Am I Insane?

Well, after today, most people would likely have to answer "yes" to the question above.  A while ago, I received an email from a group that wanted to help provide New Year's gifts for every child at an orphanae.  They could guarantee us $2500, which allowed for the purchase of an $18 gift for each child at Ulan orphanage. 

Here is where the insane part comes in (well, at least my most recent trip into insanity).  I thought "wouldn't it be fun to let each child choose a gift for themselves?"  The rest of the Kids Connection staff thought it was a great (although challenging) idea.  Today was our first of many days of shopping at a local store with the children.  Ulan Orphanage currently has 143 children.  After a bit of convincing, we were given permission to take all but the youngest children shopping. 

Our morning started out by talking to the staff at the store.  We had talked to them the week before, dropped a letter off, and called to follow-up on the letter.  Even so, it took us about 30 minutes to get things set up and figured out with the manager.  This allowed us time to prepare our volunteers for the first onslaught of children. 

During the morning, we were able to take about 35 children shopping in three groups.  We did the same in the afternoon.  It went extremely well.  One thing that we were all impressed with was how patient and helpful the staff at the store were.  Many of them seemed to enjoy helping the children pick out gifts.  They quickly figured out that the children each had a certain amount to spend and I found that when a child came near, the staff members would often ask them how much they had left and then give them all the options for items within their price range. 

We had a system where we put stickers with the names of each child on each gift that they chose and then stored them in shopping carts until the end of the day.  After the children left, we got to check out and bag each item, trying to keep items from the same child in the same bag.  This process took about an hour.  It was a great day and the children and volunteers had a great time. 

Kiikzhan described the scene at the orphanage when he went to pick up children.  Before he had a chance to say anything, kids were piling into the car until it was full.  He then had to pull children out of the car until only a safe and reasonable number were left.  They were all excited to go to the store.  The only ones that showed any sense of not really enjoying it, were some of the older boys.  We will wait a couple weeks (after Thanksgiving) and then do this again with the remaining children.