Next stop – Chengdu

We took a bus from Zigong the same afternoon. We left at 4 p.m. arriving at Chengdu at 7 p.m. Ah, a hotel again after several days of hard travel! We checked in and went to eat in the hotel dining room first. We ate a bowl of rice with pumpkin and shredded potatoes at the Jackson Family Care Center for lunch. We didn’t eat the pork because the Chinese like the fat and I saw them chopping up the meat with mostly fat and only a little of the leaner meat. They also like bones in almost every piece of meat, believing that it adds more flavor and nourishment to the dish. We took showers after dinner (the drain did not stop up from dirt, even though it had been about two days since we got the shower in Kunming at the Super 8 hotel). We got a good night’s rest and woke up about 6 a.m. We met Jackie Fang, our worker from Xi’an at the breakfast buffet and then he and Ron went to the military hospital for a meeting and lunch.

This hospital will most likely agree to a joint-venture to do open heart surgeries for us just like we now do at a military hospital in Xi’an. This will provide us with more patients and more children that we can save. The hospital is well-equipped for heart surgeries and also cleft palate reconstruction. We will pursue the next cleft palate medical mission with this hospital.

While I stayed in the room to work this morning, Ron and Jackie were served lunch by these uniformed officers of the military. Ron was bragging that a 3-star general (a lady) served him today. I think his head was a little too high in the clouds bragging about this but he’ll come back down to earth quickly enough.

The hospital bought us train tickets tonight to go to Xi’an. Our workers were unable to get tickets but the military had no problem getting us soft sleeper beds. It is a 16 hour train ride so I hope it will be a newer and cleaner train than the last one. We will leave tonight about 9 p.m. and arrive in Xi’an at 1 p.m. tomorrow. We will immediately leave to drive about three hours to the next location to look at a possible site for the next orphanage. I will report on our success with that trip in my next segment.

On Our Way to Jackson Family Care Center

We boarded another train at 4:30 p.m. for Zigong, Sichuan. It was the oldest and perhaps the dirtiest train we have been on. We had two men roommates in our cabin. One was a young soldier in fatigues and the other a middle-aged man, both silent the entire trip.

This trip was a total of 17 hours on the train. I can’t avoid a bathroom when it takes this long, but I try to visit these bathrooms as little as possible.
Restrooms on the trains and bus stations are the worst! After a few hours of daylight, with nothing to do but read or listen to music (as Ron does), we settled in to sleep. Our roommates were asleep by 8 p.m. so we turned out the lights. I went to sleep immediately and although I woke several times, it was 8 a.m. when I got fully awake again. Ron said he thinks he will buy me a train when we get home!

The trains are noisy and have many stops along the way either to board passengers or switch tracks to let another train come through. These stops are about two minutes long so I go back to sleep quickly.

After 17 hours on a dirty train and no shower for more than 24 hours, we feel rather grimy. I try to wear clothes on the train that will wrinkle the least since we sleep in our clothes and must wear them the next day as well. In this case, it was two full days and two full nights in the same clothes!

We arrived at Zigong at 10 a.m. and Jacob was to meet us at the train station. He was not there when we arrived so I got out my sheet of information to find phone numbers for Ron to call. Almost immediately, a crowd of men (about 10) gathered around me to try to see the paper I had of our schedule. I folded it back up but they still stood around. About that time, Jacob drove up and these men walked over and watched us load our bags in the van. Guess they don’t see many foreigners in Zigong!

Usually when we arrive at a train or bus station many taxi drivers are trying to get passengers. They do not take NO for an answer but walk with you trying to take your bags away from you and being persistent. It’s very annoying, but Ron and I stand our ground because these are the ones that do not use their meters and charge Americans a large sum to take them anywhere. Traveling in China requires experience and toughness. Ron is now a “pro” and knows what to do everywhere so I have confidence traveling with him.

