Ever wonder what happens to your file when it leaves Australia?

Well many of you would have heard about the "Matching Room" at the China Centre for Adoption Affairs CCAA in Beijing.  To our knowledge no SACAS member has had the honour of visiting CCAA.  We are therefore reliant upon two pictures taken, presumably by Americans, in March 2003.  If anyone has visited and has a more current picture please let us know.

 

When a dossier arrives at CCAA it is colour coded, given a Log-in-Date (LID) according to the month it was received, and filed in big cabinets.  At the appropriate time, dossiers are then sent to the "Review Room" to be checked and approved prior to being sent to the Number 2 Auditing Department, otherwise known as the "Matching Room".

 

The "Matching Room" is of course the place where the dossier from the prospective parents is matched with a child's dossier to become a referral.  One only has to look at the families who attend SACAS events to see that the CCAA staff really do a great job of matching.  An article entitled "Made in China" appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald of 20 August 2005 and a Chinese Official was quoted as saying:

 

"Our matching personnel are very experienced. First, they will look for proper candidates on our database according to the parents' requirements on age, sex, birthplace, health condition and so on. Then they try to find a child who is physically best resembling one of the parents."

 

The journalist, Hamish McDonald, goes on to note that as the child develops many begin to notice a resemblance not only in looks but in personality.  He notes with some surprise that "It sometimes seems as though the Chinese officials can make a psychological match as well." 

 

Of course this isn't a surprise to us!  Indeed some parents attribute this remarkable matching to more than just skilled staff.  Many of our members talk about red-threads of connection, fate, and divine intervention.  Whatever you're personal thoughts on this, the magic that occurs in the "Matching Room" is undeniable.  

 

Further information on CCAA can be found by selecting the English button on their website:

 

http://www.china-ccaa.org/frames/index_unlogin_en.jsp

 

The following photographs show dossiers with a May/June 2002 LID.  Some of these dossiers would even belong to SACAS Members!  Of course CCAA have relocated since these photographs were taken.  However they are still useful in gaining an appreciation of the scope of the task facing the staff of CCAA.