A message to our non-Dutch friends...

For all our Spanish, English, German and Indonesian friends (any Swahili missing?), here’s a short message for all of you.

In fact this website is a good method to pick up some Dutch language: come on, never too late to get yourself in a high mode and practise this wonderful world language that causes your teeth to fall out and makes coughing sound like language…

Anyway, Mary & I do intend to write (in Dutch) a diary starting ½ april 2006 to mark our travel to our son in Thailand. On March 20, we had received the long awaited message that a son had been placed in our parenthood. As of then we have experienced all the highs and quite some lows that obviously are part of what we normally call “preparations”. But how to prepare for this one? It is a mix of emotions, rational decisions and a lot of fully irrational actions, ending up in heaps of nappies that might be of use to our son but most probably end up being used by our grandchildren in 2075, documents and procedures that clearly prove how wonderfully burocratic our societies are (never understood the difference between the 1st and the 3rd world really!) and a lot of fully inefficient planning. To summarise: organised chaos or chaotic planning are mixed up everyday (and I miss to see the difference, but then: who cares!).

Our son’s name is Jadethabud Somboon, he is 3 years of age, was born in Bangkok and currently lives in a foster’s home north of the capital of Thailand, where we will meet, greet and hug him on Monday April 24, 2006. It is that date that we will announce (through the website) the name that we will call him, although we will retain his Thai names as well.

After the paperwork has been set (and enabling us to get acquainted with our son at the beaches of Hua Hin in mid-Thailand from 29apr06 to 10may06) we will return to Bangkok, where all official papers will be handed over to us in order to start our journey home on Sunday May 14, 2006. We expect touching down in Amsterdam that Sunday at 09:40 hrs in the morning.

Well, if you like to follow us, please check out this website now and then. You’ll either rejoice having mastered (a bit of) that strange Dutch language or just enjoyed the pictures that we will download on the website.

Un abrazo, cheers, auf Wiedersehen and sampai jumpa lagi!