Children of Dreams, An Adoption Memoir

by Roberts, Lorilyn

  I laughed to myself. I wondered what the doctors in America would say to that. Since we were already out, we explored the area for a restaurant to get some lunch. We found one on Hue Street, close enough to the hotel we would later walk to it. I asked for a seat toward the back where I could see an American television program broadcasting in English. Several tables had leather benches that Joy could climb around on and not have to be confined to a high chair.

  My new daughter’s favorite thing to do was eat. She would consume the crackers and play with the utensils while we waited, and surprisingly, she was willing to try just about everything I put in front of her. Rice, however, remained her favorite food. To give me a break so I could enjoy eating, the host or hostess would often offer to hold her. The restaurant workers were always warm and friendly to the adoptive mothers. I ran into several other adoptive mothers while in Hanoi and they all told me the same thing: The restaurants would take care of their baby while they ate.

  After enjoying our first meal together, I took Joy shopping for shoes and a stroller. I realized early on that nineteen pounds was too heavy to carry for long periods, and a child of fourteen months was too young to walk everywhere.

  By chance, I met someone who told me about a store that sold strollers. We eventually found our way there at a leisurely pace, as I carried Joy part of the time, and I let her little legs walk as best they could some of the way. I tried to explain to the Vietnamese man, who did not speak English, exactly what it was I wanted. A few minutes later, he walked out excitedly holding what he thought I wanted. Well, not exactly. It was a baby stroller for a doll.

  “No, not for my baby to push a baby in, for me to push her in,” I told him.

  “Okay. I see,” he said in broken English. “I be back.” A few minutes later he returned with the real thing. I was relieved to have something to put her in as my arms were giving out on me.

  For the first five days, the only time Joy wasn’t crying was when she was eating or when we were shopping, but even that wasn’t stress-free. Every time a Vietnamese woman would lean down to talk to Joy, she would turn away and scream. She didn’t like people looking at her. The poor Vietnamese women would look at me apologetically. I eventually told curious onlookers, “Please don’t look at my daughter.”

  “Where is your baby’s cap?” The Vietnamese mothers would stop and ask me on the street.

  “I don’t have one for her.” What was the deal with the cap, I thought? It wasn’t cold.

  “Your baby need a cap over her head to keep her from catching cold,” I was told.

  After several admonishments by well-meaning, but overly-concerned Vietnamese women, I thought I better buy one if for no other reason than to honor their custom. I didn’t want to be accused of child abuse. I found a shop where I bought her a pretty pink and white knit cap as well as a pair of shoes since she didn’t have any.

  As I squatted down and put them on her feet, Joy squirmed out of the stroller to see if she liked them. The sound of poink-poink-poink as she walked was amusing, and as I would discover later, everybody knew when she was coming. She had the distinction of being the only one in the hotel with poinky shoes.

  Over the next five days we shopped and ate lots of rice. We spent quality time at the Hoan Kiem Lake since it was a pleasant place with its many park benches, and as we relaxed under the cascading, graceful willow trees, I tried to take pictures of Joy not crying.

  Each afternoon following our shopping, the Vietnamese kids would greet us with their pictures, books, and postcards on their way home from school to practice their English. They would dote on Joy and hold her while they tried to get me to buy something. A twelve-year-boy took a special liking to Jenni and hung around with us for the better part of a week. One afternoon I treated him to a meal in one of the more upscale restaurants to thank him for translating on several occasions.

  After purchasing clothes, bibs, Sippy cups, diapers, hats, Christmas gifts, toys, or whatever struck my fancy for the day, we would grab a bite to eat. Rice was usually on the menu, topped off with ice cream as dessert. We would arrive back at our hotel room for a nap in the early afternoon.

  Joy would always cry for Va, her grandmother, before falling to sleep. I hated the crying episodes and wished she would embrace my love. Particularly distressing to me was her refusal to make eye contact with adults. She would look away in a mournful, depressing stare. After a couple of days, I lamented, “God, what can I do when she refuses to even acknowledge my presence?”

