China adoption travel: Safeguarding the paperwork

For our China adoption travel in 2001, we were required to take the following paperwork:

1. Original INS I-171H

2. Two copies of I-171H

3. Original Travel Letter

4. Three copies of the Travel Letter

5. I-864 Form with Notaization (We did not need to carry this because my husband and I both traveled to China.)

6. Three copies of our passport

7. Three copies of the Confirmation Letter

8. Current Employment Letter

9. Two passport Size Photos of each adoptive parent

10. Three years of tax returns and W-2 forms (Again, since we both traveled we did not need to take these in 2001.)

11. Complete copy of the dossier

12. Brown packet from the Consulate

During our China adoption travel we carried our daughter’s important adoption paperwork in a large expandable folder in our backpack. We kept it with us at all times until we got to the hotel in Beijing. Once in the hotel, we put the paperwork in the safe in our room.

Actually, we carried it with us on our first tour in Beijing. However, we were so nervous we would lose it we took advantage of the hotel room’s safe from then on. We couldn’t stand the thoughts of putting our adoption at risk from carelessness.

We left copies of our adoption paperwork with our family in the US just in case something happened to the originals we carried with us.

In an emergency, they could fax the copies to our agency which could get in touch with us. Check with your agency and see if you can leave copies with them if leaving the paperwork with your family or friends is not an option.

Return home.