Is this a legal means of adoption?

Question

In my novel, I want to have a mother travel back to her birthplace - the Philippines - and adopt a young girl she spends time with in a local orphanage. Is this arrangement legally possible? If not, how can I change circumstances?

Answer 1

If she is an American, just have the orphanage run by someone (probably a convent of nuns) who is respected by the local authorities. The Mother Superior says something like, "Don't worry. I'll call our attorney in the morning and get the paperwork started. It's not that hard." She says it far enough in advance of when the adopting mother needs to leave that there's a quick scene where the local authority drops by the completed papers, the Mother Superior offers him a cup of tea, and you get a chance to fill in any information the reader is going to need over that cup of tea.

If the new mother is single, you could make this polite official do some serious flirting over that tea, and add a whole new complication.

Of course, you could also make a plot line involving the papers not getting done in time, or some second cousin of the kid who wants to stall but really cannot afford to take care of the kid, and a local judge who explains it to the cousin and he signs. Or whatever. There are many possibilities for plot, but the reality is a bureaucratic paper shuffle, and little more. Some fees, no doubt.

Answer 2

It definitely is. Children are often placed in orphanages to await adoption (that may never come, since they are older than the "ideal" baby everyone seems to want to take home). To add a conflict, however, you can make the child's biological mother still be alive, and as your main character tries to take the girl back to the U.S. with her, well...

Answer 3

Yes, it is perfectly legal. As long as there is documented things that say by law the adoption took place it is fine.