  My new daughter was not ready to embrace her new reality. The pain of separation from her past, as lacking as it was, seemed better. It reminded me of the Israelites in the wilderness following their dramatic escape from Egypt, who longed for leeks and onions when God wanted to give them so much more (Numbers 11:5).

  I knew Joy was sad, but I wondered if there was anything medically that might be contributing. I continued to question her age. Jill from the adoption agency faxed a list of abilities that were expected of a two year old, but Joy couldn’t do any of them. By the fifth day of non stop crying, I was frustrated and an emotional wreck due to a lack of sleep. I took her back to the OSCAT/AEA clinic and asked them what they thought.

  “Could she be autistic?” I wondered.

  The doctor performed a few basic tests and although she was developmentally behind, everything seemed to be there for her to eventually catch up. One perceptive, compassionate nurse grabbed my hand reassuringly and said, “I think Joy will be completely fine. Give her some time. She is just one depressed little girl.”

  I went back to the motel encouraged but still feeling discouraged. I could use a lot of words to describe Joy, but joy wasn’t one of them. She was the most joyless person I had ever met. How could I get her to accept me? How could I get her over “the hump”?

  We also discovered she was very adept at temper tantrums. One afternoon shortly after receiving her from her birthmother, she was distressed in the hotel lobby. After much cajoling, I realized there wasn’t a lot I could do to make her feel better about me or life. She would have to decide she didn’t want to be so miserable. As we stood in the lobby, she yelled louder and louder to draw attention to herself. When no one took notice she stomped her feet. It was funny to see this little girl so full of anger stomping her poinky feet in defiance of the world. A couple of the people in the lobby started laughing. Joy did not like that. She stomped her feet harder as if to say, “How dare you laugh at me.”

  I reflected on how we are all born with a sinful nature. My new daughter was a sinner in need of a mother’s love and God’s salvation. I would need God’s wisdom to bring such a strong-willed child into submission and obedience unto the Lord.

  After several nights of not sleeping, though, I was tired, depressed, and wanted God to do something to make things better. Something had to change. I called Jenni on the phone a couple of floors below and asked if she could come to my room to pray for God to confirm I was doing the right thing. I wanted Him to take away her pain. Joy was so miserable that I couldn’t bear it any longer.

  We sat on the edge of the bed and prayed for the Heavenly Father to reveal His will. Later in the morning when Joy woke up, I immediately sensed a change in her spirit. She seemed “different.” We got dressed and walked downstairs to the lobby. No longer crying, she stood quietly beside me in the lobby while I tended to some business.

  The hotel clerk looked at Joy and remarked, “Is that Joy? She seems so different today.”

  Another adoptive parent made the same comment. “It’s almost like she’s a different child. What happened?”

  I didn’t tell them we had prayed, although I did wonder why we hadn’t prayed five days earlier. Now that my new daughter was more pleasant to be around, I thought Jenni would enjoy spending time with us.

  Eventually each day we developed a routine. After we got dressed, Joy would gather her shoes, cap and most importantly, my keys. Usually I had tossed them somewhere in the room and she�
�d find them for me. After the morning scavenger hunt, she would wait at the door as if to say, “Okay, I am ready to go. Hurry up.”

  I would grab my purse as she pulled the knitted cap over her ears, bend down to help with her poinky shoes, lock the door, and head down the hall to the elevator. If I was too slow with makeup or deciding what I wanted to wear, she would let me know. One day before we left our hotel room, I handed Joy bottled water, an orange, and a stuffed animal. I said to her, “Which one do you want to take with you?”

  She grabbed the orange. An American child would have taken the toy, but Joy had known what it was like to go hungry. Food was more valuable to her than toys. Once I realized her insecurity about food, I always gave her an orange or something to carry with her when we would leave the hotel. When she realized food was always available, her episodes of crying almost stopped.

  Compared to Nepal, Vietnam wasn’t much different from America. I didn’t have to discuss with chickens where the toilet was, go behind a bush to use the facility, or beg for toilet paper. I didn’t have to carry with me my own bottled water, and I didn’t return to the hotel every afternoon smelling like dirt. There were no motorcycle rides in dresses or propositions from men that stared at me. I didn’t have to explain what “caste” Joy belonged to or worry as much about getting sick.

