alan headrick

Cha Grand is a very small town out in the middle of nowhere. Maybe a few thousand people.Which is a good thing. Likely anyone you contact there would know something.I see 10 churches in the town. The orphanage you listed does not come up for anywhere for a 100 miles. So its either closed or maybe changed names. My guess is it might be associated with a church. I am guessing you have immigration paperwork showing you came from that orphanage in that town? If that's the case this should be fairly easy to find your family. Unless they packed up and moved away. Always try and find old people for help, they know a lot of people and places. Once you start searching, don't send one message and wait for an answer. Send many messages to as many people as possible. I wasted a lot of time waiting for people to answer and they never did.I wonder if these churches could be on Facebook?Do get overwhelmed with the search. Just get organized and chip away at it every day. Never discount anything until you know for sure. Follow all leads to the end.

Here are some suggestions to get you started. You have some good information to go on. Write everything down you know and any story's. Keep track of people you contact after looking for a long time you will end up going in circles. It took me 12 years to find my daughter in law's mother in Japan, I am sure I annoyed a lot of people recontacting them. Use Facebook to search. I don't use it and never found anyone on it. However there are some search groups on there that might help. You could get lucky and find her or a sibling in case they are looking for you.Look for any local message boards for the town where you were born.Try to contact the orphanage for help.DNA test with Ancestry and 23andme, might get lucky and find a close cousin to help out.You can also post on GSadoptionregistry.comSee if you can find a phone book, search for your mothers town and look for the same last name. You might need a translator to call and see if they are related. Likely your mom lives somewhere near the orphanage, I mean general area like same city.Contact churches they would likely help. Use Google maps to look around.Think like a detective and try to find someone there who will help out, speaks the language and knows about customs and how people think.And...if anyone asks for money run....

Some countries like China and Korea it seems to be. Japan its a no no. I had to help someone order and send in their kits to process.

My suggestion is to contact 325kamra. They will help you with DNA testing and with your search.

This post is a little old, so not sure if you have made any progress since this post.I am helping my Japanese daughter in law find her family and here are some ideas.You should DNA test with Ancestry.com and 23andme. Then upload the results from 23andme to GEDmatch. You might get lucky and find a close cousin that knows your family. I think Walgreens, walmart and Target sell 23andme test kits.I know with my wife's family, everyone is on Facebook. I think Facebook is free in the PI so I would make some posts and see what comes up. Watch out for scams!!! Do you have your adoption paperwork? If not you will need to file a freedom of information act request with USCIS for your immigration paperwork. That should contain a letter from your mother releasing you from her care. If it was an adoption agency then you could go through them.Your adopted parent should have some of this information, but some times these are hard things to deal with. My daughter in law's adopted family refused to help. So I had to take a couple years to figure it all out myself.Keep notes and any stories you hear, little pieces of information could be very important. Try to think of yourself as a police detective, follow every lead, and when you get some DNA cousins contact all the ones at least 4th cousin or better. Find out family names and home towns and write it down.Good luck