Shanghai Healing Home

The expat community is relatively small here considering the number of people that are in Shanghai, roughly 24 million. You end up bumping into the same people from place to place. I had this experience when I decided to volunteer with BEAN an organization that has volunteer opportunities for young people all over the world. They coordinate with the Shanghai Healing Home (check out their site!) on a regular basis, which is an awesome non-profit that provides a home and surgeries for orphans with cleft palates. They have two locations, I volunteered to help do some weekly chores at the house in Pudong and after the group of about 15 people finished cleaning the mats and toys we got to play with them. It was a truly rewarding experience and I met a friend of a friend there who also knew Trent. She knew me because Trent had told her about my trials and tribulations with trying to bring my cat, Gus here. I haven't had another chance to volunteer again but I hope to soon. Here are some photos of the babies and the volunteers, we learned that the infants do not stay in the home beyond the age of 2 and the house can hold  I think they said 24 infants at a time and they are a very successful organization saving children that would otherwise not have a chance.