  There were things that made it hard. It was not unusual to be accosted by beggars. The most heart-breaking were those that had missing arms or legs or both. The first one that approached me had no arms or legs and I was horrified at the grotesqueness of getting around without any limbs. Hundreds of Vietnamese have been maimed by long-forgotten land mines hidden in the killing fields, many of them children.

  I always lost whatever munchies I had if one of the maimed ones crossed my path as I was headed back to the hotel. My heart melted at the kind of life they had been dealt and how fortunate I was to have two arms to carry my baby and two legs to take me wherever I needed to go. After a month of giving away chips, candy, and crackers, however, I realized if I wanted that chocolate bar when I returned, I better hide it from the maimed beggars.

  In so many of the countries I had traveled, I had seen a dog that looked like Gypsy. On this day, it was no different. As we walked out of a store, a little brown and white long-haired stray was scrounging along the curb where someone had discarded a plastic bag. Looking for a meal, she appeared to have been quite successful in her endeavors, as she had a few too many pounds around the waist. I snapped a picture to add to my collection of “Gypsies from around the world.”

  My dog Gypsy from childhood was what God had used to teach me at an early age that there was a God who loved me. Wherever I traveled, God would always bring a dog across my path that looked like her. Why, I am not sure—perhaps to remind me of His presence no matter where I traveled, or that the neediness of God’s redemptive love transcended every tribe and nation.

  It was the Gypsy from Israel that haunted me the most. The frightened dog couldn’t quit shaking as she followed us along the streets of Jerusalem. Gypsy from Italy had a litter of puppies she was trying to raise in the island of a gas station. The one from Nepal was emaciated and covered with fleas. My dog Gypsy from childhood will come to me occasionally in dreams, completely white, as if she is waiting for me.

  A few hundred feet from the Lillie Hotel was a little store akin to a 7-Eleven. Each day before turning in for the evening, we would stop in to purchase my chocolate. On the candy rack were two kinds of bars—cheap and expensive. I always bought the cheap one and dreamed about how decadent the expensive one would taste. The cheap one tasted awful, but it satisfied my chocolate addiction by leaving a horrible aftertaste. In some tortuous way, I looked forward to my chocolate every night following dinner.

  Although we were routinely awakened every morning, at least it wasn’t because of people throwing up as in Kathmandu. The hotel had its own resident rooster that staked its territory at the front entrance. He was faithful not to let anyone sleep past 6:00 a.m. in the morning.

  After a few days of adjustment and wanting a change in scenery, Jenni, Joy, and I took a couple of afternoons and visited some of the local tourist attractions. One temple we visited was the Temple of Literature. It was built in 1070 by King Thanh Tong and later became Hanoi’s first university. We experienced a flavor of ancient Vietnamese architecture as the buildings were beautifully adorned in colorful relief depicting dragons, tigers, and ancient inscriptions. There were many pagodas connected to the temple with Buddha statues out front, and the burning incense created a mystical experience. From one of the buildings, the sounds of chanting monks could be heard. I stood outside the door curiously listening, but resisted the temptation to go inside.

  Outside the temple by the lake, Western-style music played via loud speakers. Several Vietnamese women had a stand set up to sell souvenirs to tourists and I bought Joy and myself a shirt. A blend of the old and the new: It was a little oasis in the midst of honking horns and city life, a charming spot to spend a few quiet moments before heading back to the hotel.

  On another day, Jenni and I were invited to eat lunch at the Sofitel Metropole with the two adoptive mothers we had originally met at the airport. It was a beautiful five star hotel a short distance from the Lillie Hotel. Out front a platform had been erected to display Santa and his snowmen, dressed in hats and scarves. The platform was decorated by a large sign with letters written in red cursive, “Season’s Greetings.” Santa Claus was seated on a bike with a carriage holding all the gifts. Bikes were the most common mode of transportation in Vietnam, and without snow, a bike worked better than a sleigh.

