Twelve-year-old Lizzy is a reluctant participant in a post-adoption trip to China. She's a last-minute addition to the Red Ribbon group and struggles with a required letter to her biological mother. "I don't want to write to someone who just left me on a railroad bench when I was born."
Once in her birth country, Lizzy leaves the note in the deserted courtyard of the ruins of her orphanage, next to a lone ginkgo tree. She spots a peasant woman, kneeling by a lotus pond across the street. When Lizzy and her heart mom try to deliver another letter to the nearby police station, she sees the same woman. Or at least she thinks she does.