Day 2 and 3 : Challenging days with no sleep for Mary

Day 2 and 3 were tough days for us. Maggie Sonia is grieving for her care-takers and we are struggling with the ethics of taking her away from all the people that loved her so much.
None of the books really prepares you for these challenges. One of the biggest hurdles for us is that we don't speak or understand Oriya -- but we have a english-oriya dictionary which helps just a bit.

So the 1st and 2nd day was spent walking the hallways of the hotel at some ungodly hours to keep Maggie Sonia from crying -- lugging 20 lbs isn't good for the back and 2 days without sleep sucks. Unfortunately she will only go to Mary so I can't help -- there will be a day soon when she'll come to me. Mary hasn't slept for two days....



Helpful hints for those following us to SMSS:
The staff and care takers genuinely love the children, and with limited resources are doing their best in raising 60 girls. Dr. Smurti Mohanty is in charge of the international adoption and is a good resource for questions on the process and status of the kids (she can be contacted via email).
The orphanage is about 20 minutes from the Trident hotel outside the city limits of Bhubaneswar.
When you arrive at SMSS -- the kids will just come to you and want to be held. Its quite chaotic --initially you will not get any one on one time with the child. Our first day we spent more time talking to Mr.Mohanty (the director of SMSS) than being with Maggie.
On the first day, it will be mentioned that a going away lunch is expected and hosting it will be 10000 rupees (that was a cost we didn't expect but were glad to be part of it --but with typical Indian-English translation we had to hold the lunch not on the day Maggie left but two days later). Mary and Maggie stayed at the hotel for this lunch because it would be very traumatic for her to go back.
Dr. Smurti Mohanty is the only one that speaks English but its difficult to understand her completely. There's a lot of the "Indian waggle" going on during the conversations -- you have to visit India to get what it is! :+)
Bring bug spray -- the mosquitoes are big and fierce.
If you are planning to give any in-kind donations to the orphanage : here's what we observed. The school age kids loved the multi-subject activity work books. Pencils, erasures, writing books and books for little kids are needed. During play time they could really use more soft balls to play catch, jumping ropes -- but the space is very confined so we think even board games would be fun especially for
the older kids. The major construction addition that is in progress but halted due to lack of funds needs
approximately 17 lakhs rupees. (Our catholic church in Starkville Mississippi raised over $4500 the week before we left for SMSS which we will send to them after we return home).
Gift in kind is suggested for all the caretakers (there are 15). It was also suggested we give Maggie's two caretakers 500 rupees. Mary made a gift bag of lipstick,nail polish, shampoo and hand cream but we only had enough for 9. It was well received by all.
And most of all, be prepared to want to take more than one child home with you -- emotionally that is the toughest.

Lunch in honor of Maggie Sonia at SMSS started with playtime.

Lunch was mutton with potatoes (it was more fat than meat and there was only one piece of meat on each plate but everyone got seconds), cauliflower, eggplant, salad and rice.

Washing hands before lunch

Mary and Maggie Sonia.....

Mommy Mary and baby Maggie Sonia at breakfast : Thursday morning

It was rather a difficult night. Its taking 110% of our efforts right now to get our little one settled down. Since we left the orphanage 20 hours ago, she hadn't eaten or drank anything. She really really missed her care-takers!!
But this morning we had our little miracles at the restaurant in the hotel during our breakfast time!
There's another family (from Spain) that have adopted a little girl from SMSS -- we heard a "Hi Sonia" from the back....and our little one perked up ...and the smile was magic.

December 16 2009 : Maggie Sonia is with us

Its the toughest thing we have ever done.
We are taking our Maggie Sonia away from her care-takers Lebi and Asmina Nayak.

Words can't describe our feelings right now....so here are pictures to share our story.....

Mary , Maggie Sonia and Lebi Nayak

Dr.Smurti Mohanty, social worker and her staff of care-takers. She is responsible for the international adoption process at SMSS.

Mr.Mohanty who is the founder and in-charge of SMSS and the other related institutions.

If you cannot cry you might as well laugh and share with all on the blog?

I thought when I left for India, I began a leave of absence from my job as a nurse practitioner. The first time I held Maggie, I could feel that she was wheezing. After hours of worrying and wondering what to do-- I did the next best thing--I emailed our social worker--Eileen, in Boston, MA. I received a daunting reply--you are Maggie's legal guardian.  Thom, Maggie, one of Maggie's care takers, and myself went to a pediatrician(see picture below)--we travelled on a dirt road with a few cows meandering in the road and arrived at the doctor's office.

I think he has a medical degree?

I did not think he was a Blue Cross/ Blue Shield provider, so we payed the bill--all is well the total bill was 60 Rupees ( $ 1.10). The physician handed us a piece of paper with the list of medications that Maggie needed. Then we were off to the pharmacy(see picture below).

We had to visit five different pharmacies before we had all of the medications--one pharmacy was able to fill one half of one of the prescriptions. The medications came to a grand total of  $16.20. We hope Maggie will improve before our flight to Delhi on Friday. We are quickly learning that despite the noise and chaos somehow India functions?? Overall it was good to see Maggie today.
Tomorrow is our big day: We will take custody of Maggie and hope it won't be too traumatic for her.

Meeting Maggie

What a morning!
We were greeted by Maggie and many of the other children( there are 60 girls at SMSS, and 20 of them are currently in the process of adoption). The girls all seem happy and care for each other--the older girls take on some of the care taking of the younger girls. They have a class room and the pre school aged children have lessons and activities. The older girls go to a local school. It was hard to see the impoverished condition of the orphanage -- the majority of the girls do not have shoes( Mary had a burning desire to give them all pedicures--their feet look old). The staff was very helpful with helping us in teaching us how to take care of Maggie and very affectionate toward all of the children.

