Friday June 1, 2007

 

 

Hola y'all!

 

We had a fun Friday evening! First we went to our café, and then to the town square. There was some sort of kid's event going on.. There were lots of kids very dressed up jumping on the inflatable alligator and riding the "power wheels" (both provided by capitalists who bought the stuff and the permit to sell on the street. All of this happening, directly in front of the statue of Mr. Lenin. Very weird) A couple of adult beverages—the soft stuff for me Chernehivskya Pivo, and the first introduction to Russian Vodka for the Mrs. (she is now sound asleep in the other room!! (Quite funny)!)

 

We had a great visit with Daniil this afternoon. In the past visits, we tried to pack way too much into our "get-togethers". He is much happier walking around the grounds and playing with the sobaka (dog) rather than having us entertain him every moment..

 

The performance this morning was fun. Daniil was in a couple of the skits, but mostly he was an observer like us. There were some local dignitaries there and they brought cakes and big Milka Candy bars for all of the kids! We brought juice boxes, cookies and "fun size" Snickers and Milky Way bars for each Groupa (the kids 60 kids are broken down in groups on 8 or 9). (they were not amused that we were in line at the market with 60 juice boxes)

 

At the end of the day, we got to finally share the pictures of home with Luba (the director). Hopefully she'll understand that Daniil is heading to a better place!

 

We have met lots of fun folks here.

 

You know about (name removed to protect her identity) . She is a Peace Corp worker from LA. She is taking us on a tour of the area tomorrow including the cave Monasteries and the Salt Lake Spas. We hope to get Chinese food for dinner (it sounds strange, but it will be a nice touch of home to get some General Tso Chicken and an eggroll!!).

 

Yesterday I spend half an hour talking to a retired Soviet chief engineer. He worked on machine tools for East German aircraft. His second language is German as is mine. It was a wonderful chat for 2 people who are far from fluent. He is struggling to get by every month. After the terrible inflation in the 90s, the retired folks here (after the promise of the Soviet system for a quality retirement these elders) do not have not enough to get by. It was very profound to hear his story and very strange to think that it was his work that we wanted to blow away into oblivion during the Cold War.

 

Today we met a 20 something girl named Leda. She overheard us speaking English on the bus on the way to the Orphanage. She stopped us as we got off the bus and asked is we would speak with her so she could practice her English. She seemed very sweet. She followed us on the way to see Daniil. We traded phone numbers and we will meet with her on Sunday after our 4pm visit. An hour of English practice for an hour of Russian for us! Fair trade!

 

For those interested in our timeline: Monday is our BIG day. We need the judge to understand that there is more to this than just a regular adoption. This is a kid who needs to get out of here and needs to get out fast. There is a lot of testing that needs to be done before our local school system shuts down. We also need to get cardio and ortho to look him over for all the typical Down's things. We really need to get him back by the 3 ^rd week of June to get all of this stuff going. The SDA, orphanage and the Embassy have been VERY helpful. The local judge has not (so far). The optimist in me refuses to think that she is playing this for personal monetary enhancement. (We will NOT go there with her). I'm sure she just wants to be sure that everything is in place for the welfare of Daniil (this is where you can mock me for being naive).

 

We will not be able to update on Sunday (the internet café is closed). We'll do our best to get to the joint on Monday (but it could get wacky with the court).

 

Please keep us in your prayers. We NEED Monday to go our way!  We are beginning to lose our sense of humor and are quite ready to come home with our new young man!

 

Marty