A new mission to China
An Easton woman helps her adopted son trace his birth parents — and the contradictions of his mysterious youth
Julia Norris and her son, Christian, whom she adopted from an orphanage in China. They eventually located his birth parents and will be going to China this week to meet them and other family members. (Baltimore Sun photo by Barbara Haddock Taylor / August 19, 2009)
EASTON — – The boy was near age 6 when he was abandoned in 1998. Police found him under a bridge in Luoyang, a city in eastern
China. Unable to learn how he got there or where he came from, officers deposited him at a busy orphanage in town.
That was the story Julia Norris heard two years later, in June 2000, when she visited the orphanage. That was still the story in April 2001, when she returned to adopt the boy and bring him to America. And it remained the story this spring as Christian Norris finished 10th grade at Easton High School, where he plays lacrosse and has a crew of buddies.
