'I am against international adoption, and this is why'

Student Danai Deblaere is the daughter of an Indian adopted child. She knows well how difficult it is to grow up in a white world where no one looks like you. The problems that arise as a result can be avoided by banning intercountry adoption, she writes.

22November 1976, Daisy, a two year old Indian girl arrives at Zaventem. She was adopted by a Belgian family with a great desire to have children, which unfortunately cannot be fulfilled in a natural way. Daisy's adoptive parents already have one biological daughter but they want to expand their family.

Daisy comes from a Missionaries for Charity orphanage in Mumbai. Daisy's adoptive parents search for their adopted child among the arrived children. They don't find her immediately. The child in the photo that they received from adoption agency De Joyzaaiers is nowhere to be found.

In the end, only one child remained of all adopted children: Daisy. She was not the girl in the photo, but she turned out to be the adopted child of the family in question. Daisy was two years old, but she looked much younger. Besides, she was not healthy. An extra day in India could have killed her.

Fortunately, Daisy didn't die, otherwise I wouldn't be able to write this opinion piece. Because I am her daughter.

And I can experience from the front row what it means to be adopted. Every day there is doubt and ignorance about important things in a human life. You have to look for answers to questions that are self-evident in a normal life.

The Hague Convention calls for as few transnational adoptions as possible. Adoptive parents must therefore first look for an adopted child in their own country.

Although there was no clear regulation on intercountry adoptions, the number of adoptions increased significantly from the 1960s onwards. For example, children came to Belgium without a residence permit. In some cases, children came to our country with false papers. This makes it even more difficult for the child to look for the biological parents.

Only in 1995 was there an international adoption convention, the Hague Convention. According to the Hague adoption convention, adoption is the last option for children who cannot find foster care and for parents who do not see their wish to have children fulfilled. Moreover, the treaty advocates as few transnational adoptions as possible. Adoptive parents must therefore first look for an adopted child in their own country.

This is already a step in the right direction, adopting a child from another continent, a different climate and a different culture means that those children have to adapt and that can cause the necessary psychological problems.

Inequality

International adoption exposes the inequality between the North and South of the world. Would we in Belgium accept that a rich Chinese family adopts a poor Belgian child? Most of the children who ended up here through a foreign adoption come from Asia, Africa, Latin America or the former Eastern Bloc countries.

Although poverty is not a reason to adopt children according to the Hague adoption convention, it still did after 1995. An important aspect of intercountry adoption is looking at the way in which other cultures deal with kinship. Anthropological studies show that cultures approach the principle of kinship in different ways. According to Western norms and values, this is a good reason to adopt a child, but who is the West to say what can and cannot be done?

My mom grows up in Sint-Denijs-Westrem, a well-to-do village on the outskirts of Ghent. She has everything a child needs during her childhood. Yet she is confronted with psychological problems and identity crises early on. In her village, no one looks like her, not even her family. She has no reference point at all on television and in school books. A brown girl grows up in a white, rich world, the contrast with her homeland couldn't be greater.

For years my mom has not been busy with her adoption story, she feels good and she feels at home. Until she has a daughter who starts to question her origins.

I realized early on that I had a different background, my mom often says that I already knew where India was before I could speak. I have been interested in our country all my life.

At the end of 2016 my mom made her roots journey together with me and my dad . We visited the state of Tamil Nadu, where my mom's roots lie. After spending three weeks in the south of India, we left for Mumbai, where my mother was an orphan in an orphanage run by Missionaries for Charity. This is the only place my mom has definitely been.

Why did we get so little information? Why couldn't they be fair?

We stayed in Mumbai for four days and went to the orphanage every day. Now there are only children with a disability because they have no place in Indian society. When we were at the orphanage for the first time, the children came directly to us. I picked up a child and then wanted to put it back down, but it wouldn't let go. It seemed like a kind of metaphor, my mom was once that child, a girl longing for love and a family.

Our last day in India is one that will stay with me forever, unfortunately not in a positive way. The orphanage sisters had promised to tell us what happened to my mom. My biological grandmother turned out to be pregnant unmarried, which is taboo in India, which is why many young mothers give up their children.

The sister added that she probably has a family now. This was a painful experience for me and my mom. We received no data, not even a name or a place of birth, just a picture of my mom in the orphanage. For the first time we saw my mom as an Indian child.

Why did we get so little information? Why couldn't they be fair? My mom and I still ask these questions every day. Part of your family, culture and identity is hidden.

Fraudulent Practices

There was a high demand but only a small supply. This is how child trafficking arises.

After some research into 'The Joy Seeders', my mom's adoption agency, I discovered that its founder, Father Eugène Delooz, entered into agreements with some orphanages in the early 1970s. He gave them money to bring children to Belgium. Although Father Delooz did this with the best of intentions, an adoption market was created. There was a high demand but only a small supply. This is how child trafficking arises.

The adoption agency lost its recognition in 2011 because too few adopted adoptions took place. The government wants the approved adoption agencies to place thirty children every year. The Joy Seeders did not meet those quotas. Now the organization is called 'Joy For Kids' and they are committed to sending as many Indian children as possible to school.

Six months after the recognition of the adoption agency was withdrawn, stories emerged from which it appeared that some of the adopted children who 'De Joyzaaiers' brought to Belgium were fraudulently taken away from their biological parents.

Adoption must be viewed from the perspective of the child and his or her biological family and culture. As a society, we must realize that there is an abuse of power in adoption and that children are being snatched from their families so that the adoption market, supported by government agencies, can continue.

Fortunately, there are currently numerous initiatives to guide adoptees, for example the Steunpunt Adoptie. International adoptions have fallen sharply in recent years and adoptees are increasingly coming out with their story.

But the positives of adoption are overshadowed by the negatives. How can you build a decent life when the most important questions in your life go unanswered, when you know that your adoption was most likely illegal, when you know that your grandmother may have been robbed of her own child?

Danai Deblaere is a journalism student at Artevelde University College Ghent

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