Wish You Happy Forever by Jenny Bowen

Li, in charge of the children’s department. Another woman, a deputy director in charge of logistics, then read the report aloud. She was nervous. Mrs. Zhang translated every word.
    I learned how many mu of land the institution occupied and how many square meters the building was. I learned about the history of the institution and about the various divisions of work and, finally, about the children. I learned how many were “brain-damaged” or “deformed” and how many were “normal” (which, in the deputy director’s opinion, was almost none).
    Madame Miao then introduced Half the Sky. In a tribute to the Chinese educational system of rote learning, she recited to Director Kong and his staff exactly what I’d told her the day before. Everybody wrote in their notebooks. Another orange was shoved my way. More tea was poured.
    Then it was my turn. It was my very first time speaking to an orphanage director about my plan. I hadn’t thought about what I would say. But I felt oddly calm. I’d now spent twenty-four hours in semiofficial China and I was starting to get the formality, the rhythm, and the tone of things.
    Before I made movies, I was in theater. I directed a little bit, but in the beginning I was an actor. When I was a young acting student in San Francisco, I used to ride the bus to my classes and eavesdrop on conversations. I’d pick up on the rhythms of speech; I’d watch people’s mannerisms and how they connected with one another. And then I’d get off the bus and become those people for a little while . . . simply let them inhabit me, and continue the conversation until I arrived at class. Despite the alarmed glances of passersby, that was how I learned to become an actor, I think—much more than in the classes. Just by absorbing the world around me.
    When I sat before Director Kong to make my pitch, that’s pretty much what happened again. I became him and Madame Miao and Mrs. Zhang and Mrs. Li and the orange-peeling women, in addition to being entirely myself. I don’t mean to suggest that my audience thought of me as simply one of them. Far from it. But this slipping into their skin—this chameleon-ness of me—made me comfortable in an otherwise impossible situation. I don’t think I’d ever done that before in my regular life. Maybe because this was all so irregular—so utterly foreign and impossible to prepare for—it awoke some old actor’s survival instinct. I became of the moment.
    â€œDirector Kong, everyone—first I want to thank you for giving us such a warm welcome. Madame Miao explained that it is our love for China’s children that brings us here to see you today. As the lucky parent of a Chinese daughter and the representative of many foreign adoptive parents, I thank you for the loving care you give to the children who need you so much. Now we want to join you and give a gift to the children who remain in China’s orphanages.”
    Careful not to criticize, I noted that the institutions’ staff helped the children as much as they could but that, with so many to care for, it wasn’t possible for the caregivers to provide all children the kind of individual attention that each needed to thrive. I told them about research that tells us that infancy and early childhood are critical times for healthy development.
    â€œHalf of a child’s intellectual development potential is established by age four,” I said. “Seventy-five percent is finalized by age seven.” Everyone wrote.
    â€œIf we want these children to succeed in school and in life and not become a burden to society, we can’t afford to waste the early years. And think of this—if a baby hasn’t bonded with a caring adult by the age of two, she may never learn to develop a healthy, trusting relationship with another human being. Not in her entire life.”
    Everyone looked appropriately