  The entrance to the hotel was adorned in rows of Poinsettias, and red and yellow flowers beneath the platform framed a beautiful Christmas display. The Christmas music and decorations helped to transport me back to the familiar. At last, halfway around the world, I found myself in the Christmas spirit.

  We were escorted inside and seated in a lovely Western-style restaurant. In contrast to Nepal, it was nice to share the adoption experience with other mothers and the camaraderie helped to alleviate stress. As we sat and waited, I took off my gold and silver Guess watch and allowed Joy to play with it. When my brother and sister were young, my dad would give them his watch while we waited to be served. I thought I would continue the family tradition.

  A buffet lunch was served and the chef stir-fried pasta in herbs and oil. I can still taste the perfectly seasoned, spicy pasta, my favorite meal while in Vietnam. I have since learned the Sofitel Metropole has a world-renowned reputation for Vietnamese and French cuisine, even offering high-end cooking classes.

  With our taste buds whetted in anticipation, we chatted and shared our adoption stories, admiring each others’ new babies. The two families were from Canada, one country I hadn’t visited, and I learned a little about what life was like in the far reaches of the north. Sometimes I forget, living in the Deep South, that the world’s second largest country of thirty-four million people occupies a vast area of land north of the United States.

  One mother showed me pictures of her home covered in snow. My mind got stuck on how cold it would be during the winter. Being born in Tampa and having lived most of my life in Florida, my thin blood would do me in for eight months out of the year.

  After lunch, we took a tour of the lobby of the Sofitel Metropole. It reminded me of the Everest Hotel in Kathmandu with its stately gold columns and chandeliers gracing a high-domed ceiling. Too expensive for my pocketbook to stay overnight, it was a nice place to indulge our appetites for lunch. I hoped Joy and I could come back later for a swim. I took a peek at the Olympic-size pool and couldn’t wait to dip my toes in the cool blue water.

  When we returned to our hotel after lunch, I discovered my watch was missing and assumed I left it on the restaurant table. I made a quick trip back to find it, but it was gone. It was the first and last expensive watch I ever owned. I replaced it with a cheap one in Vietnam for ten dollars that lasted until I retu
rned home.

  I thought it would be fun to take a tour of the countryside surrounding Hanoi. I preferred trees, mountains and scenic vistas to the hustle and bustle of city life even though I grew up in Atlanta. I asked the young woman who worked at the front desk if she had any recommendations for a half-day excursion.

  “You might like touring Bat Trang. It’s a pottery village just outside Hanoi,” she suggested.

  That sounded like something enjoyable. I hired a taxi to take the three of us on a tour, hoping to see a little countryside along the way.

  In some ways, the Hanoi scenery reminded me of Florida—flat and wet. Rice grew well in the waterlogged soil that is a food staple throughout Southeast Asia. A hard life for the field workers, it requires long hours bent over in the flooded land to tend and harvest the crop. Luu worked in the rice paddies north of us and I reflected on the future Joy would have faced had I not adopted her.

  Frequently we passed bikers wearing a hat called a Non La. I was struck at how life moved at a snail’s pace in third-world countries, especially away from the city. It was almost like stepping back in time. I wondered, in my fast-paced, hurried environment back home in Gainesville, what I was missing. If only I had time to stop and “smell the flowers.” I vowed to spend more time in my back yard working on my half-baked nature garden when I returned home.

  Bat Trang was an interesting place to visit. Established in the mid-1400s, the pottery village had a history of selling exquisite ceramics that were exported to other Asian countries. The village sits on the Red River and produces its own unique style with crackle glaze and fine glaze finishes. The pottery from Bat Trang was also distinctive in design, decorative patterns, and colored enamels.

  As I write today pondering Joy’s ethnicity, I wonder how much Vietnamese creativity is hidden in her genes. Joy’s artistry and proclivity for creating beauty out of the absurd is mind-boggling. I wished I could have brought some of the Bat Trang pottery back, but I was too concerned it would get broken.