The Country Making Orphanages Obsolete
The Country Making Orphanages Obsolete Milena Malanciuc clearly recalls the day she was sent to an orphanage, when she was just five. She had been playing in the park with her older cousin. On their return home, they found a large black car waiting at the gate of Milena’s house. Strangers ushered her into it without explaining why, or where they were taking her. The orphanage, she says, was a big, stark building made up of lots of corridors, filled with adults and children — 200 or so children in total, separated into dorms of around 12. “When the car drove off, I was confused, wondering what would happen to me. I didn’t understand why I was there, where my mother was, or where my freedom had gone,” says Milena. It transpired that the child’s mother, who had been single, unemployed and living in poor conditions, had died in hospital of an unknown illness — something Milena would not be told until two years later. She had aunts and uncles, but they weren’t in a position to take her in. Mile…
