Special people. New friends

We all hope you've enjoyed following along with us on our trip.  We thank you for helping us achieve this goal and we have big plans going forward.  I wish I could post them now, but we need to finalize details, so keep checking our Face Book page and our website for upcoming events and exciting new Foundation adventures.
     Our blog wouldn't be complete without showing you some of the dedicated people who helped us throughout our trip and who care for the children everyday.

Some of the administrators at Zhengzhou:

Our interpreter John, who is the PR guy from New Day and who accompanied us to Zhengzhou.  Here he is getting his first Starbucks Latte!

Sarah, the director of the New Day preschool program, and one of our interpreters at New Day.  Should have brought her a latte...

 Some of the nannies at Zhengzhou.

 New Day nannies

 Katie's dad (Katie is an intern from Beijing) came and played for the children at New Day.  We all enjoyed it so much!

 This is Katie in the center interpreting for Eileen, with Lily, who is New Day's "speech therapist".  She is amazing and had tons of wonderful questions, which Eileen skillfully answered!

Joy, an OT from Texas, who was volunteering for two weeks.  We named her "Beijing Joy" which is now a new term for anyone who trips frequently.  We really liked her : )

 The interns at New Day with Phil and his youngest child Hannah.  Phil and his wife, Laura, are from the UK and have been working at New Day for about 6 months.  They were an integral part of making the arrangements for us to get to China.

 Our new official Grace Foundation inductees and wearers of the friendship scarves (A special thank you to Erin Fasanella for the idea about the scarves.)  That's Sarah next to Roe, preschool director, Karen, New Day founder and director, who is next to Eileen, and Laura, Phil's wife and administrator at New Day.

Thank you all!!!!!!!! We promise we'll be back.

Our last day is here.  We are all heartbroken and it is painful to be leaving all of these wonderful people and sweet children knowing we have barely made a dent in all we could do if only we had an infinite amount of time.  Roe's feeding lecture prompted a request for help from a man in the audience who trains the nannies in Beijing orphanages.  She offered to help in any way by email and this morning received her first one from the director of a "Baby Home".  It was such a caring plea for help saying so many of their babies can't drink formula from a bottle and the only option is tube feeding.  She pleaded for help so that those babies wouldn't be traumatized and so that they may lead normal lives and not be reliant on the tubes.  The nannies are so loving and caring and there are just so many babies. 
    We have never been so cold, so sad, so happy, so hungry, so dehydrated, so emotional, so touched, so needed, so busy, so exhausted.  We've loved every minute.  Thank you to everyone who helped make this possible. 

Moving forward

Happily the government has seen fit to provide funding for a new therapy center and hospital that will be attached to the orphanage.  The director of therapy gave us a tour and his pride in the project was obvious and deservedly so.  There will be 5 floors.  The first two devoted to therapy including physical, occupational, and speech.  The difficulty is not in providing the space at this point, but in staffing it.  There is such a need there for professionals to treat these children.  The top three floors are devoted to the hospital with a NICU for about 15 babies, a casting room for babies with clubbed feet, a surgical area for minor surgery, and other medical facilities.  Next to the hospital will be a new school and both are scheduled to open in the spring of 2013. 

 

     There is such a need for a variety of supplies for the orphanage in spite of the government’s funding of the facilities.  Pacifiers, books, toys, clothing, materials for oral stimulation, for language stimulation, PECS, brushes for sensory stimulation, etc. etc.  We look forward to raising funds to purchase some of these things for the children in Zhengzhou. 

The Formula Project

New Day, in conjunction with Nestles, supports the Formula Project.  They supply infant formula for underweight babies at the Zhengzhou orphanage and track the babies’ growth.  We got to tour the infant rooms and fell in love with each and every tiny little angel from heaven.  There were so, so many babies that some were two to a crib.  It was almost impossible to pull ourselves away from these little ones and it was in tears that we left Zhengzhou for the train back to New Day.  We vowed to return.

Time to sing!

While Roe was presenting her workshop, Eileen and Joyce spent time in a preschool class.  Music is the universal language and you can see in the pictures how delighted the children were with their amazing renditions of every children’s song they’ve ever learned!  In a touching display of the children’s eagerness to give back, they sang to Joyce and Eileen in Chinese.  Such a simple event, yet both described it as life changing. 

Thank you St. Cassian students!

The children of Grace’s school in Montclair, St Cassian School, donated the funds used to purchase these gifts for the children at Zhenzhou.  How delighted we were the day after we gave them the gifts to see one of the babies in the Formula Project wearing one of the fleece jackets!  A very special thank you to them for their kindness and caring.  We hope they know how much it was appreciated by the Grace Foundation, and even more so, by the staff at Zhengzhou.  Your giving has made a difference and we thank you.  Sending smiles and hugs your way.

The Orphanage in Zhengzhou

     It was with mixed emotions that we demonstrated how to work with the children in the orphanage to the staff.  Roe and Eileen also screened hearing.  The nannies bombarded us with questions and poor John was like a ping pong ball trying to translate all their questions and interpret our answers.  It was stunning to see that in the midst of apparent poverty—little if any heat, no hot water, limited staff to child ratio, and 800, yes 800, special needs babies, children, and teens—that the staff was so obviously caring, nurturing, and loving of all the children.  The children refer to each of them as “Ma Ma” and their affection for all of the children was touching, yet heartbreaking knowing that each one of them had been abandoned—with so, so many of them with little hope of ever having a “forever family”. 

     As we moved from room to room, nannies held little ones out to us, pleading with us to tell them how to help each child.  Was she autistic?  How do we keep him from hitting himself so much?   How can we get him to eat?  How can we get her to talk?  He cries all the time, what can we do?  Why won’t he crawl?  They want so much to help and we could have spent weeks and weeks and weeks with them and still not answer all their questions.  You can imagine how hard it was to leave them knowing we saw only a few of the hundreds of children there.