Tell me if this sounds strange to you, too ...

The US Department of Homeland Security and the FBI are among the groups advising Cambodia's new national heritage police force, the agency that will be responsible for protecting the country's ancient temples from pillage.

Sure, I get that the FBI might have something going on illicit trading in antiquities, but Homeland Security? Sounds a bit of a stretch.

And... more

Just last week, I wrote about the virtual impossibility of adopting internationally from South Africa in the context of one family who has been relentlessly pursuing the process for a little girl, now two-years-old, abandoned at birth and left head-first in a bucket under a tree.

Linking to the US State Department's intercountry adoption page that details... more

The US State Department has posted a warning on their intercountry adoption page on Guatemala, and it's not pretty.

Read the whole thing, please, if you have any connection with adoptions from Guatemala, but I'll give a quick overview here. Please keep in mind that I am no expert on Guatemalan adoptions ... or much of anything, for that matter ... so am summing up to the best of my understanding a complicated situation from a hard-earned perspective of cynical suspicion.

Basically,... more

Continued from the previous post where we've started the process of wrangling some out-of-control scraps back into their doggy bag, hoping to come up with something digestible that won't make us all sick.

Some yahoos get a whiff that an orphanage in Cambodia has closed, then come across an offcut that hints at a dwindling orphan population, and VOILA!, it's an international adoption smorgasbord.

What had been a scintilla and a shred suddenly morph... more

It has been brought to my attention that some yahoos gnawing on an anti-adoption bone are taking a scrap and passing it off as a meal on groups around the adoption community.

Apparently, having heard that an 'orphanage' in Cambodia is closing down, said yahoos ... who we'll refer to as yahoos -- no caps -- for the duration of this post since I am so veddy-veddy polite, you see, and other more appropriate titles might offend ... have managed to mutate the information into something that nicely fits the narrow little agenda they have handy and would so like to fill with... more

If you haven't already seen Lisa's post of the NPR abomination I'm calling "A very few things hastily considered", please take a look.

Anyone wanting to tell National Public Radio what they think of this biased piece of dangerous bandwagon-jumping they're passing off as responsible broadcasting can write to them here.

Since many of our children come from marginalized indigenous populations... more

An historic event will be taking place in Cambodia at the end of November. From the 24th through the 2nd of December the first ever team sport World Cup will be held in the country.

Appropriately enough, the sport is volleyball for the disabled, and the venue is Phnom Penh's Olympic Stadium.

The Phnom Penh World Cup will be the biggest ever World Organization of Volleyball for the Disabled (WOVD) competition in the history of the organization with... more

We were looking at good news from Cambodia, and although there's a bit more of that, this good-and-not-so-good news strikes me this morning as being so typical of how the world works.

Seems that Cambodia has been doing so well at achieving "satisfactory" progess on the HIV/AIDS front that three international donors have decided to cut back on the amount of help they give the country.

The... more

Starting off this week's Cambodian news update on the upbeat, an announcement for people who will be in the NYC/Long Island area from the 29th of November to the 1st of December ... a simple online registration process can have 25% of what you pay for any purchases made at either the Americana Manhasset or Wheatly Plaza shopping centers be donated to The Sharing Foundation, a great organization that's been taking care of kids in Cambodia for almost 10 years.

For more information,... more

According to a blogger who seems up on the facts, the tide may be turning against the anti-adoption front when it comes to international adoptions, and it's gaining steam over the suspended process in Nepal.

Citing amongst other things this article, "Diplomats Urge Nepal to Resolve Adoption Deadlock", the point is made that at the very least, families in the process at the... more