The rest of our day yesterday went really well. We almost hit a bump when we got to the immigration office and Kim said we had to go to the cashier before the interview to pay the fee. I completely forgot about the fee and did not bring any American money with me. Mom and Kim were going to back to the hotel to get my money, but fortunately, being a good business, the US government accepts credit cards. The “interview” itself consisted of signing a few documents and that was that!

Our big news is that today at 4:30 we got Georgia’s visa! That means that all of the official paperwork is done – Georgia is legally ours and cleared to immigrate to the US – hooray!!! We moved our plane reservations to Monday, April 30th, which was the earliest flight that we could get. We are coming home soon!

We will take the remainder of our time here to relax and see Hanoi. Today we walked a bit along the pretty lake a few blocks from our hotel.

There are actually some traffic lights here and the cars and motorbikes seem to mostly obey them; that makes crossing the street much easier than in Ho Chi Minh City! Unfortunately, it started to pour when we reached about halfway to our destination. We took shelter under an awning at a bank and pulled out the map to try to figure out what to do. We must have looked dazed and confused because a woman asked us if we needed help. We told her that we had planned to walk to the Old Quarter but didn’t think we would make it in the rain. She suggested that we take a taxi to the Highlands Café and wait out the rain for a bit. She even hailed a taxi for us. I’m not sure where she was from, but she spoke fluent English with a slight accent and seemed to speak fluent Vietnamese as well. Anyway, the taxi dropped us off at the café and we had a delicious lunch there. A beer, a Vietnamese coffee (strong coffee with sweetened condensed milk – yum!), a bottle of water, and two entrées cost $9.00 – unbelievable! And, as usual, the waitstaff made a fuss over Georgia and took turns holding her and entertaining her.

She gets the biggest grin on her face when someone speaks Vietnamese to her (we bought her some CDs for home, which I hope will ease the transition somewhat).

After lunch, Georgia napped in the sling while we walked around the Old Quarter. The Quarter is a maze of narrow streets with even narrower sidewalks. Not that you can walk on the sidewalks since they mostly seem to serve as parking for hundreds of motorbikes. We were approached by women selling embroidered t-shirts and we tried our hand at bartering. I managed to get the price down to just over half of what she first asked, which is supposedly good. I still hate bargaining, though! After that, we wandered through the streets taking in all of the small shops, one after the other after the other. We were approached by women selling fresh sliced pineapple among other things. The fruit looked delicious but we were warned to stay away from any produce that we didn’t peel ourselves. So far we have managed not to get sick so we must be doing something right!

After an hour or so we were getting weary and had a hard time figuring out where we were. We had two maps but neither of them were detailed enough to be of much use. We finally hailed a taxi. It was a good thing too, because from the length of the ride it seemed it would have taken us at least half an hour to walk back to our hotel – and that’s assuming we could have found our way!

Once back at the hotel, Georgia had a bottle and a nap. Then we went to the lounge for some hors d’oeuvres. Back in the room, we played with Georgia for a bit more (she’s such a fun kid!) and Mom just got her to bed.

It’s 8:00, which is the same time she went to sleep yesterday. She slept last might from 8:00 to 3:30, had a bottle, was up until 4:30, had another bottle (!), went back to sleep at 5:30, and slept until just before 8:00. Not bad. I hope she does as well tonight. Mom and I also managed to sleep most of the time that she did, which is the most sleep we have had since we have been here. Before last night, we had trouble getting back to sleep after Georgia’s feeding in the middle of the night. Let’s just say that starting your day at 4:30 in the morning for a week is not too much fun!

So, that’s about it. "See" you tomorrow!