Adoptee Gives Ger to Family in Need

Adoptee AJ Formica’s skill for throwing javelin led to a very special fundraiser — providing a safe, warm home to a struggling family in Mongolia.

Each time AJ Formica threw javelin at his track meets last spring, he had a little extra motivation. Because with each throw, he was raising money to help a family like the one he was born to in Inner Mongolia. 

It all started the previous year on June 7, the anniversary of the day AJ was adopted 14 years ago. Each year on this day, AJ and his parents — Joe and Ellen Formica — watch the videos from when they first met. They reminisce about how 2-and-a-half-year-old AJ immediately stole their hearts, and how smart he was to recognize his adoptive parents from the photobook they had sent him at his orphanage months prior.

Adopted From Inner Mongolia

While AJ was adopted from China, he is from the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia that borders the country of Mongolia — and has always more closely identified with Mongolia as his birth country and culture. Growing up, he heard stories of the wide, expansive grasslands and yurt-like homes that his parents remember from their trip to Inner Mongolia to adopt him.  

AJ’s parents were matched with AJ through Holt’s special needs program in China at the time, as AJ was born with a cleft lip and a developmental difference in his left ear that resulted in hearing loss. While AJ was a baby in China, he had surgery to correct his cleft lip. Shortly after AJ arrived home in Pennsylvania, he had four additional ear surgeries to help restore his hearing. Because of the early care he received in the orphanage, as well as once he was adopted, these medical obstacles are of no consequence to 17-year-old AJ today.

“From the minute he came into our home from China, and we ate at the dining room table, he would reach across the table and hold my wife’s hand while they ate,” Joe says. “We knew we had adopted someone very special. And it’s not his intelligence and his athleticism, but it’s what’s in his heart.”

Although, it’s become apparent that AJ is quite the gifted athlete as well.

A Standout in Javelin

AJ first tried javelin almost by accident, when he unknowingly as a first-timer signed up for a clinic with a group of experienced javelin throwers. He remembers seeing the javelin spin like a helicopter through the air when he threw it.

“I didn’t know what I was doing,” AJ says. But from that point on he was hooked — accepting the challenge of learning the sport.

And it turns out, with training and dedication, AJ is quite good. At the second meet he threw javelin in as a freshman, he placed first in the state. At the 2023 New Balance Nationals in Philadelphia, AJ placed second among all the freshmen.

Joe is a school counselor and sees great promise in both his son’s athleticism and high academic achievement. But he also wanted to instill in his son a heart for service, to build upon the kindness and compassion that is already so evident in AJ’s personality. So together, they began to think through a service project that would be a good fit for AJ’s interests and talents.

A Service Project for Mongolia

It was while looking through Holt’s Christmas Gifts of Hope catalog that everything came together. They saw that the catalog included the gift of a safe, warm home for a family in need — the example being a “ger,” the very yurt-like home that AJ’s parents remember seeing in Inner Mongolia.

“I was most likely born in one of those,” AJ says, “And that would be a home that my biological parents and family would have lived in in Inner Mongolia. So, we thought that would be a great way to help a family similar to my biological family.”

They came up with a fun way to raise money to purchase a ger for a family in need, creating giving tiers, and an associated cost-per-foot donation for each official throw AJ logged in his sophomore year track-and-field season. Donors could choose to pledge a $25 flat-rate “participation” level, a “bronze” rate of 1 cent per foot, “silver” at 2 cents per foot or “gold” at 5 cents per foot.

AJ reached out to all his family and friends about his goal to provide a ger to a family in Mongolia. Throughout his track-and-field season, he shared with them video and email updates about his progress.

“I was most likely born in [a ger]. And that would be a home that my biological parents and family would have lived in in Inner Mongolia. So, we thought that would be a great way to help a family similar to my biological family.”

AJ was so appreciative and humbled by the generosity of the 25 donors who stepped up to give — all people who had been part of AJ’s life since he was adopted. Together they raised $3,500, enough to provide a brand new ger to a family in need.

AJ sent the money he raised to Holt, not knowing who exactly he would be helping in Mongolia. But across the world, his gift was about to be the miracle a family was waiting for.

A Family in Need of a Ger

Three years ago in Mongolia, Bayarmaa lost her husband to a sudden heart attack, leaving her alone to provide for her five children. Once her husband died, his side of the family made Bayarmaa and her children move out of the house they shared together. Bayarmaa rented a small apartment room, but it was cold, dirty and tiny. She had to send her two youngest children to a residential kindergarten that would keep them 24 hours during the weekdays, because there wasn’t enough room for all of them at home.

Bayarmaa worked part time at a cafeteria, but she didn’t earn enough to support all of her children — and certainly didn’t have enough to afford a bigger, safer home for them.

“This family is desperate for a ger of their own and has requested help,” reads Holt Mongolia’s intake report about the family. “A ger dwelling would ensure a place where the mother can live comfortably with her children in a safe environment, lessening the financial burden she continues to face and raising them to be well and healthy.”

When AJ sent in the funds he raised to provide a ger to a family in need, the team at Holt Mongolia knew exactly who needed it most. 

Within weeks, the funds were transferred, a ger was built, and Bayarmaa and her children moved in.

Today, they are all living together, safe and warm as winter comes. Bayarmaa’s youngest two children are receiving ongoing support from Holt sponsors and donors to ensure they can go to school, and help meet their daily needs.

Full Circle

AJ and his parents were so grateful to learn about Bayarmaa and her children, and how their service project changed their lives and will keep them safe this winter.

“We were there in June, and it was cold in June,” Joe says, remembering their trip to Inner Mongolia years ago. “I cannot imagine the winters.”

And for AJ, giving a ger is a profound connection to his beginnings in Inner Mongolia, and an opportunity for his life as a Mongolian adoptee to come full circle.

“My biological parents, whatever their circumstances were, they weren’t able to give the life they wanted for me,” AJ says, “so they trusted in Holt International to give me the life that they hoped that I would have. … Holt was able to set me up with two of the best parents in the world. I’m just grateful for Holt and everything they’ve done for me getting me to where I am today.”