This year, too, we received another letter of thanks from Surabaya. It is always beautiful and heartwarming to see the photos of the children who have received medical treatment.

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In The donation from the Lions Club Putten was well spent. Three young children were therefore able to be operated on.

It has now been 43 years since I was born in the Jati Margo children's home, in Semarang, Indonesia. My birth mother stayed with me for 2 weeks, with an older brother or sister. I'm not sure exactly. Nor why she stayed. Spicy delivery? Emotional ground? The fact is that I was well looked after by a couple who worked there. And by all the other supervisors and children. That's what Els de la Croix (former leader) told me when I was 17^e I was allowed to stay in Jati Margo with my parents for 2 weeks. In the meantime, she had started running another children's home, Eagle's Nest, where I also visited.

My dad picked me up when I was 5 months old. He stayed in the children's home for 10 days, and had a great time there; the cosiness, warmth and love for his new baby are 4^e child. My mother stayed home with the 3 boys, the youngest of whom was also adopted, from Seoul. I grew up in a warm and nice family in Oosterhout. Got all the attention from my 3 big sweet brothers who were very happy with me, and fought so to give me the bottle. And I had every opportunity to develop in whatever I wanted: playing piano and guitar, singing in choirs, playing chess, dancing, swimming, gymnastics. Actually, nothing was too crazy; if only I wanted to. And I wanted it all, at the same time. Thanks to my parents, I had the opportunity to study, live in rooms, study abroad, and grow up at my own pace. Now I am a mother of 2 wonderful daughters, a musician, teacher trainer and chairman of a national network for (teachers and student counselors of) gifted students in higher education. Proud of myself for doing this. Thanks to my parents.

Getting adopted is wonderful. The chance to live a (probably a lot) better life, with so much more love and opportunities... that's something I want all children from all countries. I understand that adoption is going very well for many children, like me, and that many children are not doing well at all. In terms of papers, illegal, human trafficking, attachment issues...

Despite that, I hope that stopping the adoption of children from abroad can be reversed so that all people who so much and consciously want to adopt a child can become fathers or mothers, and so that those children grow up in love. To do so, we will have to stand up, together with our political leaders, to investigate what caused the abuses and how we can combat them.

I would be lying if I said I haven't experienced attachment problems in my life... And houses with crosses. But it doesn't outweigh all the beauty I see, feel and experience to this day. A rich life.