Our Adoption part 5

Yeah, I know. Not video games related. I will have something tomorrow though - I've discovered that Guangzhou has a Video Game Wholesaler and I'm going to take a look. I'm expecting lots of accessories and lots of ripoffs - we shall see what we shall see.

In the mean time we've been busy - we've been on a river cruise, we've been to Knock Off Central to see copies (and not really very good copies) of prada bags, rolxes and all that. We've been to the Jade Market, done some clothing shopping and this morning we went to the toy wholesaler where I picked up some pretty awesome binoculars and also some LED badges, which are pure awesomeness.

We've also been hanging out with my brother and one of his friends, Wilson (who's been mega helpful, and who has a china doll for a wife and the cutest little boy apart from Cameron).

Tomorrow it's the first consulate appointment to present our petition to bring Cameron into the states as a new citizen.

So some pics.

Posted at 25/03/2008 06:23:03 AM PST by Jake Simpson
Groups : Life, Family

Our Adoption part 4

I'll add some pics to this when Cathy gets back with the camera!

Last night we had dinner with my brother Cris at a calypso / asian restaurant. We met with his friend Ben (who is pretty awesome) and his wife and child. It was an awesome dinner and evening, particularly so since we got some gifts from family back home (Thank you Bella for the "Don't blame me, blame the parents" T-Shirt for Cameron).

The whiskey went down a treat:)

Today is easter and the wife and kids (how weird it is to say that) are out at church - not my thing but they wanted to go so fine - and I get an hour to myself, which is most welcome.

So the story about our flying out here - basically we were due to fly out on Wednesday, from Phoenix to SF, connecting at SF to a flight to Tokyo and on from there to Guangzhou. Our flight from Phoenix was a united flight at 7:15 am, but booked through All Nippon Air (a new carrier) which then took us the rest of the way.

We booked Super Shuttle to take us the 15 miles to the airport (since we didn't want to leave our cars at long term and incur costs) and we informed them of when our flights were (we'd have to be at the airport at 6:30 at the latest - 45 mins before they fly) and they assured us we'd be there on time. They picked us up at 5am sharp and we thought it was all good. Turns out there were 3 other pickups, and the driver didn't know where any of them were, they were all in locked in conclaves and in the end we got dropped off at 6:40, too late to make our Phoenix-SF leg.

So we talked to United, who couldn't help because they didn't issue the ticket. We talked to our travel agent who did her best but couldn't find us a different flight - we'd already missed that days ANA flights to Tokyo / China - we'd have to go the next day. And here was the kicker - ANA wanted another $6300 for us to rebook the next day because "they had no seats and all they had was business class, which cost that much more". This is on top of the $5500 we'd already spent on tickets. They told me they literally had no economy seats leaving mainland USA for China at all until the following Monday, which was too late since we had to be in Feng Du to pick up Cameron by Sunday. Our Travel agent informed us it was the same with all the carriers - no seats anywhere.

Needless to say I wasn't having any of that. I got on the phone with ANA and pointed out to them that a) I didn't have that money extra lying around and b) the next day the LA Times could have one of two headlines on the opinion columns, one of which read "AZ couple fails to adopt child because of extra $6300 demand by ANA for seats for flight" or "ANA triumphs by getting AZ couple to China to adopt over difficult circumstances". I made the point that this was a highly media pathetic situation and they wouldn't come of looking good out of it, and if I failed to adopt a child because they wouldn't get me on a plane out to China that it would cost them in the long run. They had a point in that the fact that we missed our flights wasn't their fault, but as I pointed out, attempting to charge us an extra $6300 absolute was their problem.

In the end, after going up 3 levels of management to a VP I finally got someone to 'find' us some seats the next day.

In terms of Super Shuttle - well negotiations are still underway on that situation. I can't quite believe that a business who's entire focus is getting you to the airport on time can't do it, particularly when we are sitting in the back making nervous noises to the driver the whole time. What really pissed me off was he was totally aware that he'd completely failed to get us to the airport on time, but he just dropped us off and left without even saying sorry. Needless to say we won't be utilizing Super Shuttle again.

Eventually though, we made it out here and we have Cameron.

He's awesome. Here, take a gander at this pic from dinner last night:)

Posted at 22/03/2008 09:08:56 PM PST by Jake Simpson
Groups : Life, Rants, Family

Our Adoption part 3

Ok, I promise to resume normal video game development blogs soon, but not until we've completed this adoption next week.

So whats been happening? Well, lets see. We went to the Zoo, saw some Panda's -

Posted at 20/03/2008 05:19:49 PM PST by Jake Simpson
Groups : Life, Family

Our Adoption, part 2

Yeah, I know, this is supposed to be gaming blog but I'm in China adopting and so you'll just have to bear with me talking about that for a bit.

So we are still in Chongqing, just coming to terms with having a new little one to cope with. He's been great except for the fact that he just won't dump! I mean normally that's a cause for celebration since I certainly don't want to deal with the contents of diapers and nappies, but him not having passed anything for 3 days is some what of a concern. We are giving him laxatives and crossing our fingers! As I type this Cathy has Cameron on her lap and is bumping him up and down and saying "Where's that poop?".
Yeah, probably TMI but what the hell...

I'm sure Cameron will enjoy this entry when he googles his name years from now:)

Posted at 18/03/2008 03:46:11 AM PST by Jake Simpson
Groups : Life, Family

A new son!

Well, here we in China, in Chongqing - one of the 4 largest cities in China. The hotel we are staying at - the Harbor Plaza - is right in the center of town right off what would be the Chonqqing version of Picadilly Circus or Times Square. Lots of neon and people selling stuff.

So we have our son - after a 6 our drive to the orphange in Feng Du (which will make me never complain about roads anywhere else ever again) we picked him up, along with the other couples who got their girls.

We've named our boy Cameron Elliot Zhuang Simpson - Zhuang means strong in Chinese , and Elliot was my best friend from the age of about 2 who died when he was 19.

Here are are some pics, since I know family will want to see them.

Posted at 16/03/2008 04:06:47 PM PST by Jake Simpson
Groups : Life, Family

My Friend Dave

I have this buddy - Dave Taylor. He's an ex Id, ex Transmeta, ex, well, almost everything guy.

He's really well connected, he's extremely funny and he knows his shit when it comes to the video game business.

In fact, I had drinks with him just the other night as I was visiting LA.

Anyway, there's also a show on G4 looking for a video games correspondent. Dave is the man for the job, without any question.

A quick glance at his reel will tell you that.

It works by people basically voting - so I need you to zip over to this link here, make a real fast account (no email sending required, it's a quick and dirty account) and vote for him.

The votes reset daily in terms of you being able to vote more than once - so I'm asking for a little bit of help for my friend Dave.

In fact, while you are there, check out the other reels, you'll see what I mean in terms of Dave being the man when you watch the others.

He needs our help - lets get a real game insider on G4!

Thanks

Also, I'll be going dark for a while next week since I am off to China to adopt a little boy (assuming I can find the extra $10k I need to finish this since everything went up).

Wish me luck!

Posted at 07/03/2008 11:28:27 PM PST by Jake Simpson
Groups : Game Development, Life, Family