Maggie has changed physically since the last photo we had seen, so initially our  thought was "where is Maggie"--but she still has the same big beautiful eyes.  Because of the cultural disconnect, our first meeting was difficult--Maggie's care takers wanted her to run into our arms --opposed to letting her come to us. Also we did not have any time alone to interact with her --it was like a three ringed circus--but our motto on this trip is" go with the flow."
We will return to SMSS tomorrow in the afternoon to observe the afternoon routine. Then we will plan to take custody of Maggie on Wednesday---we initially thought that we would not be able to take custody until Friday--it will be nice to have some quiet time with Maggie at the hotel , before we fly back to Delhi.

Our friends Sergei and Anat Drizlikh had given this stuffed animal as a gift to Maggie -- she loves it!

The orphanage :Subhadra Mahatab Seba Sadan in Kolathia Khurda Orissa about 15 km from Bhubaneswar.

Bhubaneswar Orissa 12 13 2009

We arrived in Bhubaneswar last night on KingFisher Airlines -- the flight was uneventful and Mary was the only caucasian on the flight. English is not spoken by many in Orissa as compared to Delhi. There have been lots of nods and smiles!
Of the 28 states in India, Orissa is one of the poorest. Mining and Agriculture are the primary industry. Now is the harvest time for rice (which is harvested 2x a year)....we noticed many women working in the fields -- WHERE are the men?

Bhubaneswar is the city of temples -- there are 57 temples within 10 kms and most are to the God Shiva. We were not allowed into the temples because we are not Hindus but we were approached by a "priest" next to one of the temples : He could take us into the temple but first we needed to make a "donation" for the new "roof" -- see the pic!

The roof looks pretty solid?!

We contacted the social worker at SMSS (Dr. Mohanty) and confirmed our appointed to meet Maggie for the first time at 10:00 am tomorrow morning.
The hotel:

The Trident is the only 5-star hotel in Bhubaneswar, note: the star rating is relative. Its clean, the tap water is filtered but we continue to drink bottled water; the grounds are beautiful with flowers and vegetable gardens; the pool is in the center courtyard and in good shape. But the tennis courts look very old and are of an odd size.

Flying Carpets....

Where do you go to buy carpets : well when in India : Flying carpets of course :+)
During our only free time on this trip before we pick Maggie, we decided to use it to try to find some carpets for our home. Bob and Maggie Daigle set us up with a carpet shop in New Delhi : Its called "Flying Carpets (owner is Nitraj Dhawan) on E-17 East of Kailash, Delhi.
We had a great experience--learned a lot about knots per square inch, the difference between silk and wool carpets, the dying and washing of the carpets--it takes between 8-9 months for a hand made carpet to be made. The different patterns on the carpets represent where the carpet is made--carpets made in Pakistan have different patterns than those from Afghanistan. We had to sign the back of the carpets that we purchased--quality control--so that when they arrive home we can confirm that they are the ones we purchased. Still struggling with jet lag---was crossed eyed at 6:30 pm and wide awake at 3:00am.

Mary ready to "haggle" with the carpet guy.

Nitrataj Dhawan and his assistants with Mary at the Flying Carpet

Mary was asked to autograph each carpet....

Flight to India

Exhausted but excited, we arrived at our hotel at 1:45 am local time on Friday morning December 11. (We had left Starkville Mississippi at 11:50 on Wednesday Dec 9th).

Our flights were uneventful but long. We flew on Delta from Mississippi to Atlanta then on Air France from Atlanta to Paris to New Delhi.
The Paris airport was in disarray; we were stuck in Terminal C for couple of hours before we boarded the final leg of the trip -- this terminal didn't even have a water fountain and the boarding process was a complete chaos

Our adoption story.

We are Mary and Thom Francis. In a few days we will be meeting our daughter Maggie for the first time at an orphanage in Orissa to bring her home and become part of our family. This is our story:
We started the adoption process three years ago. We picked the best adoption agency (in our opinion) -- Wide Horizons for Children from Waltham, Massachusetts. Then spent the next year completing our dossier for the India adoption program. The paperwork was extensive and through -- thanks to all our family and friends who helped. We couldn't have done it without you. We submitted our completed dossier in August 2008. Then waited -- the typical time for a referral of a child from India is between 2 to 3 years after the dossier is submitted to the Indian authorities. But we must be extraordinary applicants? : Someone in the Indian system must have liked our qualifications or thought that raising a child in Mississippi is good or the stars must have lined up that day on our behalf.
On Mary's birthday --February 3 2009 we received the call from our adoption agency that this little beautiful child in Bhubaneswar Orissa was going to be our daughter.
What an amazing birthday present!!!

For those following this blog who are also going through the adoption process, this is our timeline:
Dossier sent to India in September 2008.
Referral -- February 3, 2009.
NOC received -- April 7, 2009.
I-800 approved -- April 13, 2009
Article 5 received -- April 29, 2009 then waited for the guardianship.
Orissa courts closed for summer holidays in June and
additional week of closure for the heat wave.
In October, Mary's India visa expired and applied for a renewal.
After unexplainable delays and obvious frustrating moments with questions of continuing the process --
we received the guardianship notice on November 11th!!
The orphanage applied for the Indian passport on 23rd.
We will be leaving Mississippi for New Delhi on December 9th!!!

......Mary and Thom Francis