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Finding Signe (Part 3): Around Chongqing, and in Liangping

11/14/2004
2:00 PM
Holiday Inn Yangtze Chongqing

The last several days have been oddly exhausting. We haven’t had much to do, really—one official appointment, that’s all—but we’ve been very busy getting to know Signe, learning her cries, trying to guess her needs. And she’s been learning about us as well. This whole parenting thing is a little more tiring than I expected. I think maybe it’s just a level of hyper-awareness I’m not used to, but still…

On Wednesday we went on a morning excursion, a tour around Chongqing or sorts. We visited a large performance hall, an interesting place sourrounded by the usual packed houses. We went to Chaotianmen Square, an open plaza at the confluence of the Yangtze and Jialing rivers. It was an interesting place, clearly a popular destination with both tourists and locals. The flag-lined pavilion was crowded with people, and we got great views of the boat-crowded Yangtze and Jialing rivers.

We also visited Liberation Monument, in the middle of downtown Chongqing. Sadly, the big excitement here was not the monument itself, but the 4-floor childrens store, Children’s World. Outside, the crowd was a crazy mix of people dressed in western-looking clothes and traditional Chinese, including a woman with a child in a basket.

Through it all, Signe did great, very relaxed and easy with us. The only real issue is that we attract a lot of attention from Chinese women, who all want to touch or hold her. She cries at that, though, and the women seem embarassed. It’s been really amazing to watch her adjust, watch her realize that we aren’t going anywhere and reach for us, emotionally and physically.

Friday we visited E’Ling park, which was, at it’s core, a wonderful chance to walk outside through beautiful gardens and trees. The park is high, and afforded some great views out across the Jialing river, as well. There were several monuments, and loads and loads of people. At one point Jo was mobbed by Chinese women, all looking at Signe and talking. There was also what appeared to be a class outing for young children.

Saturday we went to Liangping itself for a tour of the orphanage. The idea was also to visit to the site where the babies were abandoned. There are so many of us, though, that we didn’t have time to do that. Still, it was a really interesting day. Liangping is more than 2 hours north-east of Chongqing by car, following the Yangtze river, by and large, crossing gorges on high bridges, and passing through long tunnels, a couple that seemed to stretch on for more than a mile (and smelled strongly of diesel fumes—poor ventilation, I suppose). It rained all day, though, and the windows of the bus were heavily fogged from the breath of all the adults and babies, so we didn’t really get to see too much. Lot’s of rice fields, small houses scattered around, some water buffalo working fields, some white herons. Some of the steep hillsides along the road, the cuts, have been sluiced with concrete, presumably to control erosion and landslides, making for a surreal artificial appearance.

Liangping itself felt, at first, like any smaller city, with lots of buildings that looked to be 20 stories high or so. On the way into town we drove past what was clearly a bus station, perhaps the bus station where Signe was abandoned. Soon, though, were were away from the center of town, following a narrow road with tightly packed businesses and homes, a classic looking Chinese street scene, really.

The bus stopped along this road, and we disembarked in front of the Liangping Social Welfare Institution. We were led through an arched entry into a large courtyard framed on three sides by buildings. After a brief introduction to the director, a kind sounding man, we followed him upstairs to the fifth floor of one of the buildings, the orphanage. Off a long hallway were several doors, each leading to two small crib-lined nurseries and a small kitchen/bathing area. Each of the nursury rooms contained about ten cribs with two babies each, and a single bed in one corner, presumably for the night nannies. There were todlers following the working nannies around from room to room, watching us and crying. All the babies—apparently about 80 still there—were bundled up with what looked to be several layers, clearly a necessity as there was clearly no facility for heat in the building.

As Jo and I looked into the rooms, one of the nannies approached us and said, “Peng!” She spoke to us, clearly indicating that she had been Signe’s nanny, and gestured to a room down the hall. As she waited for us, she stepped to the side and I saw that she was crying. She led us into the last room on the hall, into one of the two nurseries, and pointed to one empty crib. Hanging above the crib was a little photo of Signe—it had been her crib. The nanny held Signe for a minute, surrounded by other orphans, but Signe cried for us and we gladly accepted her back.

After the tour the director took us to another room off the main courtyard and lunch was brought out. It was simple—pork dumplings and some sort of breaded vegetable and warm milk—but so respectfully presented it was really striking, reinforcing how much our presence there, and how much our adoption of the children, was valued. As traumatic as it was to see the poor conditions in the orphanage (especially knowing that the Liangping facility is supposed to be one of the better ones), the love and care shown to the babies by all the people working there was very heartening. They’re doing the very best they can for the children with what little they have. It was an emotional and draining day, but we came away glad to have gone there, glad to have seen it, and all the more thankful that Signe is a part of our lives now.

Next: In Guangzhou, and home at last

- posted 14 November 2004 in blog Favorites

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