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June 20, 2017

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Home » City specials » Hangzhou

An orphan’s quest to find her birth parents

CHINESE-AMERICAN Katie Iles was abandoned at a train station in Zhejiang Province as a baby and ended up in an orphanage. She was adopted by a couple from Boston 23 years ago. Now she is looking for her birth parents.

She has little to go on. No birth date or birth certificate. No original name or actual birthplace.

A few years back, Iles and her American family visited the Zhejiang Orphanage where she was taken as a baby in search of more information. They made no progress.

Last month, after finishing her bachelor’s degree in psychology, Iles decided to give it a second try. Along with her sister, who was adopted from the city of Guangzhou, she booked a flight from Boston to the capital of Guangdong Province.

“A piece of my heart is missing,” Iles said. “It can only be filled by my birth parents. I hope one day to find them.”

When her flight to Guangzhou was delayed and she was shifted to another flight, Iles found herself sitting next to a woman from Hangzhou. Her seatmate happened to know a journalist who once work for a Hangzhou newspaper.

The paper, City Express, is a leading paper in Zhejiang Province, and it owns the online platform Kuai Zhao Ren, which means “search for people fast.” Its aim to reunite people with missing relatives and friends.

Iles’ search quickly appeared in other provincial media, including Ningbo. Her photos and a video spread across social media. In the video she said, “My biggest wish is to know who you are. My life has been very beautiful and I want you know that. But I also want you to know that you are also part of my life. I forgive you, I love you and I want to say thank you for giving me life.”

The appeal brought an outpouring of responses. A Ningbo family came forth, claiming Katie was their daughter. Ten days later, another family in the city made a similar claim. Iles flew to Ningbo.

City Express helped arrange DNA tests at the Di’an Forensic Center in Hangzhou, where a Shanghai Daily journalist met Iles and the families.

One family, surnamed Chen, has a daughter and a son, both in their 20s. The other family, surnamed Wang, has three daughters.

“We left our daughter at a train station when she was 17 days old,” said father Li. “Three doctors had diagnosed her with a heart condition.”

“We left the baby at a train station because we were too poor to care for another girl,” said father Wang.

“When’s my birthday?” Iles asked Wang.

“I don’t remember the exact date, it’s been so long ago,” he replied awkwardly.

“They almost abandoned me, too,” said the youngest girl in the Wang family. “It was my grandma who stopped them.”

Wang said Iles shares the family’s nose and profile. Li said she looks very much like her mother.

The Chen family lives in a village of 160 people. When Chen showed Iles’ photo to other villagers and asked who she looked like, they all answered, “Your wife.”

“If you were my daughter,” said Chen. “I would ask you not to hate your mother. Hate me. It was me who made the decision to abandon the baby.”

The mother, in tears, couldn’t utter a word.

“I am here because of love, not hate,” said Iles. “I was brought up in America and tend to think like an American. You know, be optimistic.”

After the DNA swabs were taken, the two families and Iles toured the scenic sites in Hangzhou and ate meals together.

Three days later, the results came back. Neither family was biologically linked to Iles.

The DNA information is recorded on the database and will be used to match the genetic material of any families searching for a lost daughter.

But the story does not quite end there.

The City Express and Iles have initiated an online group that helps American children adopted from China to look for their birth parents.

Iles posted a notice on the Facebook Adoptee Group and invited people to join a WeChat site.

“Despite the disappointing outcome so far where I am concerned, this has been an extraordinary experience and I want to help others in their search of parents,” Iles wrote in the post.

According to Public Radio International (www.pri.org/stories/2016-02-11/born-chinese-raised-american-adoptee-explores-her-identity), there has been a huge wave of Chinese adoptions over the years, with 80,000 children going to the US and 40,000 children going to other countries. Many of the adoptees are girls because of a traditional preference for son in China.




 

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