Day 19--November 13, 2008

Day 19—November 13, 2008

Today was a very eventful last day. We started out by signing documents with our coordinator for two hours this a.m. (and missing our morning session with Aidar) to being informed that our coordinator needed three copies of our photos (one from each day) to submit to court (which meant scrambling to get more pictures printed) to an afternoon session (again, interrupting our visit with Aidar) in which we almost could not tell Aidar that we would be leaving for a while, but would come back for him (the coordinator said that someone would tell him after we left). I have to give kudos to John for tracking down someone who spoke both Russian and Kazakh (Aidar only understands Kazakh) to explain to him what was going on. I’m sure he knew something was wrong when we didn’t show up this a.m. and then there were a number of people in the playroom who were meeting with me to answer our U.S. pediatrician’s questions. After he was told that John and I were leaving, he was very sad and just sat in my arms as I rocked him. John and I were in tears, too. We had to change our disposition for him, though, and we ended on a happy note. We left a stuffed dog with him (wait until he meets the real thing!) and a photo album of pictures of him, Karis, John, and me. We take comfort in knowing that everyone who works at the baby house will take good care of him. They love him dearly and will be sure that he is OK.

Our coordinator assured us that she could not request a court hearing date until all documents are complete—including the U.S. gov’t 171-H. So, who knows when we will be back in Almaty. We have documents that are on their way, and documents to send when we return, but we still need to do the fingerprinting for the 600-A application so that they can do the background check. I only hope that Aidar does not lose faith. We were told today that since we arrived, he has become happy and much more active. We can’t imagine him any other way.

So, it will be a bittersweet homecoming for us. Words cannot express how much we want to see Karis and all of our friends and family, but we also cannot express how sad we are to be leaving Aidar behind in the baby house (Baby House #1 in Almaty).

We had a great dinner with Marianne tonight. She is such a good friend. It’s like we’ve known each other for years. I know she will stay close to those from Belgium, and another family is arriving on Friday, so she will be in good company. She has done so much to make our trip more enjoyable. I truly hope that everything works out for her and the beautiful little girl with whom she is bonding..

So, our driver will be here at 1:00 a.m. (trust me—it’s not a limo driver) to take us to the airport for a 4:00 a.m flight to Frankfurt. I’m sure it will go quickly since we will most likely be sleeping the whole way there. If we don’t sleep on the way to Frankfurt, we’ll get a second chance on the way to Dallas. And another chance on the way to Raleigh-Durham….

We’ll let you know more as we know more, but our blog might be hit or miss for a little while. Thanks for checking in. For those of you adopting, please feel free to email us at cindiehale@hotmail.com and we can chat more. We wish everyone the best.

Cindie and John

Day 19--November 13, 2008

Day 19—November 13, 2008

Today was a very eventful last day. We started out by signing documents with our coordinator for two hours this a.m. (and missing our morning session with Aidar) to being informed that our coordinator needed three copies of our photos (one from each day) to submit to court (which meant scrambling to get more pictures printed) to an afternoon session (again, interrupting our visit with Aidar) in which we almost could not tell Aidar that we would be leaving for a while, but would come back for him (the coordinator said that someone would tell him after we left). I have to give kudos to John for tracking down someone who spoke both Russian and Kazakh (Aidar only understands Kazakh) to explain to him what was going on. I’m sure he knew something was wrong when we didn’t show up this a.m. and then there were a number of people in the playroom who were meeting with me to answer our U.S. pediatrician’s questions. After he was told that John and I were leaving, he was very sad and just sat in my arms as I rocked him. John and I were in tears, too. We had to change our disposition for him, though, and we ended on a happy note. We left a stuffed dog with him (wait until he meets the real thing!) and a photo album of pictures of him, Karis, John, and me. We take comfort in knowing that everyone who works at the baby house will take good care of him. They love him dearly and will be sure that he is OK.

Our coordinator assured us that she could not request a court hearing date until all documents are complete—including the U.S. gov’t 171-H. So, who knows when we will be back in Almaty. We have documents that are on their way, and documents to send when we return, but we still need to do the fingerprinting for the 600-A application so that they can do the background check. I only hope that Aidar does not lose faith. We were told today that since we arrived, he has become happy and much more active. We can’t imagine him any other way.

