Sunday, May 20, 2007

Although we have started the process to adopt Amina, we haven’t been able to ask her if she wants to be adopted by us or even to mention it to her! Until that time, we are only allowed to take Kristina (or is it Khrystyna?) Who knows?!?!? Anyway, Mark and Christine and Fred and I decided that it would be fun to take Khrystyna and Masha to the Extreme Fun Park. It’s like Funspot (for those of you in Indiana) or a very, very small Six Flags! Since we will probably start including Amina in all of our outings within the next week, I figured it would be more fun for Masha to go with just Khrystyna. It’s really hard to take 3 girls somewhere without 1 of them feeling left out…especially in a place where most rides are designed for 2 people! We decided that it would be best to go to the park after lunch so the girls would have more time. We picked up Khrystyna and Masha at the orphanage this morning at 11 and headed for the center of the city to get lunch. We had a little bit of time, so we walked around the center of the city with Svetlana and she showed us where the stores were and a few good restaurants so that we can walk around in the city during the day without her. After walking for a while, we stopped at a pizzeria. The menus were in Russian, but Svetlana helped translate what was on the various pizzas. Fred had pizza with chicken and pineapples and I got pizza with chicken and mushrooms. It was out of this world. Khrystyna doesn’t like pizza, so she ordered a salad. When her salad came out, it was in a goblet. Her salad was made up of lettuce, tomato, cucumber, and crabmeat with a big glob of mayo on top that was covered with cheese. Not exactly what I was expecting when she ordered a salad. After lunch, we loaded back up in our cars and headed to the Extreme Park. When the translator was telling me about it earlier this week, she told me it was an indoor amusement park. When I woke up this morning, I couldn’t decide whether to wear jeans or shorts, but since we were going to be inside all day, I figured I’d save my shorts for a day when we would be outside. I checked with Svetlana again before we left our apartment this morning since she was in shorts and a tank top, but something must have gotten lost in translation. When I asked if the park was inside, she said yes so I wore my jeans! Needless to say, when we pulled up to the amusement park, it was outside…and it was a really HOT day. It cost 1 grivna per person to enter the amusement park which is the equivalent of 20 cents. Each ride in the park cost 1-3 grivnas per person depending on the ride. We let the girls pick which rides they wanted to go on. They picked out a ride with swings that fly around in a circle…something you see quite regularly at carnivals and Fred and Mark agreed to go on it with them. They also wanted to go on a ride that looked like a waterslide and that’s what it was except instead of wearing a bathing suit, you go down the water slide in a little inflatable rubber raft. We let them go on that by themselves…it looked fun to me except I was burning up and you had to go up a zillion steps to get to the top of the slide. After the slide, we headed for a freefall ride. Mark and Masha and Khrystyna and I rode together. It didn’t look very high from the ground, but once we got up in the air, it was really quite scary! After the freefall ride, Khrystyna, Masha, Mark, and Fred headed for one of those rides that is shaped like a banana where 4 people sit in each car facing each other and the ride pivots on an arm and goes up and down in a U shape. I’m sure you have no idea what I’m talking about because I described that horribly, but if you look at the pictures, it might make sense. While waiting in line for that ride, the girls noticed we were next to the bumper cars, they bought tickets and headed for the bumper cars with Mark and Fred. Khrystyna and Masha started out together in one car, but then when Mark and Fred were let in, Masha got out and got in a car with Mark. That left Khrystyna and Fred together in one car, however, there was one car left, so Khrystyna hopped out and rode by herself. They all seemed to have a really fun time. We had bought tickets for a few rides before heading for the freefall, but after the last ride, Masha decided she didn’t want to go on the roller coaster. She said she wanted to go down the slide again. Khrystyna said she wanted to go down the slide again as well. We told Khrystyna that she could go on the slide and the rollercoaster if she wanted and she quickly decided that she wanted to do them both. As Masha and Khrystyna headed for the slide, they made a strange detour and headed for the swings again. We knew they didn’t have tickets for the swings and when we asked the girls what they were doing, they told us that the lady who operated the ride said they could ride for free. I was a little concerned that they had made that up, but it was apparently true since the lady didn’t make them pay. They headed for the slide next! When they were finished on the slide, Khrystyna told us she wanted to ride a children’s ride where these logs float around in this track of water. It looked extremely boring!!! We asked Khrystyna if she wanted one of us to go with her or if she wanted to go with Masha, but she told the translator she wanted to be by herself! We let her go on the ride and I expected her to look extremely bored, however, instead of being bored she was paddling like crazy with her hands. She got to the point where she was bumping the kid in front of her and he was turning around and telling her to stop, but she just kept paddling and bumping him until he decided to start using the walls to push himself along. Who would have guessed a children’s ride could be so fun? After she got off that ride, we headed for the rollercoaster. Fred and Khrystyna went on it together and had a really good time. From the rollercoaster, we moved on to bumper boats. After we got off the bumper boats, we re-connected with Mark, Christine, Masha, and Svetlana. The girls went on the slide a few more times, on the small children’s ride, and then Khrystyna, Fred, and I went on the ferris wheel. After the ferris wheel, we all got some ice cream and the 7 of us headed to the park. We dipped our feet in a fountain and tried to cool off a little. By this point, the adults were all pretty sunburned, so we didn’t stay long in the park. Our drivers came and picked us up and we took the girls for a bite to eat before bringing them back to the orphanage.

After dropping the girls at the orphanage, Fred and I headed back to the apartment. I was so ready to change out of my hot sticky clothing!!! Svetlana went by the internet café with Mark and Christine and they found out that we can bring laptops to the internet café. When Svetlana got home, she decided to rest and Fred and I headed for the internet café. It’s about a ten minute walk from the apartment. Fred felt a little conspicuous carrying a laptop bag so we’ll probably try to pick up something a little less obvious tomorrow. We were able to get on blogger with our laptop! WOOHOO! I should be able to update daily now! We stayed at the internet café for an hour and a half uploading photos and catching up on our blogging. Our time at the internet café cost us 6 grivna…the equivalent of one dollar and twenty cents! We walked quickly back to the apartment so that we would be here before dark. We folded some laundry and hung more up to dry. As I sit here finishing my ramblings for the day, Fred is sound asleep in the other room. He went in to add more air to our air mattress and fell asleep in the middle of the bed. Oh well….we all had a long day and are quite tired. I should probably follow his example! Sweet dreams!