Friends

Abigail is starting to understand how our naming system works. She knows that she has a Chinese middle name and an English family name, which she shares with the rest of her family. We are all Friends. It took a little bit of explaining at dinnertime to get her to understand that everyone else outside our family is not also named "Friend".

Back in the orphanage, all the kids will typically have the same family name, usually taken from the city where the orphanage is. So Abigail, whose orphanage was in Tongchuan, had the family name of "Tong".

It took a little bit to catch on why she was starting to refer to the girls she knows at church as Elizabeth Friend and Kari Friend and Rachel Friend. We first thought she was talking about her cousins. Yes, she does have a cousin Elizabeth Friend, but there is no Rachel in either of our families, and I suppose Kari could be confused with her cousin Kirsten.

When we figured out she was talking about her church friends, we got out the church picture directory and pointed out the family names of each of her friends. I think when she could see them in the context of their own families, she began to understand.

It probably didn't help that we sometimes refer to her friends as "your friend, Rachel" for example. In China, the family name is listed first, so their Friend Rachel would be Rachel Friend here in the US. Having "Friend" as a family name is certainly cool but I can see where it could really mess someone up. Particularly an adoptee from China.