Published by - Americans for International Aid and Adoption
Transcription
Published by - Americans for International Aid and Adoption
Spring 2011 Published by: Americans for International Aid and Adoption 2151 Livernois, Suite 200, Troy, MI 48083 248·362·1207 Fax 248·362·8222 email: [email protected] www.aiaaadopt.org A Message From the Executive Director Dear AIAA Families and Supporters: A lot has happened since our last newsletter more than a year ago. Some of it has been very positive and some sad and discouraging. Total placement of children in families has stabilized and increased from a low in 2007 and 2008. Korea and India are still our predominant placement programs. We are excited to be reopening a Russia Program after a 5 year hiatus. AIAA is working on expanding our aid programs in Haiti. Donations have strengthened the services to children with special needs and our counterpart Korean agency, Social Welfare Society, has made efforts to support single birth moms who choose to parent their children. Jon and I were privileged to attend the opening last spring, in Vietnam, of a clinic that AIAA helped build in Ho Chi Minh City for children with physical and mental challenges. Unfortunately, three countries that allowed their children to be placed with families outside of their borders, Guatemala, Vietnam and Nepal, have been closed due to accusations of corruption and child kidnapping without sincere international efforts to help these countries establish regulations that protect the children from possibly being exploited. The children needing families did not disappear; they have become more vulnerable. See the article on Our Lady of Mercy Home in Guatemala. Twenty eleven is AIAA’s 36th Anniversary. Many of our “children” are now adults with their own families. Adult adoptees might consider making a donation on the anniversary of the arrival to their new families, or their parents or grandparents might want to donate in honor of this wonderful addition to their family, so that AIAA can continue to provide humanitarian services, “one child at a time.” From the AIAA Board and staff, our best wishes to all of you. Change of Address for Parents & Adult Adoptees Nancy M. Fox Executive Director AIAA would like the residence addresses for all of our adult adoptees so they can receive our newsletter. If you are planning a move or have recently changed your address, please send us your new address and telephone number, so that we can update our database. Email us at [email protected] or mail us the information. We would love to hear from you. Homeland Discovery Tours Summer Culture Camps Listed below are several opportunities for “Homeland Discovery Tours” which families and adult adoptees might want to explore. Multi-Cultural Heritage Camps Knapp Forest Elementary School 4243 Knapp Valley Drive NE Grand Rapids, MI 49525 SWS Welcome Home Tour #4 This year SWS will conduct its 4th Welcome Home Tour which will be held August 21-28th. The tour is open to Korean adult adoptees between the ages of 20 and 35, with priority given to those who have not visited Korea before. Adult adoptees will be paired with Korean mentors. For further information, please contact Rosemary Jackson at [email protected] or call AIAA at (248) 362-1207. Tour applications may be found on the AIAA website www.aiaaadopt.org , click on What’s New on the homepage to access the application. Applications are due at AIAA Friday, May 20. Ties Program Adoptive Family Homeland Journeys Traditional Ties programs are staffed by an adoption professional as well as an English speaking in-country guide. Guatemala . . . June 26 – July 7, 2011 India . . . . . . . . December 27, 2011 – January 9, 2012 Vietnam . . . . . December 27, 2011- January 8, 2012 (South-North), April 5-15, 2012 (north including Sapa) Korea . . . . . . . June 26 – July 8, 2011 Russia . . . . . . July 30 – August 10, 2011 For information on these and other Ties tours, visit www.adoptivefamilytravel.com 2012 Roots Family Tour to Korea The Roots Tour is the combined effort of three agencies in the states, AIAA being one of them, that have Korean programs through Social Welfare Society (SWS). On the Roots Family Tour you will travel throughout Korea, reunite with old friends and make new ones. Typical itinerary highlights include Gyeongbok Palace tour, Korean Folk Village tour, visiting the SWS main office and meeting with foster families, DMZ and 3rd Tunnel tour, visiting Mt. Seorak National Park, Bulguksa Temple and Seokguram Grotto tours, drive to Busan with free time at Haeundae Beach, and a traditional music and dance performance at Korea House. The 2012 Tour will take place in July. For 2011 the airfare from New York was $1,700 and the ground tour costs were $2,280 per person. If you are interested and would like your name to be placed on the waiting list for further information, please contact Rosemary Jackson at [email protected] or call AIAA at (248) 362-1207. Kyung Hee University Korean Language Program This three week intensive summer program in Korean language will be held August 1-19 at Kyung Hee University in Seoul. For further information, please contact Rosemary Jackson at rosemary@ aiaaadopt.org or call AIAA at (248) 362-1207. Applications may be found on the AIAA website www.aiaaadopt.org , click on What’s New on the homepage to access the application. Applications are due at AIAA Friday, June 10. Heritage Camp is held by Families for International Children (FFIC) the 3rd full week of June and is a day camp experience that provides adopted children an opportunity to learn about their birth cultures and the cultures of others. Interested siblings are welcome. These multi-cultural camps are for adopted children ages preschool through 9th grade. Included are Chinese, Korean, Latin American, Eastern European and African American sessions. Current camps include: China Camp Eastern European Camp Korea Camp Latin American Camp Multi-cultural Preschool Camp Multi-cultural Teen Camp For further information, visit www.fficgr.org. Sae Jong Camp Sae Jong Camp is a summer camp for children of Korean heritage held at Camp Westminster on Higgins Lake in central Michigan. At Sae Jong Camp, campers explore their Korean-American identities, learn about their Korean heritage, and make lasting friendships. Two one-week residential sessions held each August (August 7-13) for Korean children (one session for adoptees 7-17 and one session for 2nd and 3rd-generation and adopted Korean-Americans, 7-17). Sae Jong Camp P.O. Box 250632 Franklin, Michigan 48025 (718) 937-1124 (Leave message for Jeanah Hong, Director) Email: [email protected] For further information, visit www.saejongcamp.com. Miss Ohio USA Contestant Trishna Helmick Trishna Helmick is one of our India adult adoptees who was adopted by Jack and Georgina Helmick at the age of 1 in 1989. She ran for Miss Ohio USA in 2011. Although she did not win the title, Trishna did make it into the top 15. An award of a $30,000 scholarship will come in handy since she is currently a student at Berklee College of Music in Boston with a major in Professional Music. As part of the pageant requirements, contestants had to choose a charity to represent and for whom they would provide service efforts. Trishna chose AIAA. In addition to being a lovely young woman with many talents, she is a professional singer, songwriter, and model. Trishna has sung for the Boston Celtics and many venues in Ohio and the New England area and has worked with James Taylor’s brother, Livingston Taylor, as well as Grammy award winner, Raymond Reeder. Trishna will be graduating this May 2011 from Berklee and will be moving to NYC to further her performance/singing career. What’s New with Our AIAA Kids Gaffner Family – Diana (3 ½) and Stuart (1 ½), children of Scott and Sandra Gaffner Derkos Family – Ryan Kaon Derkos (20 months), son of Joe and Kari Derkos, checking out his soon to be new home Rudloff Family Jimmy (21), Julie (14), Janie (15), Sam (17), children of Martin and Virginia Rudloff. Laarman Family – Hilary (21), Michelle (12), Patrick (25), Andrea (23), children of Brian and Gwen Laarman Bigelow Family – brothers Ethan (8) and Jake (2), sons of Kevin and Maria Bigelow Program Updates KOREA: Open intake for either sex/male. Waiting list for female infants without significant medical issues. Children with special needs waiting. EL SALVADOR: Open intake for children, 3+. All ages with medical issues. Couples/singles. Flexible requirements. RUSSIA: Open Intake. Looking for families wishing to adopt infants, toddlers, school age, siblings. Couples/single females. HUNGARY: Single children, 6+ years, siblings must be open to up to 8 years. All ages with medical issues. Couples/single females. Flexible requirements. BULGARIA: Children at least one year of age at time of referral. Couples/singles. INDIA: Closed for NRI/OCI applications for infants with no known medical issues. Children of all ages with medical special needs, school age children and sibling groups. One parent must be prepared to travel. Single females for older and special needs kids. Welcome Home Experience By Kim Horger Where The Heart Is By Jacob Yaeger The Welcome Home program, sponsored by SWS, was a truly welcoming experience that helped me to connect better with my Korean identity. I have always felt a great desire to visit my birth country, but I must admit that the idea of planning a meaningful trip on my own seemed kind of daunting. I wondered how I would ever be able to find my way around, order food, or shop for souvenirs since I don’t comprehend the Korean language. Welcome Home is a well-organized program that alleviates these issues and provides adult Korean adoptees the opportunity to interact with domestic and international Koreans, experience Korean life, and engage in multiple aspects of traditional and modern Korean culture. In the Detroit Airport I met with my flight companion, Kim, as we prepared to fly to Korea for Social Welfare Society’s (SWS) Welcome Home #3 taking place August 22-29, 2010. We would go on to fly together to Incheon but the experience in Detroit was already feeling pretty surreal. While we were in the terminal waiting to board, we were looking for our other companion, Elizabeth. All we could do was laugh because, without being potentially offensive, we would never find her— everybody looked like natural citizens of Korea. The Welcome Home program was a unique blend of cultural lessons, modern performances, a 3-day mini trip to the Korean countryside, public service, and a file review of our own adoptions. Some of the international participants had also prearranged to meet their birth families. We all learned about SWS and the services they provide, such as taking care of the handicapped and elderly, in addition to adoption support. We made a craft with children at the AMSA rehabilitation center and played with babies who were awaiting adoption at the