Immigration and more pics

Today we needed to go into Immigration to get Katrina's picture taken. I think this means that her paperwork is almost done! We left the other 3 kids with friends and just took Katrina.

A trip to immigration is always a "trip". We're such a spectacle no matter how we dress or how quietly we try to slip in! Every eye was on her infant carrier when we walked through the room. I guess it didn't help that a 6'7" blond guy was carrying her. Then in the room where we were to wait everyone sat and stared until it became apparent that I wasn't going to take off the blanket covering her. (She'd just fallen asleep and I didn't want her disturbed!) Once the girls in the office heard we were there, they came out into the waiting room to see Katrina. They pulled the blanket back and would have woken her up right then and there, but I explained that she was on a schedule and I'd rather she stay sleeping until "picture time". That interested them and they asked me all about her schedule. They were amazed that she was sleeping through the night! Then there were questions about what/how I feed her ("exclusif susu dari mama" - or exclusively breast fed?) and exclamations on how big she was for 8 weeks old.

Eventually they got back to their jobs and we were called in for the photo and fingerprinting. (So strange to me that they're fingerprinting an 8 week old but guess it's necessary.) As the lady and I were working on the fingerprints, suddenly people were DYING laughing behind us. I turned to look - there was a teen girl standing beside Josh and she literally came to just above his waist. She looked embarrassed but all of the others were laughing their heads off! This is a common occurrence - people even do it standing behind him in line at the cash register or walking behind him on the street. They measure how high they come on him with their hands.

There were many exclamations about how cute Katrina was and how big her eyes were. She treated them to a number of smiles which resulted in amazement all around. They just love all things North American/western - the white skin and blue eyes especially. (One lady commented on my mom's nose while they were here - she said she'd love to have a nose like my mom's! That was the first time in Mom's LIFE that anyone has complimented her nose! They notice and comment on things about westerners, like "wow, she's a fat lady" but generally they mean it in a complimentary way!)

Just as we were about to leave, one lady (who earlier had asked about how I fed my baby - she bottle fed hers, she informed me, cause she didn't have any milk) asked, in a very concerned way, about where Katrina's socks were. I've overheard a number of times where people would say, "poor baby - she doesn't have any socks on". I guess that's a must for a national baby even in 90+ degree heat. I explained that in our culture we don't wear socks on our babies in the heat, only when it's cold. She asked, "Aren't you afraid she'll get sick?" I said I wasn't and that this was the 4th child I had done this with and we'd never had a problem with it. She was amazed.

Needless to say, we were glad to be done there in the office. The whole thing took only 20 minutes start to finish!

One thing I'm so thankful for (and have noticed this when we travel as well) is that we know enough of the language to understand in general what is going on. When we first got here, including the first time at immigration, we didn't understand more than the very basic of greetings and it's hard to function when you don't understand what's going on. It is inconvenient but also can be somewhat scary. I still struggle with understanding the language at times. Just Wednesday I was hanging out with the helpers at the Mission Home and chatting. One of the girls asked me a question that I totally didn't understand. I think I asked her to repeat it 3 times and I was totally blank on what she was asking. Usually they can restate what they want to know in a way that I can understand but, poor girl - this time I totally didn't know. I sure do enjoy sitting and chatting with them though. There's so much to learn about them, how they think, how they do life.

Anyway, here are some more recent pics of Katrina and the kids. Enjoy!