We arrived at the beautiful new Jackson Family Christian Care Center and were very pleased to see the change from the crude construction we observed in August. The finished facility is very nice. They have completed almost everything but continue to do some clean-up work around the building. They will have picnic areas around outside in various areas that will be wonderful for the children.
The school paved the area between the school and care center and put in a track for running. There were ping pong tables, benches and lots of areas for the children to play. The road into the care center from the school has been paved so it improved things greatly.

We inspected the building and saw the cooks preparing lunch in their new modern kitchen. Since most children live too far to go home for lunch, the care center will serve lunch to 150 students and teachers each day. They will pay a small amount for their lunch but it will cover our expenses for food and have a little extra for our effort. It creates good will with the teachers and school officials as well. We ate lunch with them yesterday. The children told us they loved the food and their home there. It is very pretty and we are happy to provide a good life for these poor children.

Only 27 have moved to this facility but they will be bringing in more and more children as they locate them. It was difficult to know which children live at the care center because all the other school children were there together. We met the new director, Mr. Chan. He seems very nice and qualified. He is a Christian and lives in that general area. His wife will move there this week.

Jacob and his wife will relocate to our Mama Jo’s House Care Center in Biyang. Our director at Mama Jo’s quit and we need a lot of work at this facility. Jacob is willing to go work and improve things there now that he has finished the Jackson facility and there is a director in place.

The Travel Only Got Harder

We left on a night train to Kunming, the hometown of Sherry Shi, one of our Chinese workers in the U.S. After an overnight train trip (12 hours), we arrived at about 6:30 a.m. and walked outside to find it very cold. Up to this time, the weather had actually been rather warm. It was nine degrees Celsius that morning in Kunming. We brought coats knowing that the weather will also be cold in Beijing when we get there. This was the first segment of our trip where the coats went on our backs instead of just hanging on our arms. They felt so good that it was worth worrying with them the previous week.

Sherry arranged for her cousin to meet us at a hotel that was not far from the train station. We had trouble locating that hotel and after asking people in several other hotels that did not know where we could find it, we finally got directions from a group of German tourists getting ready to board a bus.

We tried to get a room for the day at that particular hotel but none were available. We wanted to get a shower before meeting with the hospital personnel, so we went back up the street to a Super 8. They let us rent a room for a few hours but it was really bad. The carpet was molded from the shower water running into the small, crowded room. The shower was just open in the small toilet area with a drain in the floor. It was my first time to take a shower like that but I felt so grimy, it didn’t matter. The room looked like what I THINK a brothel would look like, but it served the purpose for us to clean up and change clothes to look fresh for the hospital visit.

A translator from the university came to help us for the day. He was a very nice young man and did an excellent job. After learning what we do in China, he refused to accept any pay. He cared for us the whole day and helped us to the train station that afternoon.

Sherry’s cousin is a doctor at one of the women and children’s hospitals owned by this private sector. She had a driver take us to the hospital who we needed to consult with regarding the next cleft palate medical mission. She was a very kind and sweet lady and very helpful to us. We appreciated her so very much. She took her time to do this for us and we are grateful.

After a meeting with the hospital officials, they invited us to a nearby hotel to have lunch. It was a very delicious meal, one of few we have had since we left home. We said our goodbyes and went to another location to meet two doctors (one from China and one from Singapore) who have an organization to do medical work for the poor in the Kunming area. We met them at a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant and caught up on what they do and explained our work in China. They were able to give us some information about the area that may be helpful in deciding where we will do the next cleft palate mission.

Next Stop – Wesley’s House at Pingguo

The drive to Pingguo was very mountainous with curvy roads around the mountains. It was very beautiful but dangerous. We met a large truck head-on around one of the curves and barely missed having an accident. Even this experienced driver drove in the middle of the road. The center line means nothing in China. He drove right down the middle until he saw a car coming. That was like playing “Russian Roulette” on a mountainous road. We are amazed that there aren’t more major accidents, although there are a large number killed in transportation accidents every year.