So, it will be a bittersweet homecoming for us. Words cannot express how much we want to see Karis and all of our friends and family, but we also cannot express how sad we are to be leaving Aidar behind in the baby house (Baby House #1 in Almaty).

We had a great dinner with Marianne tonight. She is such a good friend. It’s like we’ve known each other for years. I know she will stay close to those from Belgium, and another family is arriving on Friday, so she will be in good company. She has done so much to make our trip more enjoyable. I truly hope that everything works out for her and the beautiful little girl with whom she is bonding..

So, our driver will be here at 1:00 a.m. (trust me—it’s not a limo driver) to take us to the airport for a 4:00 a.m flight to Frankfurt. I’m sure it will go quickly since we will most likely be sleeping the whole way there. If we don’t sleep on the way to Frankfurt, we’ll get a second chance on the way to Dallas. And another chance on the way to Raleigh-Durham….

We’ll let you know more as we know more, but our blog might be hit or miss for a little while. Thanks for checking in. For those of you adopting, please feel free to email us at cindiehale@hotmail.com and we can chat more. We wish everyone the best.

Cindie and John

Day 18--November 12, 2008

Day 18—November 12, 2008

Today was a frustrating day, only to be complimented by two great visits with Aidar. As I’ve said, expect the unexpected.

Aidar picked up a crayon and said “red” today as best he could, which made us so happy. But the exciting event was that he blew bunches of bubbles!!!! We were all so proud!!! We have recorded a lot of video to show everyone. We watched some of it with Aidar this afternoon; he is always mesmerized. Most of the snow has melted, but there is still some on the pine trees. He likes to shake the branches and have it fall on him. John tasted the snow from a branch, and thought Aidar would do the same, but, instead, Aidar shook the branch to make the snow fall on John. The kid has a great sense of humor!

He worked on he puzzle much more attentively this a.m., and we blew up a lot of balloons for him. We threw them up in the air, and he kicked them around (our future soccer player). He still laughs when we blow one up and then let it go flying around the room.

Tonight, we went to dinner with some Belgian friends we met as well as with Marianne. We had a great time. One of our regrets of leaving tomorrow is that we will miss those we’ve come to know. The Belgian family was told that they would be able to adopt a healthy girl, only to be told once they got here that she was HIV positive, and that there was “probably a mistake” with the test. Belgium will not allow and HIV child to be adopted, and everyone (including their adoption agency) suggested they pass, so they will be adopting another son instead. Can you imagine the emotions that must evoke?

We walked Marianne to her apartment and were stopped by three policemen when we arrived at the alley to our apartment. It was good to see them, since a car with two guys had just pulled out of the alley, and then stopped, and the guys got out. The police asked for our passports, asked if we were Italian, and then let us go. They didn’t ask the guys for any ID, and the guys went into the first door of the apartment building (we live at the third door). I had read in the past about someone not having a good experience with the police, so I had a slight reservation, but they gave me a slight comfort feeling as well in that dark alley. Unfortunately, they didn’t stay to make sure the guys weren’t going to jump us, but we obviously got home safely.

Tomorrow, we have to sign a Power of Attorney form and have it notarized with our coordinator and then meet with the director at some point to have our pediatrician’s questions answered. Throw that in with two visits with Aidar and preparing to leave at 4:00 a.m., and we have a busy day ahead of us. With that, I’ll make this a short blog, and we’ll see everyone on Friday.

Day 17--November 11, 2008

Day 17—November 11, 2008

It is FREEZING here. All I have is a long sweater coat, so it is a longer walk to the orphanage now than it was last week. We took Aidar out to play in the snow this a.m., and played for just a short while before we took him inside. Finally—the kid had mittens on his hands. We wish we were as lucky! He loves throwing the snow up in the air and having it fall on him. When it falls in his eyes, he just turns toward us with his eyes closed and a big grin on his face. We wipe the snow away, and it inevitably happens again! John showed Aidar how to taste the snow; he got a big kick out of that. He is so open to anything new. He cleaned the snow off of one of the small horse statues on the grounds, and was astonished that his mittens had snow all over them. When he looked at his jacket and jeans, he was covered with snow. He looked surprised and then just laughed. What an easy-going guy.

