Mary was up with Patrick Hao at 5:00 again. Lucas and Don slept until 7:00. We went down for the breakfast buffet (Patrick’s second breakfast of the day). The boys really liked the hotel’s Rice Congee.
Today we went to visit the boys’ orphanage. Since we didn’t want to stress the boys, we left them at the hotel with Cindy A-Yi (Aunt Cindy). At this point they seem to be comfortable with Cindy so they didn’t even notice when we left (traitors!). The orphanage was only a short distance from where we were staying. We were greeted by two vice-directors of the orphanage and shown the nursery. The orphanage was very clean and well maintained. Don was able to get pictures of the cribs where our boys slept. We also visited the playroom. There was one little girl that took to Mary right away and wanted to be picked up and played with. She wasn’t that big so we probably could have snuck her out in our luggage. We know of a family that are coming as soon as they get travel approval to adopt a girl from the same orphanage. We were able to get still photos and video of that girl to send to the waiting family. She is beautiful!!!
After visiting the nursery, we went back to the administration building. There we were able to talk to the directors and tell them how glad we were to have the opportunity to be Ming and Hao’s parents. The director of the orphanage stopped by and welcomed us and told us that the caretakers reported back last Monday and said that we were very nice people. They felt that the boys were in good hands (OY!). It was a very nice visit and we were very surprised when one of the staff showed us a folder on the computer with lots of pictures of the boys.
Previously we had spoken with CCAI about donating something to the orphanage that they really needed. We were told that they could use a digital video camera. We thought that we would get the camera in China so that we met China’s power requirements. When we got to Nanjing, Nancy had contacted the orphanage and they stated a computer would be of greater help. After the visit we went to the computer store with the lady who showed us all the pictures and a man who had computer experience. We wanted to make sure they got what they needed. That was an experience in itself! The store was not air-conditioned and the temperature was in the high 90’s with about 200% humidity. After, the man, who turned out to be a computer engineer and the lady’s husband, negotiated a good price.
Tonight we were taken to dinner by the director of the orphanage. We got the boys all cleaned up and tried to comb Patrick Hao’s hair. He’s got some serious cowlicks. There were 11 adults and 2 children at dinner. We had a private room in the restaurant with a big round table. Don finally got his lazy susan dinner. There were about 15 courses to the dinner. The Director was surprised at how attached the boys were to us already. She told us about when the boys came to the orphanage. They were so small she was afraid to pick them up. It would take the caregivers an hour to feed each boy. We kept telling them how grateful we were for the great care that they received. We also kept asking who taught them their cute antics (Ming wiping his face with his sleeve, both boys making very loud ‘maa maa maa’ noises to be fed). Nobody would ‘fess up’. They got Don all liquored up on rice wine and presented us with a boxed duck when we were leaving. Jiangsu is famous for their duck. Tomorrow we leave for Guangzhou!!
We are glad that we got to see the orphanage and meet the people who took care of our boys. We are sad that we didn’t get to see the boys abandonment site. We don’t have much history for the boys regarding where they first came from. We had hoped that we could at least take pictures to show them if they are interested. But unfortunately, the county where they were found was at least two and a half hours away. We were not prepared to subject the boys to another four hours in the van. Or four more hours away from us.
