A young woman’s unforgettable journey to her Chinese homeland

Insight

A young girl born in China and raised in the U.S. state of North Carolina.

20 years after she was adopted, Kelli Free went back to China to learn about her homeland.

While she didn’t learn much about her biological parents, she returned, a changed person.

CCTV America’s Asieh Namdar reports.

20-year-old Kelli Free was born in China. She was found in a cardboard box at a bus stop about 20 miles from the village of Langtian in Guangdong province in 1996.

She was six months old when she adopted by a North Carolina couple.

Her grandparents had promised to take her to China to learn about her homeland once she was old enough. They fulfilled that promise last year. A three-week journey chronicled in her journal and home videos.


Susan Soonkeum Cox on international adoption

For more about how international adoption works, CCTV America’s Elaine Reyes spoke with Susan Soonkeum Cox, a vice president at Holt International.

She’s been an adoption and child welfare advocate for more than twenty years.