Eating: Camille trains to be a supermodel

All the orphanage told us was that Camille liked to eat rice congee and sweet things. The White Swan offered us a dazzling array of foods to choose from. During the first week we offered Camille everything: rice congee, watermelon, banana, rice cereal, egg, rice, bread, cheese, rusks, nashi pear, kiwi fruit, orange, cornflakes, rice bubbles and even cheerios.

She ate nothing. That tiny little mouth clamped shut and totally refused to even taste the smallest morsel. In fact the first thing she took a bite of was paper. Yes, she chewed paper. Ruth, another member of our group, said that Camille was training to be a super-model (a thought which offered no comfort to her despairing mother).

Postscript. Camille has made a giant leap forward and is now eating rice congee (provided it is flavoured with chicken) and she has been seen nibbling on the odd Vita Weet biscuit and potato chip.