Happy Birthday Princess Tian-Tian

My Precious Daughter,

Today is your seventh birthday. I hope it is a great day, despite the fact that you will spend it as you have your last six birthdays--in a cold and lonely orphanage. Now that you are getting older, you may be wondering why you've never been able to share your special day with your family. "Why haven't Mama and Baba brought me gifts? Why haven't they visited in all the years I've lived here? Don't they love me?" These are perfectly reasonable questions to ask and I will do my best to answer them.

Do you know why grown-ups have wrinkles in their skin and grey in their hair? It is because of the important decisions they have to make every day of their lives. Often times, these choices they have to make are not easy and as a result, they suffer more than you could imagine. Undoubtedly, the woman who gave birth to you has developed a lot of wrinkles and grey hair in the seven years since she decided to give you up. We will never know her reasons (or her husband's reasons) for doing so, but I am certain that she has agonized over her decision.

Here's why you've never received any gifts or visits from your parents: Because your real parents live all the way across the world in the United States and it took us a long, long time to find you. We actually talked about adopting a little girl in China the day Alex (your Ge-Ge, or big brother) was born in 2000. In 2006, when you were still a baby, Mama and I started searching for a daughter, but we found Truman (your Di-Di, or little brother) in China in 2008 while we were waiting for our baby girl. Not long after that we decided to resume our search for our daughter. And do you know what? About a month after your sixth birthday we saw a photo of the most beautiful girl in all of China and we knew that at long last we had found our daughter. And of course, that beautiful girl was you!

We're sorry it has taken so long to find you and we're sorry you have to spend this special day apart from your family, but we promise that you'll never be alone on your birthday ever again. We promise to give you a cozy home with a nice soft bed to sleep in, two silly brothers and a bunch of toys to play with, and all the love we have in our hearts so that you will never doubt how special and cherished you are. Happy birthday Mei-Mei. We'll be there to bring you home as soon as we can. Wo ai ni! (I love you!)

Love,

Daddy (Baba)