The countryside around Nanning, Tiendeng and Pingguo is very beautiful with tall pointed mountains and flat lands in between with fields of banana plants, sugar cane and rice paddies. The mountains are covered with evergreen trees (many newly planted) that are a type of pine or spruce. In the valleys, you could see small farms but I saw few houses and wondered how the people found their way to the flat valleys to farm. Every possible hillside is terraced and planted if there are no trees. We even see gardens along the roadside (shoulders of the road). They do not waste any land that will grow food. It is their survival.


The hotel in Pingguo is probably the most beautiful we have ever had but even it had its drawbacks. The furniture was more Japanese style with straight wooden chairs so we had to pile up pillows to be able to sit in them. The bath is glass with pretty Japanese wood stripping. Not much privacy unless you are rooming with your mate!

The hotel is across the street from a beautiful park but at night they have loud music until 10 p.m. Also, fireworks (the loud kind) are shot off regularly. Ron said they never need a holiday or any reason to justify using fireworks.

We stayed in this hotel last year at Christmas and thought the noise was because of the holiday, but there was no holiday this time and it was the same. I could not help but laugh when I heard the song, “Who Let the Dogs Out?” playing over their loud speakers. I told Ron I had come all the way to South China to get to hear that!

I was so tired the night we arrived that I went on to sleep at 9 p.m. and ignored the music and fireworks. Ron was up working. After he came to bed, he received two phone calls that I never heard. Our travels certainly make me sleep well. I never sleep this well at home, but I am also not this tired at the end of the day.

We spent one day at Wesley’s House. The children were at school when we arrived. Ron inspected the building to get a check list of what needs to be done. The children came in for lunch and were very shy around us but before long they were sitting near me, stroking my arms, looking at my watch and rings, staring into my eyes and giving me spontaneous hugs.

Once I walked out to the flagpole to sit in the sun a few minutes. One little girl came and climbed up the steps to sit with me and before long I had about 10 children all over and around me. A little boy about five was stoking my hair and rubbing the skin on my arm. He would look intensely into my eyes and my heart just melted. I told Peter later that I wanted to bring him home with me. He said one of the visitors with Jim Griffith last September wanted to take him home with her too.

The children gathered around waiting for our taxi and it just breaks our hearts to leave them. They are happy and have a great life there but they are lacking so much love and attention that they will never get from relatives.

To Our Next Destination
John Connor Brown Care Center in Tiendeng

After another five hour train ride, we arrived in Nanning. Since this trip was during the afternoon, we had seats rather than a sleeper bed, but it was not great. It was a very dirty train and we had to deal with peasants (the poorest people in China travel this way). There were also many screaming children and since they do not use diapers in China, they let them go to the bathroom wherever they are even though there are crude restrooms on the train. There was a lot of loud talking, arguing and eating going on the entire trip. Only the uneducated and very poor have poor manners and are often rude. The more educated people always treat us with great respect and courtesy, but we never expect it from the poor class in China.

The seats were terribly uncomfortable so Ron’s back was hurting worse the next day. It was the only train we have been on that was late arriving at the station. You might know it would be this one! But we changed from the poorest level of transportation to the very best when we arrived in Nanning, three hours from Tiendeng to our destination that night. (Tiendeng is located in Southern China about 50 miles from the Viet Nam border).

Mr. Edward Li, the head of Toyota, heard that we were coming to visit our care centers in Tiendeng and Pingguo. When Jim Griffith and his family from North Canton, Ohio, came in September, Mr. Li personally escorted them. He was in Guilin at the time we arrived, so he sent a driver in one of their new $60,000 cars to meet us at the train station and drive us to the John Connor Brown Care Center in Tiendeng. The driver stayed overnight at a hotel to take us to Pingguo the next afternoon.

