These days, the daily flight from Moscow to New York City carries a few American families with Russian children all with pasty complexions and brand new, ill fitting American clothing.
Russian law allows foreign nationals to adopt Russian orphans.
In some cases, the problems were minor and readily treatable, but some children are diagnosed with vague ailments, developmental delays that are hard to quantify, though they do make the children available for adoption. Perhaps the diagnosis a well-intentioned lie, in hopes that the child will have a far better life in the US than an orphan s fate in today s Russia. Or maybe it is a callous device used by local officials to keep the lucrative adoption business going. We learn that she was an unplanned child, and that she was placed in the Home at birth. Born prematurely, Olya has been diagnosed with a vague developmental disability.