truth in china

changsha is china at its grittiest. its a huge city with tons of traffic, construction , and noise. changsha social welfare institute number one was once one of the most prolific sending orphanages for international adoption in china. no more, just like all of china, the adoptions from changsha number one have slowed to a trickle. it has relocated three times since ruby was there. currently it is in the same location it once was - a new building built on the exact spot where it was when she was adopted, so the drive there looked somewhat familiar. changsha is also known for being quite closed with information.

i had minimal expectations for our visit of learning anything new. as michael says " it's just changsha number one". ask all the questions you have but it is just changsha number one. as i expected, we were not allowed to see the files." it was a long time ago" and "there was a fire a few years ago so we are not sure we could even find the files" . we were allowed to write a list of questions for them to look for answers in the files ( if they can find them) . apparently the people we were talking with did not have the authority to look at files, and the person in charge of the files was in the country so they would have to check...



none of the old workers were there. although the folks who helped us were friendly, there was no connection to the girls. they entertained themselves playing hangman and slide while we moms were negotiating with the workers. once we wrote our list of questions it was established that we could have a tour of the orphanage, so we set off to the part of the building where the children live.i was surprised to hear that there are 500 kids still there, with about 200 infants. going up the elevator when the doors opened i saw some nannies holding babies that appeared to be wearing half the sky t shirts.

we were not expecting to see any kids so it was a shock to be led into a room with several dozen kids eating lunch. one little boy had obviously been severely burned in a fire. even as a medical professional, it was hard to see the kids there, several others also had severe burns or very obvious problems. one of the girls later pointed out that there were also alot of kids who appeared normal and healthy...

we visited a classroom and got to see a sleeping room. but it was clear that the girls did not want to look any further. all three were crying quietly and clinging to the adults. ruby said it best when she said "mommy i don't like this place".

we moms decided that the kids had had enough so after lunch we dropped them off at the hotel with granny to swim and watch movies. m and i went to the finding spots for both girls. her daughter was adopted about 5 months before ruby . we had both been to the finding locations on our adoption trips and what we found was an illustration of "the chinese way". m's spot which nine years ago was a 2 lane dirt road was now a busy highway with a gaping construction site on one side and high rise buildings mixed with parking lots and one ancient looking building on the other side of the street.

rubys spot looked nothing like i remember . just like last time, we could not find the actual building address, there was a number 280 and a 268 but not a 271. on the street near rubys finding spot the buildings were very old i know it was not the same place i was 8 years ago. walking down the street it suddenly dawned on me that the man i hired to locate the foster mom several years ago who also went to the finding spot could have just found any building with 271 on it and told me that this was "the place" ... truth in china is fluid. now i realize that i won't ever know and really, what does it matter? i know that she spent her first 9 months of life here, and that will have to be enough.

traveling back to the hotel looking out the window , the contrast between old and new was everywhere. construction, dust, noise.i am fascinated and frustrated by china. when we arrived back to the luxurious dolton i was glad to be entering the cool quiet hotel. for that day i had had enough.