A path to the beginning

From Bill:
If there are spelling errors I will correct later.

Today was a journey to Ahna's beginnings. Through circumstances that only God could arrange, 6 of us, (including my son Jacob) were able to make a trip to the orphanage today. It was 2 and a half hours each way, and worth every minute of the ride.

The journey out of Nanchang revealed a nation in contrast. Outside the already confused Nanchang, is a countryside that returns you to China as it has been for centuries. Rice and clay are the main sights to be seen. We must have passed 50 brick making factories along our journey. But, Jiangxi province is the largest rice producing province in China. Today many if not most of this rice is farmed by hand and not by machines. We passed rice paddy after rice paddy being worked by hand. They must plant and reap 3 times a year with almost no rest for the weary. Most of the farmers must dry the rice by the side of the road since they cannot afford the machinery required to dry rice. This is the type of community into which Ahna was born.

If you have been to any developing nation in the world and seen poverty first hand then you will understand the surroundings into which our precious daughter was born. Circumstances that we will never know or understand led to her being placed into the care of this orphanage; our day's destination.

The road we traveled was rough. It reminded me of places in Africa that I lived in the past. Once roads are bad, they are just bad, and narrow to nearly impassable at points. So we went to the middle of nowhere, 2.5 hours from Nanchang, and then went a little further to get to Ahna's home for the past year of her life. Such a small village, Za. Yet, surprisingly there is an oasis where the orphanage is situated. Some new apartments have been built and the orphanage is new as well. The director later told us that they only moved into this facility in May of 2007. Ahna was found July of 2007, only 2 months after they had moved here.

Our tour of the facility was welcoming and well hosted. While I would not wish this place on any child, I was prepared for much worse. I believe all of us who made the trip were relieved that the conditions were not worse. The room that Ahna was in had twelve babies on this day, and 2 nannies caring for them all. These precious little faces all gathered around in walkers and potty seats was certainly pulling at my heartstrings. Would that I could have simply picked a couple of the precious ones up and taken them with me.

We discovered that another baby in our group, Li Ming, fromdatingtodiapers , was in the crib next to our Ahna. What a special bond for our families. The most touching discovery I made was the location of Ahna's crib. Seen in this picture:


Since we have had Ahna she has been obsessed with touching our wooden headboard in our room. It was so obvious why after seeing this. While many of the beds were out in the open, Ahna's was up against a wall. She was able to sit and play with the wall, like a headboard while in her crib. It made tears come to my eyes as I thought about her sitting in this little bed playing. She also curled up with the towel that was in her bed as a blanket. This explained the affinity she had for our hotel bathroom handtowels.

Seeing the porch outside her room where her little referral photo was taken, the tv inside her room (which we discovered she loves yesterday), and the area where she would take a bath somehow all helped to weave part of the fabric of her story into ours. Pieces of thread for a larger piece of fabric.

It was worth every minute of that rough road to see the part of my daughter's life, It truly was an errand spent on a path to her beginning. One which helped me see into a part of my daughter that otherwise would have been forever lost. Now, it is a treasure to be cherished and understood.

I love this little girl. We are blessed indeed.

Here are more pictures from my journey