Today I spoke w/ Kim, my personal contact, at my local credit union; I must say that I love my credit union, so if you don't belong to your credit union, chop chop! Anyhow, all of my brand new money came in today. :) Big Huge Smile! All crisp, clean, no rips, tears or wrinkles money. Perfect! So this is just one reason that I like them so much, because they truly care about me as a client, and secondly I truly appreciate that they are truly concerned for me. Kim wanted to be sure that I was not being taken advantage of and that everything with this adoption was on the up and up. She said, "I know that you are smart, and I know that you did tons of research, but we are a bit concerned about you because this is such a strange request." I must admit that if I hadn't researched my butt off, talked w/ other adoptive families and read so many darn blogs, I would be super leery if someone came to me asking for $24,000 in brand new $100 bills. It is a weird request, and I must admit that when Kim asked if all was okay as this seems like a shady request, I started to question the weirdness of it too. :) And I know it is just the way things go in the adoption world.
I do have a question however, is this rule the same when adopting from other countries? If you adopt from China, do they ask you to bring brand spanking new cash too? Are there adoptions from other countries where you don't have to carry the cash on you? This is the one thing that most freaks me out about this entire journey, to travel with this amount of cash on me to a foreign country where people quite obviously know that I am traveling to adopt and have this money on me freaks me out! I know that much of this money is given to my coordinator the moment that I step off the plane in Almaty, but not all of it, just a bit freaky. I best quit posting on this topic or my mom will get too nervous as she reads. :)
5 comments:
24,000 wow we only have to bring 10K. I guess we pay more of our things stateside. I will admit this is the one issue my family and friends have about this entire adoption, the travelling with so much money. I on the other hand am not even bothered by it as in reading everyone else's blogs and talking to other parents, that no one has had issues, and therefore we will not have any issues.
Sandi
The only cash I have to bring is for our spending money. All adoption costs are taken care of here.
And yes, with China you need to bring cash, all unmarked, brandspankingnew, unfolded, excetera but it has to be in denominations no smaller that $20s for the adoption costs itself. However, I also believe that the hotels and restaurants in China take credit cards. And you travel and stay together in large groups with other adopting families. I don't know about other countries.
Now that I think about it, China takes $100s. For some reason though when I was starting to gather cash for Kaz, I thought it had to be in smaller demonominations ($20s).
Being that anything in the US that requires cash and new unmarked bills is probably illegal, this does seem weird. However, from my blog reading it also appears that folks in Kaz carry alot of cash on a regular basis, and being that credit cards are not used as standard payment like it is here, I suppose its not so freaky.
isn't it interesting how different agencies do things differently? of course, SAndi and I are both with commonwealth, and we are only bringing $10K (i can't believe i just said "Only $10K", but compared with how much you are bringing, it seems like peanuts. :) I Just had to go look at the breakdown to see where it all goes. It still seems so far away to me (when we go) but i guess we could go in January, so I guess i need to start to commit this travel guide to memory. Like everything else, it will go by fast.
The adoption journey is a wonderfully strange, yet exciting and fabulous one, is it not?
Yes, my dear, as your Mother this does FREAK me out!!!! I don't like it one bit! I know that you have done your research and this agency is reputable, but I still don't like this one piece of the adoption puzzle. It will all be so worth it when that little girl is tucked in safe and sound in your home!
Mom
Post a Comment