We were invited to stay in the home of Ross and his lovely wife in Tiendeng. They are volunteers who help at the orphanage. Ross is from Australia and Raewyn (I’m not sure if I have spelled her name correctly) is from New Zealand. They have two children of their own and two adopted Chinese boys. Their children are wonderful teenagers. We got in about 11 p.m. so we met their sweet children the next morning at breakfast. The Chinese boys are younger. They were found in suitcases as babies as part of a smuggling ring of Chinese babies. They are very fortunate boys to have a lovely family now.

Their house is amazing. It is narrow but has five floors of rooms. There are two rooms and a bath on each floor so the winding stairs just go up and up from the first floor to the roof.
From the roof, they have a fabulous view of the mountains, fields and lake. They have white tile floors that were spotless. It was a beautiful place, but right on a very busy and noisy street in the middle of town.

We owe a lot to this family. They also gave Ronald, our son, a room when he first arrived in Tiendeng. They have encouraged and helped him so much. Ross and Ronald have done a lot to clean things up at the care center and assist the workers in making this a better place for the children. The construction of the new kitchen and dining room has begun so Ronald’s time will now be devoted to that work. Ross said he and his wife will continue to help Mark oversee things at the care center. They are helping teach the children, get things better organized and maintain a cleaner care center. They have sorted through a room full of clothing that was donated to see what is usable and what needs to be passed on to others.


Ron did a check list of things that need to be done to improve the building. With so many children, things are naturally going to get dirty, so walls and windows need to be cleaned and many places need new paint. Maintenance of the buildings is a constant problem, but we want the children to live in a clean and nice facility.

Seeing Ronald was especially nice. He has
accomplished so much in the few months he’s been in China and we are very grateful for his assistance. The children love him and call him Uncle Ron. They sometimes drive him crazy hanging on him and teaching him Chinese words, but I think for the most part, he loves them very much. He said sometimes he has to say, “No, no, that’s enough,” and they have learned that they must stop playing with him so he can do other things.

Ronald built a wonderful table for their dining room. It bothered him that the rice cookers were placed on the floor and the children had to bend down to fill their bowls. Now they have a nice table for this purpose. The present kitchen is in another room and food is brought to the dining room and served family style at the tables. While workers and children were away for recent holidays, Ronald scrubbed every pot and pan in the kitchen, organized the shelf items and cleaned the floor.



The children were so sweet and well-behaved. They wanted to touch us and hug us all the time we are there. They laughed and enjoyed the fact that we are Ronald’s parents. I told them when I arrived, “I am Uncle Ron’s Mama,” and they kept repeating “Uncle Ron’s Mama.” It was difficult to tell them goodbye when it was time for us to leave.

We ate lunch that day in the city with two government officials from the school system. The building we use for the care center is on the school property, so we try to keep a good relationship with these employees. The Toyota driver also had lunch with us and then drove us to Pingguo.

Many Miles Behind us and Many More to Go
Neil Taylor Christian Care Center Was Our First Stop


One week ago we left Atlanta and we have traveled many, many miles. Trips to China with Ron are challenging and not for the “faint-hearted.” But it’s a great adventure and experience if a person is flexible and does not expect a “luxurious tour.” It is anything but that! We go days without a shower or bed and have many meals of nuts and fruit in-between hotels. Don’t worry, we have not lost any weight!

From Shanghai we flew to Guilin where we met John Li, our worker over the foster care children in that city. John brought Lilly, a fellow-Christian and his English teacher, to meet us. She helps John with the visits to the orphan children. We had lunch together and then they saw us off at the train station as we left for Rongshui.

Rongshui is the city where our Neil Taylor Care Center is located. Most of you remember that King was our first burn patient to the U.S. and lived with Ron and me for 19 months. When he returned to China, he chose to go to this care center.


