careful what you wish for

so, remember in the last post how I mentioned that this waiting was like not knowing when we got to go to the hospital when Rachel was pregnant? well, I guess that was enough for the forces at work to send us to the hospital. Permitanme explicar: yesterday we met with Harry's doctors and psychiatrists at Ayudame. They were very helpful and gave us a good (or pretty good) background on his behavior, fears, etc. And again, he is very excited to meet us and to be adopted. more on that later.... We left Ayudame with a placement date of Friday because the director broke her wrist and had a doctor's appointment on Thursday (honestly people, get it together). Then Addie started feeling awful. She had a slight cold when we left, but she was coughing and making awful noises now and was looking a little flush. Manuela's husband is a doctor (and former ambassador to Costa Rica) so we went the her house so he could listen to her lungs. He said she did not sound well at all and suggested a trip to the hospital. Manuela called her daughter's pediatrician and off we went. He met us (after waiting for about an hour) and told us we needed x-rays and to have her blood drawn. so we went to another office down the street. she had several tests done (she was very scared, all these people poking her and talking to her in Spanish) and we went to a third office. At this point we were just following Manuela and trusting her. We had to pay for all the procedures out of pocket, and while not cheap, it was still less than in the states. Sometimes they take our credit card, but sometimes Manuela had to pay and now we owe her. I cant imagine how hard this would have been without her. So now she has an antibiotic, it came in powder form that we had to add hot water to, not a pill like back home. So today we are resting and relaxing at Betty's Place.
on another unrelated note; driving in Bogota is insane! at one point we were darting in between other cars, narrowly missing other bumpers, jerking to stops and starts, diverting random motorcycles that zip past us at twice our speed, just missed nailing some wandering pedestrians, and avoiding several accidents, and all this was in a parking garage! I am not making this up. The streets are even worse. But everyone drives this way and no one gets angry in the process. My head would pop off like a dandelion if I lived here.

So we get Harry tomorrow (although they do not use the name 'Harry' here, so he will need to get sued to that. 'Harold' is too formal for us). and then the real fun starts. Thanks for all the well-wishes everyone! about the pics: The top pic is Manuela, she is great! the second is the view from the hospital waiting room, and then the waiting room ( I had some time to kill), then a very un-patient Addie, the man in the orange shirt is Harry's psychologist, the outside of Ayudame, and the street corner the orphanage is on.