The Orphanage Visit

Hubby Gene here once again. I'll talk a little about our orphanage visit on Friday, though I am sure Keri will post her perspective at some point. We drove from Guangzhou to Maoming starting early in the morning--departing at 6:30 a.m. It's about 5 hours to this neighboring city to the southwest. This is where Zoey was found and lived her life up until a few days ago.

Maoming is much smaller than Guangzhou. It's filled with tens of thousands of people on mopeds. I've never seen so many motor scooters. We got to the orphanage just before lunch time. The staff led us up to the fourth floor playroom, where we met many of the caregivers. We got pictures of several children whose Lifeline parents asked us in advance to contact. We gave out some care packages to these kids and talked with the orphanage director.

Then we met Zoey's foster mom. It was really a rather unemotional experience, which surprised us. Zoey cried when she and some other teachers left the room, which was one of the few times she has showed any kind of great emotion, so we took that as a good sign. We gave her foster mom a gift and soon left the room. Our travel group had gathered some money and given it to the orphanage and they showed us the large pile of diapers they were able to purchase with the money.

The orphanage was comparatively nice, based on others Keri and I have seen around the world. They kids had good food, a roof over their heads, indoor plumbing and obviously had some good education resources. They took us to Zoey's preschool classroom and we saw her little chair with her Chinese name printed on the back of it. Her former teachers played with her there a few minutes.

Finally, they took us around front to Zoey's "finding spot"--the place where she was abandoned. We posed for a picture there, but neither Keri nor I felt like smiling. Zoey is abandoned no more, so we felt that we kinda checked that off our bucket list and were soon ready to move on. The orphanage director treated us to a nice lunch, and then we started the long ride back to Guangzhou.

I should mention that about 2/3 of the way back the headlights went out on the bus, so the driver kept going, on the highway, in the pitch black dark, and we were all scared to death. Keri started singing "Jesus, Take the Wheel" to lighten the mood and after some prayer and nail biting we arrived safely back at the hotel. I was gonna do room service at that point, since we were so tired and it was around 8:00 p.m., but we found out a room service hamburger was $30, so I opted for McDonald's instead.

The orphanage visit did shed some light on Zoey on the behavioral side. Honestly, though, we will have to wait until we get home to get her on a regular schedule and begin addressing her needs in earnest. The visit was really just a puzzle piece for us, and hopefully God will show us how this fits in her personality and behavior as we get a few months down the road.

Zoey is really a sweetheart. We love her smile and her laugh. She readily reaches for Keri and has begun repeating English words when we read to her. When she goes bathroom she says "bye bye" to her poop as it goes down the toilet. Keri has pulled out some matching outfits, which Eden just loves, and we've gotten lots of great pictures.

Today (Saturday) is more paperwork and finalizing matters before Monday's U.S. Consulate appointment. Just a few days left now before we hit the airport for home. Keri and I are both ready to be back in the States. We continue to ask for your prayers for us for safe travel, for Zoey's bonding and for God to be honored through our actions and speech here on the other side of the world.