SWS center. This was, as an adopted person of a different ethnicity from their parents will know, a rare situation. We were actually surrounded by people who looked like us and nobody could tell the difference. When we met Elizabeth, she said something to the effect, “I didn’t know which ones you were and I wasn’t about to start yelling your names!” The strangeness of it all was only beginning and our adventure was well under way. SWS hospitality was extraordinary. Our mini-group met with our cohorts of about 14 people. Little did I know it then but, as usually happens, those with whom you travel become family sharing an experience that we had never had before, together. There were parts of our lives that I don’t think any of us really knew about ourselves that we all discovered, all the while with the support of each other. The international Welcome Home participants were each partnered with a My experience was perhaps the most student from a Korean University to become profound; I met my birth mother. The our buddy, who would be our guide, anticipation and expectation built tightly Jacob Yaeger and Kim Horger translator, and companion. During each in my chest for the entire program since I activity, our buddies helped us to understand would meet with her after the SWS Tour and what was spoken in Korean and provided schedule, with a handful of others as well. additional insight. We also talked a lot about our daily lives and common customs among young adults. When the day came, I was so nervous I couldn’t decide what to wear! Such a menial thing, but it felt dire. My shirts were dirty and I wore a For those of us who stayed longer than the one week duration of the new one that I had bought. She was running late because the public official program, our buddies tried to be available during the extended transit was having problems and so I had delays to wait through. I stay, too. I stayed for three days beyond the program. During this couldn’t tell anyone what was making me anxious but waiting to see time, my buddy helped me get a haircut at a famous salon near the her felt like I was going to give a televised speech about who I really women’s university, took me to dinner at her parents’ home, and was. The time came—and she was in a room. I couldn’t believe it. helped me find and purchase traditional Korean Hanboks. Behind something as simple as a door, my family was waiting. It had I will always cherish the time I spent in Korea with the Welcome Home hit me earlier in the trip that we had never in our adult lives seen our program and am grateful that I was selected to participate. I know that blood relatives. the program helped me learn more about what it’s like to be a part I entered the room and it was like a massive pressure change in the of the rich Korean heritage and made my experiences in Korea more room had occurred. We were hugging and I was (embarrassingly) comprehensive and interactive than I could have possibly managed on sweating profusely while we shared our moment. Before we got lunch, my own as a regular American tourist. Thank you, SWS and AIAA, for she told me to change my shirt because I was too hot! I did what she making this experience possible! told me--she’s my mother… As an adopted person, strangely enough, it goes unnoticed much of the time that there is a part of one’s self that is mysterious to our own knowledge. Over time, it is commonplace incarnate to appear different, to live in a strange place, and to have personal information be so readily available to others, but out of grasp to you. To set my own feet on the soil where I came from brought me closure (to something) I didn’t know was open. In Memory of Betty Gorning by Nancy Fox This is a very difficult article to write. On March 17th, 2010, Elizabeth (Betty) Gorning, long time AIAA Social Worker, Supervisor, and adoptive parent died suddenly on a Florida trip with her husband, Lou. Betty’s connection with AIAA goes back to our beginnings and, actually, earlier than that. She was Jon’s and my caseworker when we adopted our daughter from Vietnam. During the years when we were a liaison organization in the corner of the Fox family room, Betty was the Social Worker. Without her guidance and support, AIAA would never have happened. Later she became a Supervisor but her greatest love was placing children with special needs. Betty and her husband, Lou, adopted their daughter, Amanda, in 1977 from Korea at the age of 2. Birth son, Steven, followed in 1978. Eventually Betty left AIAA to pursue other employment but she never lost her connection to the agency, the staff, and the adoptive parents and children for whom she helped find families. Betty experienced the joy of seeing both of her children graduate from college, begin exciting Amanda and Pascale Elizabeth careers, and marry - Amanda to Sean and Steven to Diane. A little over two years ago, Amanda gave birth to Betty and Lou’s first grandchild, Pascale Elizabeth, the love of their lives. In Betty’s memory, a fund has been established to help with the expenses for the special needs children at Social Welfare Society. If you would like to make a donation, please send a check to the AIAA office and indicate that it is in Betty’s honor. As always, no administrative fees will be charged. Betty will always remain in the hearts of those of us who loved and admired her, and those who thank her for creating their family. Aid Program in Need of Your Help Our Lady of Mercy