Nanchang - Day 6 - Izzy's Foster Mum

Today has been the hardest day of our trip so far.

It was the day we were going to Leping - Izzy’s home town. We knew we would be able to see the outside of the SWI (social work institute = orphanage), but wouldn’t find out until we got there whether we could go inside.

As it turned out, we were allowed inside and met the directors and carers. We weren’t allowed to go into the room with the babies, although they said that most babies from Leping SWI end up in foster care (unless they have significant disabilities). We then had lunch at a restaurant in Leping with some of the orphanage carers, then were told we would be taken to meet Izzy’s foster mother. This was incredible to be able to do this, it just doesn’t happen normally. The photo attached is outside the SWI. We weren’t allowed to take any photos inside.

We had already been in the car for the 3 hour trip from Nanchang to Leping, then had another 40 mins to Izzy’s foster mother’s village. We had to stop just before her home as the bridge on the road was being repaired and cars couldn’t cross. So she walked in the hot sun for 15 mins to come and meet us. She is nearly 60.

Izzy was distraught when she saw her again, as we expected would she would be, but it was such an important thing for us to do for Izzy, to be able to tell her about her foster mother when she is older. Her foster mother wanted us to come back to her home but our guide said we couldn’t because we had a 3.5 hour car ride back to Nanchang. I would have loved to have gone to her home.

Meeting the foster mother was one of the main things I wanted to do, so I could ask questions but when the time came I was too emotional to think of what to ask apart from has she always been healthy and why doesn’t she like baths.

The trip to Leping was an incredible experience – we travelled through the countryside and saw what I call “real China”. The car didn’t stop which was unfortunate because there were so many wonderful things I wanted to take photos of. We saw heaps of duck farms then realised they were for Peking Duck (food). Saw heaps of rice paddies which had people working in them – such hard, hard manual work. I compare what we saw in the car trip to Leping like what you would see in a documentary about China. It was so incredible.