On Christmas Day, two presents had been left unopened until 1 p.m. Sofie brought it out for all her extended family to see. She already had quite a haul. Skates from Santa. A Zhu-Zhu pet from her grandmother. A bracelet from her cousin. And lots of clothes.

The note on the smaller one said “Open me first!” She deserves a lot of credit for remembering exactly at the appointed time to get both presents and then thoughtfully proceed as per instructions. Inside the small box was something fairly familiar: her passport.

Now, for background, you have to know my daughter was born in Germany, and lived her first year there. She’s visited her Austrian grandparents many times over there. Subsequently, Sofie has had two passports – her first issued under the auspices of the US Department of Defense, and her second from the State Department, like most of us.

Her more recent one has stamps all over it. Belgium. Germany. Canada. The Netherlands. She’s crossed the Atlantic more than most people ever will in their whole lives. Getting on a plane for her is like getting on a bus for other kids.

“Open me Second!” read the other present, being a little flatter and larger. It also had some math clues: “What is 6 times 7? Now add one. After you find that, what is 2 times 3?”

Unwrapping the package, she found a child’s picture atlas of the world. That made her happy enough, to be sure. One of her favorite place mats at the dinner table is a map of the world, and it prompts all sorts of questions. Where have you been? What do they speak in India? What do they eat in Uruguay?

Times like that, I am glad I can pull out my laptop so we can go about finding the answers.

Six times seven, plus one, after a little figuring, was 43, and that was definitely a page number. And she opened to the spread on China. “Two times three is easy, Papa!” she said, and scanned the page for the number six. The entry on the page was for Hong Kong.

For the last two years, Sofie has been asking me when she could go to China. Or Hawaii. I told her it was probably one or the other. The questions started before we went to Disney World, but kicked into high gear when she learned that, having hit Orlando for five days, upon completion it had now fallen down to the bottom of the list. There were other places to see in the world.

“Like China,” she noted. Right, I said. But, I added, she’d have to be a little older, a little more mature. Eight was the age I picked. That also gave me time to save up the money.

The first and only time I was in China was in 1998. It was the last few days of a 27-day odyssey through Southeast Asia, looking for the wreck of Captain John Kendrick’s Lady Washington. I had flown from Manila into Guangzhou with a 48-hour visa. After a night at the Sun-Yat Sen University, I was squired around in the by grad student Zhou Xiang, hopping sampans to visit a 200-year-old cemetery for Westerners located on an island controlled by the Chinese military.Then it was into a taxi for a breakneck 90-minute taxi ride to an industrial park on the far outskirts of the city where the new catamaran would whisk me in a few hours down to Hong Kong. Coupled with a few nights in nearby Macao, the place left quite an impression.

Since then I’ve been able to remain in touch with Zhou Xiang. While she was studying in Sweden, she brought her husband through Wiesbaden when I was living there. Two years later, while doing post-doctoral work at Harvard, she once looked after our prized corgi, and became friends with a one year-old Sofie.

So in December, having won a grant from Mass. Humanities to promote our documentary series following the Columbia Expedition, I received an e-mail notification. The Hong Kong International Film Festival deadline for submissions was fast approaching. It would be held the end of March and early April. Sofie’s eighth birthday falls within that timeframe. And application fees for film festivals falls within the purview of the grant (if not the travel itself).

Fingers crossed, we applied online within hours of the deadline. While it is a roll of the dice, there are definitely business reasons to go regardless of being selected or not. Our story took place partly in China, so it certainly should be of interest there.

But if I were to go, it would have to be in the company of this four-foot-high seasoned world traveler. She loves potstickers, wants the next language she learns to be Chinese, and still has empty pages in her passport.

This is quite a time to return to China. There is a steady drumbeat of news stories contrasting their surging economy with our own. Their move from a manufacturer of cheap toys toward a 21st century model of next-generation green technology, and their ability to jumpstart their economy through staggering investments in infrastructure, really makes us look like we’re squabbling over the placement of deck chairs on the Titanic.

I’m curious to see the changes that have occurred there during a time marked roughly since Sofie’s birth. Such as that out-of-the-way ferry terminal which now stands at the heart of a new Guangzhou. It would be as if downtown Boston moved to Foxboro.

This sort of thing nags at me, and makes me wonder if as Americans, we’ve forgotten how to build things. Or simply lost the will.Besides, there’s a Disney World in Hong Kong, a day trip to which will make a great birthday present. And I happily get to see that immediately fall to the bottom of a very long list again.