|
|
Adopted from Russia in ‘97, Buckner Summer Intern Revisits Her
Orphanage ‘Home’
Julia Howard of Dallas, a student at Baylor University in Waco,
waited in an Italian restaurant in the heart of St. Petersburg,
Russia, for Anatoly Ulianov, director of Orphanage No. 9, to arrive.
It was the first time she had seen the man who, for seven years
of her life, had been a father figure of sorts for her when she
was a resident at the orphanage.
Howard, who was serving as a Buckner summer missions intern in
St. Petersburg, nervously fingered the gift she had brought from
her new home state – a figurine of a Texas longhorn – and wondering
what kind of reunion the two would have.
When Ulianov arrived, he broke out into a huge smile and gathered
her into his arms in a bear hug that many say is the director’s
trademark. Over the next hour and later, during a tour of the
orphanage, the two caught up on events since Howard’s remarkable
adoption story.
Howard, 21, lived at Orphanage No. 9 from age 7 until she was
adopted at 16 in 1997. She had come to the orphanage from another
one in a rural area because she showed academic promise. When
she neared her 16th birthday though, her promising future seemed
close to being cut short. Sixteen is the age many Russian orphans
are removed from orphanages – often to fend for themselves.
Officials at Buckner working with Russian orphanage knew of Julia’s
potential and her impending release and desperately sought a home
for her. Enter what some might have considered an unlikely candidate:
The widowed mother of three adult children, Jackie Howard. A series
of positive Russian bureaucratic events catapulted Julia’s adoption
process in time to beat the Russian government-imposed deadline
for adoption age just days prior to Julia’s 16th birthday.
As Howard and Ulianov toured her former home, they shared thoughts
about each other and her time at No. 9.
Passing the dormitory room she shared with three other girls,
she stepped in, commenting, “The room seems so much smaller than
I remember them.”
As the pair stepped out onto the entry steps, he pointed to them,
recalling, “When she left, the whole orphanage was crying. We
came out – it was in the evening – we all came out, standing on
the steps. Everyone was crying and she was crying too, and when
we think about her we have very warm memories. She was a wonderful
girl.”
The reminiscence brings tears to her eyes. She admitted that the
reunion “was kind of like coming home. It wasn’t a home, but it
did have that old feeling to it, just seeing people that played
a part in my life.”
As a Buckner intern, Howard helped organize and conduct Vacation
Bible School-type camps for orphans. Between camps, she and other
interns worked in children’s orphanages, a hospital for street
children and a hospital for infants whose mothers have tested
positive for HIV.
During camp, she helped lead music, teach Bible verses and crafts,
as well as soothing hurt feelings or skin knees – in the children’s
own language.
Looking at the reason she came back, to serve Russian orphan children,
Howard said she was “really excited to get a chance to actually
go back and give something to the kids. And also to just go back
and get to see…the life that I used to have from different point
of view, in a way.”
“The fact that she came back to work here speaks about her qualities,”
said Ulianov. “I know that not that many would want to work with
the difficult kids that we have in the camps.”
Howard said her Russian heritage helped her serve those children
through working in missions camps and in orphanages. “For one,
I know how to speak Russian so I can communicate. And also, it’s
easier for me to relate to the kids – I kind of know what they
are going through.” bt |
|
|
|
|
