When we were in Korea, I typed out this huge long post about the day that we met the boys' foster mothers. And then I went to publish it to my blog...and it disappeared into cyber space, never to be seen again. Awesome.
So we'll call this, "Take Two". It's always hard to rewrite something you've already written once, but I really want to remember this special day, so here goes!
We arrived on Thursday evening, and had meetings set up for Friday morning at both of the boys' Korean adoption agencies. We knew we wanted to be ready to go first thing in the morning so even though we were dead tired from the trip we sat down with the map and the subway info and made sure we were all set.
We were so wiped out that we slept really well the first night, but we found ourselves wide awake around 5am. We grabbed some breakfast at a nearby convenience store, got everything together and headed out to the subway.
Oh. My. Word.
That was quite the experience! We were there at rush hour apparently. Seoul has about 10 million people...and I'm pretty sure all of them were crammed into the subway car with us that Friday morning. It was crazy! As the crowd carried us into the train, Brad and I just kind of looked at each other wondering what in the world was happening. We laughed so hard after the train emptied out a bit. That was the only time we experienced this - from then on we did not take the train during rush hour!
It is so hard to put the emotions of this day into words. I felt so overwhelmed walking the streets of Seoul, knowing this was where our boys were. Everywhere I looked, little boys reminded me of Matthew and Nathan. It was so surreal to realize we were actually in Korea!
As we reached Nathan's adoption agency, emotion overtook me, tears filled my eyes and there was a huge lump in my throat. I looked at this plain, unassuming building thinking, "He was here! This is where my baby spent the first few months of his life."
Meeting with Nathan's foster mother was something I will never forget. We didn't really know much about her before meeting her. As we walked into the room with a woman who would translate for us, his foster mother rose from the couch and quickly came to embrace me. What a beautiful moment! She started talking quickly, excitedly, smiling and gesturing. Over the next 45 minutes we were blessed to hear over and over again how much she and her husband love Nathan, how much they miss him, that they think he is so smart and wonderful! We happen to agree :)
One of the biggest blessings for me was to hear some little details about our boy that I have always wondered about. It is a hard thing to miss many months of your child's life and to miss some of those important first milestones. I was so thrilled to learn when Nathan first learned to walk! Apparently he was 9 months old, and he pulled up on the couch one day, and just two days later started walking! Brad and I laughed because that is just so Nathan :) You really can't slow him down at all.
Nathan's foster mother had 40 foster children, and Nathan was her last! She said that she will always remember him, and she hopes we can bring him back to Korea to visit her someday. We told her we hope we are able to, and we really meant it. She is a very special woman and we are so thankful for all she did to care for our sweet boy.
After this meeting it was off to Matthew's agency!
We soon found out that the message had never reached Matthew's foster mother - she didn't even know we were coming! But DJ, the woman who works in the international adoption department, phoned her and let her know we were there, and she said she would come right away! She lives about 1 hour away from the agency but came immediately - how amazing is that? We were more than happy to wait.
While we were waiting, DJ very kindly took us out to lunch to a traditional Korean restaurant. I was a little nervous - I am quite adventurous when it comes to food, but I don't think my stomach has gotten the message, and usually different food makes me sick quite easily. We sat on the floor and I was happy to see we were having Korean BBQ ribs. It was amazingly delicious! I did okay with the chopsticks, although in Korea they use stainless steel chopsticks which are very tricky when your hands get wet!!! Still, it was a great experience.
When Matthew's foster mom arrived, I immediately felt this bond with her that I just can't explain. She is just a little older than us, and even though she didn't speak a word of English I could just tell that we would be friends if we could get to know each other. It was really strange! We smiled at each other a lot, but didn't get much of a chance to talk because we were at the restaurant. Still, it was so great to be together, to be able to give her some gifts and photos of Matthew, to hug her. She said she could tell Matthew was very happy from the photos :)
When it came time for us to leave, I will never forget our good-bye out on the street. We hugged and hugged, both of us crying, sharing a common love for a dear little boy, and we just thanked each other over and over again. I am so grateful for all she did to care for Matthew until he could come home.
Wow, it is emotional even writing about it again!!! This was probably the best part of the trip for me - I felt like I learned so much about my boys' past and that meant so much to me.
We took the subway home, ate sandwiches for dinner, did a little shopping at a very cool nearby market (Insadong - very close to Somerset, the hotel we stayed at), and went to bed really early.
We could already tell...we love Korea!
