Raina Hoffman

Albinism

Pretty, precious, precocious. Raina is this and more. Like all children, in one way or another, she is perfect. In a small town in Georgia, a Chinese girl with pale white skin, white hair and crystal blue eyes gets attention. She’s the local celebrity.

Her parents were looking to adopt a Chinese child and found it difficult because of a quota. They discovered another list, of special needs children. They found a little boy with Albinism, but he had health problems and the orphanage took him off the list. That is when they found Raina.

Like Dora from her favorite children’s book, Raina likes to explore. Her favorite destinations are inside her house. Outside “is mostly where I bump my head.”

Raina is in first grade. If she holds books very close she can make out the words. “She’s doing really, really well,” her mother says. “And considering that she has astigmatism too. At the end of last year she took a standard reading test where they have to read 30 words in 60 seconds. And she read 74.”

With many friends, she’s a social butterfly. One friend tells people that Raina is blind. “Sometimes I want to tell people but my friends just go and say it right before me and I want to speak for my own self!”

Raina has two dogs, Uno and Flash and a cat named Fridge. She also has a brother. A year after they adopted Raina, the boy with health problems was doing better and was put back on the list. They went back and brought him home. His name is Isaiah. They are quite a pair.

“Raina has made life very interesting,” her mother says. “I’ve learned a lot of things that I never thought I would learn. She’s very lively, she’s a lot of fun. Sometimes she’s kind of strong willed and difficult. She’s a colorful character. We don’t know what we’d do without her.”

WHAT RAINA SEES