Wednesday, May 30, 2007

When we asked Svetlana if we had anything to do today, she told us that didn’t think so. She left our apartment around 11am to take some documents to the court. She told us that she would pick us up around 1pm. I was being lazy this morning and just hanging around the apartment since we didn’t have anywhere to be and since it was quite hot! I decided to hop in the shower around noon, however, I was distracted by a phone call. It was Svetlana calling to tell us she would pick us in 15 minutes. We were needed at the court to sign some documents. We quickly got dressed and headed outside. Unfortunately, from the time of her phone call to the time she arrived, was 45 minutes…not 15. When she arrived, we hopped in the car and headed off to court. We had to sign our application to adopt Amina and Khrystyna and to change their names to Amina Lynn and Khrystyna Ann. It didn’t take long to sign the papers and then Svetlana told us to wait for her in the car while she took the papers to the judge and tried to get a court date. (Funny side note…All of our documents we have signed have been in Ukrainian. We have had a translator interpret each document that we’ve signed and we’ve had to sign a bunch since we added a second child and there was a lot of extra paperwork. Each time they translate a document the document starts out with our full names, date of birth, and full address as well as our passport numbers. Whenever they read our address, they always put the word “Mister” in front of our city. They read our street address, say “Mister Fort Wayne”, state of Indiana. It totally cracks me up. At first I thought it was just some funny way that our translator was reading it, but after having multiple translators say this, I guess it must be just the way they say the city…although when they saw where our passports were issued they just say San Francisco…who knows? If anyone has an explanation…please post it in the comments…I’d love to know.) Back to our day… We waited in the car for 15 minutes and when Svetlana came out, she told us that if all went well, we would go to court on Monday. Please pray that all will go well!!!! While we were waiting in the car, we noticed that the sky was looking very overcast. We really hoped that we would have rain soon. When we left the court, Svetlana needed to pick up some folders at the office supply store. This is the store that I wanted to go to on Monday, but after walking there on Monday, we discovered it was closed for the holiday. I was so excited to go in there. It was a small store with various writing tablets as well as markers, pens, and pencils. I couldn’t find any 3x5 cards or even 4x6 cards for flashcards, but after asking, I was able to puchase a few packages of cardstock. The cardstock is about 5x7, but hopefully it will still work for making flashcards. We were able to purchase 5 packs of cardstock and a box of markers for under $2. I thought that was quite a deal! When we came out of the store, it was pouring outside. We got totally soaked in the 10 steps it took to get to the car. When we got to the orphanage, we waited inside for a little while for the girls. It didn’t take very long for Masha to show up, but we waited quite a while for Khrystyna and Amina. When they came downstairs, we headed out for lunch. It was so dark and gray outside that it seemed like night. Also, traffic was very slow due to the rain. When we got to Vivottime (I know I spell this differently everyday…I’m experimenting), we ran inside. We got in line behind Masha’s family and began our daily ritual of picking out food. The girls normally each get a bottled drink, a cup of juice, soup (Ludmilla insists the girls eat soup everyday), salad, and various other foods. They ask for soda almost everyday, but we usually say no and they end up with bottled water or sparkling juice. Today we decided to let them each get a coke. The café was out of borscht today and Khrystyna and Amina didn’t want the other kind of soup they had. I told them that they could only get one bowl between the 2 of them, but that they each needed to have 5 bites. They agreed, but Khrystyna had a hard time accepting that. As we moved down the line, the girls added potatoes and sandwiches to their trays. Khrystyna was rather impatient today, so she decided to pass everyone in line and head to the juice dispenser. She moved her tray over to the display of desserts and grabbed a glass of red juice. While Khrystyna and Amina were deciding on what dessert to split, Khrystyna inadvertently spiller her entire LARGE glass of RED juice all over her tray and the floor. The juice filled her plate of potatoes and created quite a mess. I think Khrystyna was really embarrassed. She just stood there looking at the floor. Amina quickly asked one of the workers for a rag and started cleaning up the floor. When I got Khrystyna to make eye contact with me, she looked like she was going to cry. I told her that we loved her, that it was OK, and asked her if she wanted more potatoes. Her sandwich was wrapped in plastic wrap so we were able to salvage that. When Khrystyna said she wanted more potatoes, Amina headed back to the potatoes, and asked for more. We held up the line for quite a while trying to take care of the juice issue and eventually we made it to the cash register. We had a ton of food, divided between 3 trays, and somehow I managed to leave the line with only mashed potatoes for myself! It was quite an experience! I’d like to say that lunch was completely normal after that, but things just got stranger! When we finally got everyone situated at the table (no easy task), we began eating our lunch. There was a man in his 60s and a girl in her 20s sitting at the table behind us. The mans’ chair backed up to Fred’s chair. A few times during the meal, I noticed that the man was leaning on Fred’s chair rather strangely. I even