THE BUSINESS OF EDUCATION - International Indian

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[ FAMILy ] International Adoption: Raising Global Children “They were adopted as infants out of orphanages in New Delhi, Pune and Nagpur by British parents who had to move heaven and earth to get them. The family returned to India recently to reconnect with their roots and launch their book Three Indian Orphans Touched By Destiny which reveals in abundance how international adoption brings human beings together across national boundaries, a situation le plus desirable in the global society we now inhabit.” [ By INGRID ALBUqUERqUE ] Once they were orphans in three dilapidated orphanages in New Delhi, Pune and Nagpur. Today they are in a sense international Indians and true citizens of the world. Lovingly lifted out of their orphanages and put into the keen arms of British parents, Bina-Ruth, Rachita-Beth and Pratiksha- Kate have grown amazingly into young Indian women who have the world at their doorstep. In India they were unaware of one another’s existence. Then they met as sisters in Europe, grew up in the UK, have British passports, traveled the world and now live in the Alps in France. The parents… David John Lee is English and his wife Loralee is Canadian with Scottish roots. Their three daughters are Indian. Not flesh of their flesh, nor bone of their bone, but three wonderful girls, miraculously their own. The family moved from UK some years ago, to settle in the south of France and at some point in the future, plan to go to Canada. David who is an author, writer and regular David John Lee, Pratiksha-Kate, Bina-Ruth, MP H.T. Sangliana, Rachita-Beth and Loralee Lee at the book launch held at The Windsor in Bangalore contributor to international agencies like Saatchi and Saatchi, shares how his family came about: “My wife Loralee and I arrived rather late at the idea of having children. We could not go about this in the normal way, owing to a history of haemophilia in Loralee’s family.” However, what Loralee clung to and never forgot, was a dream she had as a teenager she firmly believes came from God. In the dream, she saw herself surrounded by Indian children. Men have their own down to earth way of 70 THE INTERNATIONAL INDIAN
[ FAMILy ] looking at things. David says, “International adoption made sense to me in the same way as environmentalism made sense. Why bring another child into an already overcrowded world when there are so many children out there who need parents? It’s what the management gurus refer to as a win-win situation. Adults who want children; children who need mothers and fathers. What could be simpler?” When in the early 90s, David John Lee was on assignment in India, his wife Loralee accompanied him, and they shared their dream with a social worker, their jaws dropping and their heart stopping in amazement when the lady said quietly, “Well, it happens that a beautiful baby girl was left with me last week. Would you like to see her?” As the prophecy unfolded, what followed was almost surreal. Loralee describes her visit to the hospital in Delhi where the newborn child happened to be: “My eyes adjust slowly in a cool, unlit corridor. We are shown into a tiny dark room. There are maybe six cots arranged against two walls, with barely enough space to walk between them. A young nurse wearing a white sari smiles and I smile back. She bends over one of the cots and picks up a bundle. As she pulls the blanket back, I see a mass of curly black hair and a tiny sleeping face. What happens next takes me completely by surprise. As I lean forward slightly, my heart catches in my chest and I know, absolutely and terrifyingly, that I would lay down my life for this child. I have never felt or thought anything like this before, and it is a sign to me, in the long process that is to follow, that this child and I are meant to be together.” A few hours later, David and Loralee had become parents. However, they left for Scotland without their precious child because they had yet to go through the ‘paperwork’. This took an “agonizing” 14 months. Thereafter David flew back to India alone to collect Bina, to take her to their home in St. Andrews in Scotland. David explains: “Apart from the people who ran the local curry house, she was the only Indian within thirty miles.” They decided to keep the child’s Indian name and simply added an English name to it. Bina became Bina-Ruth. What were their early days together like? Loralee remembers: “She was not in very good health, having arrived with a terrible cold and running infections in both ears Rachita-Beth presents flowers to Queen Elizabeth II (Ultimately the child had to go through operations to get both ear drums replaced). It quickly became apparent that she had never been given solid food, and so didn’t know how to chew. Neither had she learned how to cuddle. Although she enjoyed being held and carried, Bina-Ruth wouldn’t initiate affection.” However, soon it was as though Bina-Ruth had always been with David and Loralee. They say, “We simply couldn’t imagine life without her.” Bina-Ruth had big brown eyes and a slightly bewildered look, and on many occasions elderly Scots ladies would stop the parents in the street to coo over their daughter. Almost every time, what they said was, “What a wonderful thing you’re doing.” Though it was meant as a compliment, David could never understand this reaction. He says, “We had not embarked on international adoption as an act of charity. We did not feel as though we had “rescued” Bina-Ruth. She wasn’t our adopted orphan; she was just our daughter.” The final stage – legally adopting the child – doesn’t happen until the child has been in the UK for at least twelve months. Prior to that, the focus is on gaining permission to bring the child into the country. For this the adoptive parents need three things: legal guardianship awarded by an Indian court, an Indian passport, and an entry visa stamped on the passport by the nearest British Embassy. And before you can do any of that, you need the document without which no adoption can proceed: the Home Study Report. Basically, the HSR is a series of visits from a social worker in the UK, whose task it was to decide if David and Loralee should be allowed to become parents. Apart from a cursory count of the bedrooms in their house, not much of it was about the home. The items under the microscope were the parents. David says wryly, “The irony at the heart of all this is that couples produce babies of their own every day without anyone asking if they have the appropriate skills, opinions or financial means. It’s not uncommon, then, for adoptive parents to feel discriminated against.” But their passion for parenting was so intense, David and Loralee went through it all with a stiff upper lip, their love for Bina-Ruth increasing each day, as hers did for her parents. Bina Ruth knows her origins and says simply, “I was born in the state of Uttar Pradesh in New Delhi. I was going to be living on the streets of India or even I was going to die because of infections in my ears but that was until my mother and father adopted me.” She became part of an international family that is spread all over the globe, and she has visited and met all of her uncles, aunts and cousins; loves her granny in Canada the most, has been bridesmaid at Auntie Melanie’s wedding and is now in College in Lycee in France. Of the dozens of countries she has been to, Italy, Greece and Maui are among her favourites. I love the way she puts the story of her life: “I started at nothing and discovered I could become anything.” Rachita-Beth, adopted from Nagpur some years later, was totally different from Bina- Ruth. Her mother Loralee says with a gleam in her eye, “In every crisis situation we have faced, my middle daughter could always be relied upon to be helpful and keep her cool. Not that she was always sensible and serious. At her children’s home in Nagpur, they used to laugh and call her a naughty baby. It was only when she went to school that we understood what they’d meant. Rachita-Beth tells it like it is… When Rachita-Beth started at Cathedral School nursery in England at the age of four, she was tiny. I couldn’t find a uniform to fit her, even the size three had to be folded THE INTERNATIONAL INDIAN 71
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