Children’s Home in Guatemala AIAA has been involved in supporting this Children’s Home for more than 10 years. We did 5 adoptions but our major commitment has been to the children who are sent to the Hogar by the Family Courts but without any financial support. Now that international adoption has been discontinued in Guatemala, many of the children’s homes have been closed but the children without families have not disappeared. Presently, there are 18 children, 1 ½ to 6 years that have been referred to from the Family Court and with no support from the Government. Mery Garcia, the Director, and her daughter, Martha, struggle every day to care for these children. Without AIAA’s support, the Hogar would be closed and the children turned over to the Government facility. We don’t want that to happen. A preschool program for Down’s Syndrome children whose parents would pay tuition is planned but major renovations were required, such as installing new windows and upgrading bathrooms. Fortunately, the generosity of one of our incredible benefactors has helped pay for some of the renovation but more needs to be done and the school supplied with educational and therapeutic equipment. However, it now appears that Mrs. Garcia will not be able to receive her license until the first of the year. Until then, AIAA has to raise the more than $2,000 a month needed to continue with the rent of a second house and to feed the children. If you adopted from Guatemala, this is a way to honor your child. If you just care about children in need, this is a way to give back for all your family has. As always, AIAA takes no administrative expenses out of our donations. Every cent is used for the cause. Workplace Giving - A Child is Adopted/ Americans for International Aid and Adoption* Payroll deduction is the easiest way to support your favorite charities on a regular basis. A Child is Adopted/Americans for International Aid & Adoption is a member of Children’s Charities of America Federation (CCA). The Combined Federal Campaign (CFC) takes place each fall for federal employees. Please consider making a pledge to us. Many employers offer a similar program for their employees and permit you to choose your favorite charity. Please consider A Child is Adopted/AIAA. If you are A Child is Adopted/Americans for International Aid and Adoption donor or you are considering becoming one, you may be eligible to double your gift through your employer’s matching gift program. Many companies today match monetary support to nonprofit organizations that are supported by their employees. Check with your employer to see if a program is available to you. If your company does not have an employee giving program, or if you would like to include us in your existing campaign, please ask the person responsible for your workplace giving program to contact Jodie Richers: [email protected] or 404-307-2901(cell ). *Our DBA (Doing Business As) for fundraising Americans for International Aid and Adoption 2151 Livernois, Suite 200 Troy, MI 48083 Return Service Requested Certificate of Citizenship Update Effective January 20, 2004, all children entering the U.S. on an IR-3 visa will automatically be mailed a Certificate of Citizenship within approximately 4 weeks after immigration. This does not apply to children entering the U.S. under an IR-4 visa or for children who entered the U.S. before January 20, 2004. For children entering under an IR-4 visa, you must still apply for a Certificate of Citizenship AFTER adoption/readoption requirements are met. It is imperative that all foreign-born adopted children have a Certificate of Citizenship issued by USCIS (U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service). Do not rely on a U.S. Passport for proof of citizenship. Check Out Our Website at: www.aiaaadopt.org The best way to stay connected with AIAA is through our website. It features Who We Are, Program Descriptions, Requirements and Latest Updates, Contact Us and a What’s New section for events, articles, book reviews, adoptee surveys, aid projects and much more. OUR T I S I V TE AT r g I S B WE opt.o ai w w w. aaad Update Regarding Letters and Packages to and from Korea There have been a few changes regarding procedures for your items going to Korea. They will still come to AIAA, but the $20 fee for the processing/translation of letters has been eliminated, as has the $25 fee for packages. From now on there is no charge. For the complete set of GUIDELINES please go to our website: www.aiaaadopt.org, click on What’s New, and scroll down to REVISED GUIDELINES FOR LETTERS AND PACKAGES TO KOREA. Also, regarding letters and packages coming from Korea via Social Welfare Society, for families whose adoptions are finalized, these will no longer be sent to AIAA and processed here. SWS will notify us that they have a letter/package for a particular family and ask us to verify the contact information. At that time we will do our best to reach you to let you know that a letter/package is being sent from Korea. After this time, items for your family will be sent directly without notification. Only the two agencies will have your contact information. For families in supervision, items will be forwarded from AIAA as before. We ask that you keep AIAA updated regarding any changes to your address and phone numbers. If you have questions, call Jan Adler in Post Adoption at (248) 362-1207 or email her at: [email protected]. She is in the office on Monday and Wednesday.