The Orphanage

Today we got to visit the orphanage where Rayanna has lived her whole life.  It's in Fengxin, about an hour from where we are staying.  Fengxin is a smaller city than this and is known for its production of rice, bamboo, and kiwi.  We saw a lot of rice fields and many water buffalo used for plowing them!  I really enjoy seeing the country side here, and areas where the people still use old methods like water buffalo.  The ride there was an adventure.  We had a different driver and van, with working air condition--woo hoo!  The ride had many of the near death experiences I've come to expect when riding somewhere in China.  In the cities it's crazy, but at least you can't go very fast because of the traffic.  Once you get out on the highway though, it's another story!  That yellow line down the middle of the road is just a decoration I guess.  Heaven forbid you slow down or pass on the right!  Anyway, we made it safely to and from.

Rayanna was found at the gate of the orphanage, so we got to see the precise place.  Then we went inside and we saw the two baby rooms, There are other rooms for the older kids, but they have mostly babies.  Only 30 kids live in the whole orphanage.  There are a few other buildings on the property too, which are charity homes for elderly people.  When we came into the room, the nannies were very excited to see Rayanna.  They were very boisterous and kept saying "Hao De!  Hao De!" and a bunch of stuff in Chinese.  They eagerly wanted to hold her as soon as we walked in.  She was a little reluctant, but didn't cry when I passed her to them.  The nanny set Rayanna down in her former crib, and I was expecting an outburst because she SCREAMS every time we even think about setting her down.  But she didn't cry at all.  I'm not sure what was going through her mind.  Perhaps at the orphanage she has resigned herself to life in a crib, so she went immediately back to that mentality.  I don't know.  They brought out a couple of baby toys for her, but she didn't seem interested.  I didn't see any other toys for any of the kids though.  The babies were all either in cribs or walkers.  Two little boys who shared a crib were very animated and friendly with each other.  But many of the babies just stared at us with imploring little eyes, and some just stared off into space.  The lack of stimulation for them was very sad to see.

On the other hand, the nannies were very friendly.  They seem happy to be there and amazingly not overwhelmed by so many children!  I think there were 5 or 6 nannies for the 30 kids.  I wish we could've stayed for a couple of days to see how on earth they manage to feed and diaper so many babies!   (They all wear the split pants with cloth diapers--really more like handkerchiefs--which I guess makes diaper chaging quick.  But it can't do a very good job of holding in messes!)  I was very glad to see that the nannies did seem to like the kids and were excited to see Rayanna again.  Hopefully that means they're giving all those other kids the best care they can.  I wish I could do more to help.  Maybe someday our family can come back to China and help in an orphanage.  I would really like to do something like that someday.  A couple of the kids there were about to be adopted within the next couple of weeks.  It's hard to understand why they're not ALL being adopted, with so many people waiting for children!  I don't understand how it all works, but hopefully all of those precious babies will one day have families of their own.

Since we got back Rayanna's been pretty grumpy.  I don't know if she's just tired from not having a realy nap today, or if it upset her to go back there.  She hasn't shown much emotion yet about anything, so it's hard to tell.  She still can't bear for us to set her down (or even change position when we're carrying her), so we've been holding her pretty much all the time, except at night.  Thank goodness she sleeps well!  She still won't try any food but her bottle, and even that takes work.  We're hoping she'll broaden her horizons to at least rice congee or something like that!

We've been able to Skype with the kids and Heath's parents a few times.  It seems like they're doing well and having fun.  I'm doing better than I thought I would being apart from them.  I can't wait to see them though!