Angelina Jolie in Time Magazine

Time Magazine has a great article up about Angelina Jolie and her latest adoption. There’s not a whole lot in there that’s news to us but it’s still a good read. They do have some background info on Pax’s life to date.

It mentions how Pax was only one month old when he was abandoned by his mother at a hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, leaving after his birth. For 30 days, the hospital put up notices and searched for his mother, then they placed him in the orphanage while police still attempted to find his birth parents.

Angelina entered the picture, applying through an international adoption agency to Vietnam, searching for a healthy boy between the ages of 3 and 5 - it turns out Pax was the one and only boy at that orphanage who fit the request, because although there were 31 other boys within that age range they were either unhealthy or they still had relatives (presumably they would have been put in the orphanage due to hard times in the hopes that they could return to their family some day). The article says that Vietnam’s national adoption director had ten files for boys for Angie’s request, from various orphanages.

Apparently only 30% of the children at Tam Binh actually get placed; in fact of all the children in the photo from the orphanage, only Pax was set for adoption.

Pax is off for a better life but he will be very missed by Bui Thi Bach Tuyen, his primary caregiver at the orphanage for the past 18 months. She was quoted.

She said, however, she wasn’t worried about how he will adjust to a new style of food in America because he already eats some Western foods like yogurt and spaghetti.

For the first three years, according to Vietnam’s adoption laws, Angie will have to send reports every six months to keep them up to date on his physical health, mental development, and his general life such as hobbies.

Ho Thi Kim Thoa who helps run the orphanage said this about Angelina Jolie.