Almost every adoption experience involving adoption from Russia involves gifts for the orphanage. This is actually harder than it seems, as gifts for the orphanage involves gifts for the orphanage workers, for the doctors, and for the multitude of people who process your paperwork along the way. And don't forget your translator, your driver, and your facilitator, who should all be properly thanked. In Russia, that means a big Bolshoi Spasiba as well as a very nice present.

Russia has a gift-giving culture. It is very normal to bring a small gift when you visit someone or meet them for the first time. We do that here, too, but in my neck of the woods it's really only done when you are going to a very nice party, or if you're staying with someone for a long time. I think that's pretty typical of most regions in the U.S.

But in Russia it's different. Gifts are expected (or maybe I should say required) by the multitude of people involved in your adoption process. When we went to Russia we were pretty lame with our gifts, I think. I didn't really know what to get so I brought a bunch of costume jewelry, some scarves, and stuff like that (most of the people you are dealing with are women, but you should bring a few unisex items just in case) . My husband is a professional photographer so we also brought some of his landscape photography. The photographs were very well received by the beaureaucrat-types in the MOE's office. The jewelry and scarves were sniffed at by our facilitator (as gifts for the orphanage workers) so we think we didn't do too well in that regards.

We gave cash to our translator and our driver - they seemed very pleased with that present. Please note that some agencies do not allow their workers or contractors to receive cash as gifts as it might be considered a bribe, so keep that in mind. We didn't see it as a bribe at all since it was at the end of our trip. We saw it more as a tip. Our translator and driver were so incredibly wonderful while we were in our region we wanted to give them something that would have impact on their lives. Money seemed very appropriate.

We also brought a suitcase full of clothes and toys for the children in the orphanage, although the orphanage director did not seem particularly impressed by what we brought. She had asked, on the first trip, for us to bring booties for the kids but I had a hard time finding any that weren't too expensive...so I guess I disappointed her.

So - since I've confessed at blowing the gift-giving portion of our trip, here are some possibilities that might work better. I've gleaned these suggestions from various adoption listservs that I read. You are expected to bring 10-12 generic gifts for the people you'll run into. I tried to spend no more than $10/gift, which may have been a little chintzy, but at that point we really needed to economize.


--bags of makeup from companies like Clinique, Mary Kay, etc. I think this might be fairly expensive, so it occurred to me you could also make your own at a place like Walmart by buying a little makeup bag and filling it with makeup basics. -

--hand-made items are appropriate, but let's get real: only give them really nice hand-made things. You know if you're good at making something.

--Nice chocolates or a local food item. I live close to Chapel Hill, NC, home of A Southern Season, and in retrospect I should have gone there and picked up some gift boxes of various delicious food items. Everyone likes to eat, and they package them very nicely there. But it also would've been bulky and heavy...so you need to keep that in mind.

--Buy something while you're there. In Moscow everything seemed really pricey but I bet while we were in the region we could've gotten something really great and inexpensive and it would've been something which we wouldn't have had to cart all over the universe. But we didn't know how much time we'd have, so that's an issue.

What did you bring for your orphanage gifts? More suggestions would be appreciated!