Volunteering at an orphanage

So besides teaching in China, Amy and I will be volunteering at an orphanage. We will be doing this after we teach. As of right now, I don't quite know which orphanage we'd be volunteering at in China.

I have written a lot of emails to different organizations and people to figure out different possible orphanages that could use our help. This process of emailing and contacting people has been extremely frustrating. I've written to at least 35-40 different organizations and people that could assist me in finding an orphanage to volunteer at. Many have not responded but those who have, have been a huge help getting me closer to an orphanage to volunteer at.

After much research I've come to find 2 organizations that seem promising. One is called Shepherd's Field Children's Village and is located in Tian Jian-next to Beijing. This particular orphanage specializes in special needs children and rejected children that are found nearby. The other organization is called Home of Hope. This orphanage is right next to where we would be teaching at in Henan. Many of the children here are older, around 5-8 years old. Both of these orphanages are foreign-ran. This means that they are set up and ran by foreigners usually Americans. I think it is very rare that foreigners are aloud to volunteer in Chinese ran orphanages and that is why many of these volunteer options are foreign based.

I have to still think about the different choices and figure out budget to see which orphanage would be best to volunteer at.