A Day In The Life Of......

After we left Nok's foster home we went back into Chiang Mai and visited Ban King Kaew (sounds like BanGingGow) baby home. They were awesome there! They were all prepared for Nok's visit and were calling Nannies and caretakers out of the woodwork! We fell in love with Mae Ma (the buddhist Nun there) They had made a book for us w/ baby pictures and hugged Nok and made a big deal over her. She had no clue who they were but of course they quickly informed her of all of their rolls in her life there. She had been there nearly 7 years. She had had a fever when she was around 2 or 3 and that is how she got CP. Until then, she was the pride of the orphanage! They took special care of her there, providing therapy and developmental games. I can't say the same thing for ViengPing. Nok was nearly adopted by a family in Australia but they couldn't get her Visa so they had to quit. It seemed after that, that they sent her to ViengPing to a foster home to continue out her years in foster care. After that point.....no one cared anymore. I wasn't sad to hear that, but I was so angry I could smell the smoke coming out of my ears!!!!!!!!! How dare they leave a child to the wayside!? She can't read or write and it completely shocks Thai people to hear that. Alot of them don't even believe us so they ask her to read something. It's very embarrassing for her and makes me angry that they do that to her. Most of the time it happens at meal time when we sit down to eat and the menu has no pictures. At the doctor's office the doc asked her to read something since she didn't believe me. Nok couldn't read English of course and the doc was surprised about that but she insisted that Nok could read Thai. She tried it and Nok stared blankly. The doc kept asking her to read it and finally Nok stared at the wall and said she couldn't do it. Thanks a bunch ViengPing for making a successful future adult. Can you tell I am a bit bitter about the system? It's the same all over the world though....I guess being a foster parent should have made me used to it but it hasn't.