van....Even that was questioned by officials, who came over and asked what we were doing...it was a large building on a main street....there is an outside area in the back that the kids could play at.....other than that, a non descript apartment style building.......Zach, per usual, did great...Bella, per usual, ate the whole way up, slept the whole way back.....!!! We are here for one more day (Sunday), and tomorrow we are visiting a very large mountain area, close to the city and a famous 'flea market', where we hope to get some trinkets representing this area......When we got back from the trip today, we were all hot....tina took Bella upstairs.....Zach and I took a walk.....Zach bought two lolllipops for 1 YUAN (7.75 YUANS equal a dollar), and I bought an ice cold beer for 3.5 YUAN (less than 50 cents).......When we were waiting for our trip this morning, we noticed red carpet rolled out...numerous official looking cars....large stretch limos....BMW"s.....much to our chagrin, we were NOT travelling to Laibin in style....the Prime Minister of Viet Nam is visiting, and actually staying at our hotel...i guess that speaks well for our hotel....We depart Monday morning for Guangzho, which is less than an hour flight from here...We go to the Consulate.....Get visas for the babies.....and get them checked out, medically....supposed to be very quick, and we are staying at the famous White Swan hotel for two nights, which caters to American Families adopting...guess great shopping in the area, and some "american style" restaurants....i love chinese food as much as the next, but craving a good old fashion juicy Burger, with an ice cold beer...(that and a damn drink with ICE in it...!)....more later...