GongYi Home of Hope

Christmas is always a very special time around the Home of Hope. This year was no exception. There was one thing different though! This year the older children decorated the entire facility for Christmas and it turned out lovely!

We hadn’t wanted to make them feel uneasy about what they were doing so we stayed away from the room where we were going to have our Christmas party until just a few hours before time for the celebration. We were really amazed when we walked in at how well they had done!

The one thing that really choked me up though was when I looked at the black board. Actually there are two blackboards in this multi purpose room and the children are very artistic. Anytime we have a special function like this they always draw and or write things on the blackboard in celebration.

If you look close at the picture above you will see little hearts all over the blackboard… No.. they are not confusing Christmas with Valentines day… they associate hearts with love and joy… and in each heart the children had written their English names. One heart for each child; one name in each heart.

What choked us up was that in the center of the hearts there was one large word! You can see for yourself in the blow-up to the right and we think you will also understand why it brought a lump to our throats!

We have always strived to make the Home of Hope lose as much of the institutional feeling as possible. As we sat staring at the blackboard while at the same time holding back the tears we had such mixed emotions as we realized that somehow, someway over the years the children had indeed developed what we always wanted them to develop. A sense of belonging! Right there in the middle of all the hearts with the children’s names in them was the word, “FAMILY”! We think you would have choked up also!

Another thing you can see (top picture)  is stockings hung around the black board. A wonderful group in the United States sent a stuffed stocking for each child of the Home of Hope and were they ever so excited about that. Nathan told them about hanging his Daddy’s sock up on Christmas Eve when he was a little boy and how the next morning it was full of candy, apples, oranges and some little toys… they truly loved it!

Our Christmas dinner was not one that most Westerners would think was their “cup of tea” but the children truly loved it! We had BBQ Donkey (grin… this is true) Baked Chicken, steamed fresh water shrimp (I am not sure what they are but they call them shrimp and they taste like shrimp) BBQ Goat on a stick, Steamed Pork Fat, Garlic Stems, Lotus Root, Green Beans and Peppers stuffed with Tofu and meat. Everyone ate till they were ready to burst!

The children are given a small allowance each week to use for the sundry and miscellaneous things they need in school, i.e. pencils, erasers etc. We do this to teach them the value of saving and that they can’t expect everything to be handed out to them in life. Many of the children save their money as much as possible and at Christmas they buy little gifts and trinkets for each other and the staff.

These are a few candid shots of different things this Christmas.

To the left Annie Kang Cong Ying is opening her gifts. Annie is one of the most valuable people at the orphanage. She wears many hats from being our translator (spent many years in the United States before coming to the Home of Hope) to planning the meals, doing the accounting and meeting out discipline when it is necessary among many other things she so tirelessly does in her never ending day(s) at the Home of Hope.

To the right we have (left to right) Holly, Julie, Esther and Logan as they performed for the group at our Christmas celebration.

They sang a nice song but the impressive thing was before they sang and as the music interlude was playing they read a poem they had written in English.

We can’t actually write the content of the poem on the web site but it had to do with Character, belief, the true meaning of Christmas and the single thing in life one can believe in, in this day and age of indifference and social upheaval. We were impressed and really moved by what they wrote!

Nathan Clowning it up with Moses and Ruthie after the celebration was over.

We want to wish you all the very best this new years! If you would like to help support the Home of Hope please do so. We have found all of our major expenses are increasing rapidly with the growth of the Chinese economy. Our utilities are double this winter from last year and the cost of the children’s education is almost double this year. Please help if you can… Any amount, small or great, will go along way in helping defray the costs of our operation.