Waiting for us in the hotel lobby at 8:30 this morning were the current director of the Yudu Orphanage, Mr. Li, and the former director, DingGuiLan, who cared for Julie. She handed us a photograph of Julie taken when she was 59 days old, which is now the earliest photo we have of her. She was so excited to see Julie and gave us the following information.
DingGuiLan said that in March 2002, she found Julie crying in a paper box under a tree in a vegetable garden near the orphanage. The garden was located near a salt factory. She took her home for two days and cared for her before bringing her to the orphanage. Julie was at Yudu Orphanage for several months before DingGuiLan brought her to Jianxin Orphanage. She said she would have loved to keep her but had children and a granddaughter to care for at home.
We drove to the location of the orphanage, but the building was sold and is empty. We visited the new location which only has three children and many elderly people. DingGuiLan took us to Julie's finding site which is now part of the city. The vegetable garden has been replaced by shops. But the salt factory is still there.
Then Mr. Li, the current director, surprised us by taking us to a nursing home to meet the nanny who took care of Julie. She is 91 years old and was so happy to see Julie. She gave her lots of hugs and kisses. Her name is YuYuYing. She seems pretty healthy and told us she is a vegetarian. She is a widow and never had any children. We could see that she really cared for Julie.
We then had lunch with both directors before leaving for the airport and a flight from Ganzhou to Guangzhou.
This sure was an emotional and memorable day. We learned more about Julie's early life than we thought we would. Everyone we met was so kind and helpful. And it was especially gratifying for us to see how much Julie was loved as a baby in China.
What a blessing to learn those details and meet that sweet lady! I'm sure Julie will remember that forever. Jill Folkerts
ReplyDeleteHola familia....
ReplyDeleteSomos una familia española que en octubre del 2011 adoptamos a nuestra pequeña Rita YuFen, ella es de Yudu y estuvo en el orfanato de Yudu hasta que fuimos a buscarla.
Nos la entrego el nuevo director del orfanato en el registro de Nanchang, pero todo fue muy frio y no nos dieron ninguna informacion de ella.
Nos da mucha alegria haberos encontrado y que nuestras niñas sean las dos del mismo pueblo.
Agradeceriamos mucho que nos pudieseis dar informacion sobre Yudu y el orfanato, y si teneis fotografias del pueblo, etc,etc.
Nosotros todavia no hemos vuelto porque nuestra pequeña tan solo tiene 3 añitos.
Nuestro correo es: josemmp26@gmail.com.
Muchas gracias y un fuerte abrazo de la familia Martos Garcia
We are a family of three in Norway. Our daughter Frida (born 2010) was adopted from Yudu CWI. She and three other girls from the same orhanage were brought to Nanchang ang we met her first time at our hotel in July 2011. We never got the chance to visit the Yudu CWI, but from your photos we recognice Mr Li who was present at the hotel in Nanchang when we met our daughters. A few times I have tried to search the internet to get more information or photos from the Yudu CWI to give our girl more details on her background. Your site - along with the spanish familiy site is the first ones I have seen. No activity on the Yahoo group.. Can you help me with more information or photos from the Yudu CWI? Anything would be helpful....
ReplyDeleteMy email adress is hilde.braten and then @ and then hadeland-energi.net. "And then" is not a part ot the adress, just don`t want too much spam....