King came to meet us at the train station and had dinner with us the night we arrived. We did have a decent hotel that night and good food in the restaurant. King came back the next day about noon and went to lunch with us before we left by train for Nanning at about 3 p.m. King looked really great. He’s grown taller and was clean and neatly dressed. He lives at the high school but comes to the care center when he has time. He has classes all day and at night. He is studying seven subjects and said his work is very hard. He must study almost all the time to keep up his grades. He said he would have made 100 on an English test but carelessly made one mistake that cost him 4 points. He said he ranks #7 out of 67 students. We encouraged him to keep up the work because he wants to come to the United States for college. He was so sweet and our reunion with him was comfortable and lovely.

King’s thumb that had surgery has become bent due to scar tissue so he really needs to have more surgery to correct that as well as at least two facial surgeries. We will help him return just as soon as we can, but it can’t delay his education.

Due to an outbreak of N1H1, schools had closed in that city.
There were only 20 of our orphans still at the care center. The rest had gone home to visit relatives to reduce the risk of exposure. A 16-year old girl from our care center was in the hospital with fever but they did not know if it was the flu.
We only had about a half day at the care center but really enjoyed our time with the precious children who hung on our arms and loved having pictures made with us. The children never want us to leave so it’s hard when it is time to say goodbye.

Rongshui is difficult to travel to and it’s so remote, you feel like you are on a movie set when you arrive there and look around. It just doesn’t seem real to wake up with roosters crowing (at a nice hotel in the middle of the city). The only taxi available is a motorcycle with a covered tent-like structure over it. It only cost cents to ride in it. Only a few cars are on the roads.

How 15 Hours to Shanghai Turns into 24 Hours

For the past 15 months, Delta has operated a direct flight from Atlanta to Shanghai, taking 15 hours, at the most. We usually arrived in 14-l/2 hours. This flight started for the Olympics but they discontinued the flight in September of this year. Now, we have to go the long way to Shanghai.

We left our home Tuesday morning, October 27th, at 9:30 a.m. in the pouring rain. When we arrived at the Atlanta airport, we saw planes lined up to take off. We knew then we would be sitting on the plane for one extra hour before leaving due to the weather conditions. The flight was late boarding everyone because several people needed wheelchairs. After sitting on the plane at the gate for about an hour, the pilot came on and told us that a sick person and companion had to be removed from the plane because we would not have been able to land in Japan with them aboard. He said the problem was that they had to recover their luggage which had already been loaded. We waited another half hour and he announced again that all baggage had been removed and, as might have been expected, the passengers’ bags were in two different sections in the last baggage hold. We waited another 15 or 20 minutes for them to reload the baggage and get us on the taxi way to take off. Needless to say, we were two hours late leaving Atlanta.

Once airborne, we were in very bouncy weather conditions. This continued for an hour before the pilot came on the intercom and stated that the weather front extended all the way to Wisconsin and it would be another 30 minutes before we would be out of it and then the flight attendants could serve lunch. We were finally served lunch at 4 p.m. Atlanta time. I would have gotten something to eat at the airport had I known it would be this late. It was not great food but was still very welcome after having only cereal for breakfast at 7 a.m.

Ron’s seat would not recline. They reset the computer several times but decided to move us to other seats. They had to relocate a lady to another seat for us to have seats together. She was not happy with the move because she wanted a window seat. I suggested she take my former seat which was a window seat. It worked just fine and we all ended up happy.

We arrived in Japan at the Narita airport at 3:30 a.m. Atlanta time. We had three hours in that airport before catching another flight to Shanghai. It was a 3-hour flight so we arrived at 9:30 p.m. (China time) which was exactly 24 hours from the time we left home. We got to bed about midnight.

We will check out of this hotel soon and relocate to a hotel near the airport where we will fly out of early tomorrow morning. We will fly to Guilin and from there take a train to our Neil Taylor Christian Care Center at Rongshui.

In my next segment, I hope to have some pictures to post from the orphanages, but many of the students at the Neil Taylor Care Center have been sent home because of an outbreak of H1N1 flu in the schools. Schools have closed in an effort to prevent an epidemic.