pointed it out to Mark and Christine, but every time they turned to look he was sitting up normally. I eventually tuned the man out and went back to discussing English with the girls. We have been practicing English everyday. Today we wanted to do something a little different so we asked each of the 3 girls to come up with 3 word or phrases that they would like to learn in English. Masha said that she didn’t want to learn anything because if she wanted to know something, she just asked Svieta and Svieta would ask us in English. Khrystyna told us in Russian that she didn’t have any specific phrases because she already knew everything. Amina seemed to think long and hard before she told us that she had something she wanted to know how to say. We were all expecting something like where are we going, what time is it, or the name of a favorite food. Instead, she asked “How do you say ‘lawyer’ in English?” We were all totally dumbfounded! I asked her if she wanted to be a lawyer when she grew up. She quickly responded in English…”No, a doctor” I guess Fred and I better start saving for med school. We still have no idea why she wanted to know the word for lawyer, but I guess we’ll find out eventually. Amina’s desire to become a doctor quickly sparked another conversation about what each girl wanted to be when she grew up. Masha said she would like to be a Professor of Russian Literature. When Christine asked her what kinds of books she liked to read, she responded…I like DVDs. We all think it may be a little difficult to become a Literature Professor if you only watch DVDs, but who knows. Khrystyna does not know what she would like to be when she grows up. We probably could have gotten an answer from her, but while we were having the conversation there was a very loud “THUD” Fred had moved his chair and the old man behind him fell on the floor! He seemed to be unconscious! He was laying flat on his back groaning or gurgling. We all jumped up…we were quite worried. When I turned around to look at the girl who was with the man. She was just sitting at the table eating and drinking as if nothing had happened. The man was still laying on the floor! He hadn’t even regained consciousness! We quickly moved the girls away from the man. Mark ran over to the man while Fred ran to the cash register and pointed to the man. Svieta went to the girl at the table and asked if the man was ok. The girls said that this always happens when he’s drunk. She didn’t seem to be the least bit bothered that he was still laying on the floor unconscious. At this point, security came over and began halling the man off the floor. We took this as our cue that it was time to leave. We headed out to the car, hopped in, and headed back to the orphanage. The girls had another dance practice so we said goodbye and headed back to our apartment. We wanted to spend some time uploading pictures from the last week, so we grabbed our laptop and headed to Papa Karlo. We were quite discreet this time with the use of our laptop. We kept it behind our bag the whole time and tried to not to speak English. Amazingly enough, the internet stayed up the whole time we were there. When we were finished uploading pictures, we headed back to our apartment. It was raining outside and had cooled down considerably. Although it didn’t stay cool for very long, it was a very welcome respite! When we got back to the apartment, we waited for Svieta to return from the train station and then headed to Amstor. We were able to pick up some “real” spaghetti sauce as well as a few other items. We have to pick up bread every few days because they don’t use many preservatives in their food. The bread is fresh and quite delicious! When we finished our shopping, we headed back home. I made spaghetti for dinner and it turned out to be delicious! Much better than the last attempt with the borscht sauce. I also picked up some garlic rolls at the bakery. It was a good dinner and I thoroughly enjoyed eating something similar to what I’d eat at home! When we were finishing with the dishes, Svieta came into the kitchen and asked if we would need to purchase any clothing for the girls. She told us that when we finally get permanent custody of the girls and go to pick them up at the orphanage, we must bring all new clothes for them. They are not allowed to leave the orphanage with any clothing. I brought a few outfits for Khrystyna and the girls are close enough in size that they can probably share those outfits, but I knew I would need to buy shoes. I wondered why she was asking about this now. We haven’t had our court date yet and we have to wait 10 days after the court date to pick up the girls. When I asked her about this, she told us that she may be heading back to Kiev tomorrow! She told us that she would try to pick up whatever we need tomorrow while she is still here. I thought she may just be heading back to Kiev temporarily, but she told us that she may not be coming back at all. We may be on our own from here on out! She’s still not positive if she will be leaving. She said she would let us know tomorrow. Although we will miss her if she leaves, it will be nice to have our own space. We’ll let you know what happens! After talking to Svetlana, we spent the rest of our evening making phone calls and working on the logistics for the rest of the trip. Fred spoke to his boss about his return to work. His boss has been extremely kind and flexible and it has really made the uncertainty of the trip a lot more bearable! We also talked to our facilitator in Kiev about Fred’s return to “Mister Fort Wayne”…Ok…so we didn’t say Mister Fort Wayne while talking to him, but I think it has a nice ring to it. It makes it sound like a much friendlier town! I’m beginning to ramble, so I should probably go to bed. We’ll keep you posted as things develop here! Thanks again for all your prayers! They are being answered!