a bad day, then a good book

I thought I had flights for Vietnam, but was I wrong.  The travel agent reserved my round trip and I got the itinerary, but he didn't process my credit card so I don't actually have a ticket. He said he reserved Mai's trip, but I didn't get the itinerary and it wasn't charged either. Before I knew that we didn't have tickets, I received an itinerary change. But the itinerary and the change were sent to me in some application called Tripcase, which I don't understand how to use. The "new" flights I got looked exactly the same as the first ones. But then when I looked at my updated itinerary screen, my flight from Vancouver to Guangzhou was gone! The agent had all day today to fix this; he did reserve Mai's ticket and charged it, but I guess that's it. I asked him contact me before he closed today, but he didn't. So right now I am planning to swim to Vietnam, because there are barely any seats left to Asia in August. Oh, and Mai the 5-year-old is flying to Canada on her own.

Next, I though I had confirmed with the Vietnamese embassy by phone that I could get a 2- or 3-month visitor visa. My trip (for which I don't have a ticket) is only 3 weeks, but the Canadian foreign service workers at missions around the world are in a legal strike position, and they are doing rolling strikes. If the workers in Singapore or Ho Chi Minh City strike while we're waiting for Mai's Canadian documents, our trip home could be delayed. When I applied for my visa on Monday, I enclosed a letter explaining the situation and the phone call. When I got my passport back today, it contained .... wait for it .... a 1-month visa. The chances of needing more than a month are slim, but my problem is this: don't offer me something if you're not going to come through. I have spent the past 6 and a half years of my life dealing with lies, fraud, broken trust, and enough frustration and disappointment for a lifetime. While I realize that officials at the Vietnamese embassy have no idea what my travel agent did, and he has no idea what my agency did, and they have no idea what my doctor did, and on and on, all of it is ridiculous. Why is it unacceptable for me to treat my clients this way, but pretty much everyone associated with adoption can treat people this way and still have a job?

It's days like today that fuel my passion for helping other adopters, so I'll do a bit of that now and cool my jets before bed. Here are some useful things I've learned while preparing for my trip/swim:

- Part 2 of the direct citizenship application and the citizenship certificate application cost a total of CAN$175, which you pay on the CIC website before you leave.
- The passport process for children adopted in Vietnam now costs CAN$260 (temporary passport, regular passport, and notarization of something or other). You can pay by credit card, but you have to fill out a form and pay a 3% surcharge.
- The recommended total to bring as gifts for the orphanage and staff is US$200.  In the case of my agency, the representative deals with the gifts for you.
- Green taxis in Vietnam are more expensive than green and white ones.
- My agency is charging a file administration fee again this year. Nobody knew this for sure, despite many people asking multiple times over the past several months. My friend got the letter today, four months after it was expected, and the money is due on Wednesday. I'm too tired to even add a comment here, but you can imagine.

I'll end on a happy note. I found the perfect single mama (or papa) adoption book: God Found Us You, by Lisa T. Bergren. I ordered it online, figuring that "us" was mom and dad, as usual, and thinking I would just tell Mai that in our family, "us" means me, Nana and Poppa and Auntie's household. But surprise! In this book, Mama Fox always knew that she was part of an "us", but she had to wait for God to find Little Fox. It's such a beautifully written adoption story that single Mama Fox is just the cherry on top!

"I started seeing you everywhere, in the leaves of the giant oak and in the bark of the pine. Even in the stars! Oh, how I longed for the day that you would arrive, when God would find us you."



"I think she prayed like crazy that you would be safe, Little Fox. I think she prayed for me as much as I prayed for her." -LTB

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