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We have received the info on Olivia. First things first, here’s her picture:
According to the report, she’s very healthy with a plump face. She was found on Dec 2 outside the entrance of the Social Welfare Institute of Wanzai County. On Dec 7, she was placed under the care of a foster family. She is active and adorable who sleeps well (hooray). Karen went over the medical records with Lisa our neighbor who is an MD. All the results show that she is healthy and normal. Yeah!! We’ll be signing the paperwork and returning it to CHSFS tomorrow. Wow. We’re pretty excited.
We showed Hua Mei the pictures of Olivia. Okay, let me rephrase the earlier comment. Karen and I are pretty excited. Suddenly the reality of no longer being the only child has overshadowed the thought of having a mei mei. She is a little jealous and told me that she doesn’t want us to have two daughters. Well, we have some time to ease the transition. ;-)
A couple more photos:
It was kind of odd to hear her called Wan Jin Run. When we adopted Hua Mei in 2005, we had originally asked for twins (what in the world were we thinking?). We decided on two names: Natalie and Olivia. So, Hua Mei is Natalie and her little sister would be Olivia. We’ve been calling her Olivia for over three years now.
Natalie’s original name was Xue Fu Yan. She came from Wu Xue City in Hubei Province. Her surname of Xue comes from her city of origin. Others in her cohort from Wu Xue also had the name of Fu which is likely her generation name. Natalie’s given name from the orphanage is Yan. So, Olivia’s surname of Wan likely comes from her place of origin, Wanzai county. Similarly, her generation name is Jin and her given name is Run.
My sisters and I have Chinese names for our middle names. My generation name is Sheng and my given name is wei. We were named by our paternal grandfather. Karen and I asked my dad to give Chinese names to Natalie and Olivia. My dad named Natalie Hua Mei and named Olivia Xia Mei. He said that both names mean born in China and raised in America. The word huaxia is an archaic name for China. Meiguo is the Chinese word for America. So, Hua Mei and Xia Mei could also be translated as Chinese American. Hua also means splendid, illustrious; xia means great or grand; and mei can be translated as beautiful or good deed. So, that’s what’s in a name.