We were barely inside the door to go to the playroom when the director of the orphanage told John that we had to bring Aidar to his group, and we had to leave; they had an inspection today. John and I assumed that they were having an inspection soon, since they were doing spring-cleaning in the midst of winter. But, it didn’t make sense to us as to why they asked us to leave. We understand that they probably needed a headcount, but we were the prospective parents of a child; we were fulfilling our fourteen-day bonding period; and, God forbid that we look like we might actually be a happy family in the days to come. Again, more bureaucracy.

We went back this afternoon, and everything was fine. Their inspection went well, and we were able to play with Aidar for our regular time period. We actually saw the same family whose coordinator had asked about Aidar. The dad spoke English, and we chatted a little bit. They are from Italy, and do not yet have a child, yet there they were at the baby house (I’ve learned recently that the younger children are in “baby houses”, and the older children are in orphanages). There are so many different ways to handle an adoption.

We met a family the other day from Belgium. They are incredibly nice, and are adopting a child from another baby house. We were in a restaurant, and, when I said “Thank you” to the server (one of the two Russian words I know), a cute little four-year-old boy at the next table said “She said ‘spaseeblah’!” (that’s how it’s pronounced—I don’t have a clue how it’s spelled). We all laughed and started chatting. We ran into them the next day on the street, exchanged emails and subsequently set up dinner plans. They were told not to bring their son to the orphanage any more. It’s too bad because now they have to alternate days to see their adoptive son, and their son can’t see his new brother. Someone suggested that it could be that healthy children disrupt the flow of how things work in an orphanage/baby house. It’s a very reasonable assumption to me.

We were able to change our flights to Friday. We tried last night, but Lufthansa can’t do any updates to international flights from their website. So, we had to call this a.m. Get this, though: their hours don’t begin until 11:00 a.m.! I need to work there ;-) And, our flight leaves at 4:10 a.m. I have no idea how we’re going to get through the night. At any rate, we’re looking forward to coming home. We wish we could bring Aidar with us. It seems we can have one child or the other, but not both. Time to go…..we’re going to try to pack some stuff tonight.

Day 16--November 10, 2008

Day 16—November 10, 2008

Winter is still here, and the last thing I need (in the U.S.) is another winter coat, so I’m just cold all of the time now. So, we’re moving very quickly in this brisk weather. It’s no colder than a winter day in New England, but need I remind anyone why I moved from New England to North Carolina?

John and I had another great visit with Aidar. His comprehension of the English language is impressive—it is incredible how much he understands of what we’re saying. We’ve been here almost 3 weeks, and all I can say in Russian is “Thank you” and “Have a nice day”. Ooops! John just corrected me and told me that I have NOT been saying “Have a nice day”, but have been saying “Goodbye” instead.

He and John were playing a game of “who can get the Lego piece first”, and John beat him a few times until Aydar held out, watched John’s eyes, and then quickly switched hands on John when he went to grab the piece. Pretty tricky! He liked the mini-Doodle pad that Marianne gave him (much like the kind that Beth gave Karis—you draw on it and then slide a bar to erase). We drew triangles and squares (I helped him), and he drew a lot of scribbles and circles. He tries to speak English—he attempted to say “line” numerous times as he drew the sides to the shapes, and he tries to count in English. And he always says (as he signs) “I love you!”

He loves to have John blow up balloons, but he doesn’t do much with them once they’re inflated. Marianne also gave us a Sesame Street puzzle that had fewer and much larger pieces than the one we bought for him. He was slightly more interested, which is a good sign.

We’re going to meet with the orphanage director again tomorrow to try to get some answers to questions our doctor had re Aidar. I would recommend that people get an evaluation from a Western trained doctor (we went to the international SOS clinic). One nice thing is that the SOS clinic translated the summary from the orphanage in addition to its own report. We were given more information than the orphanage provided, and, after we scanned it and sent it to Karis’s pediatrician, her doctor had some additional questions based on the SOS report. We are sure everything is fine and that he will catch up to other children in the expected timeframe, but it would be nice to have as much history as possible. Sasha (our coordinator’s son who speaks English) is supposed to translate for us, but he is sick today. I’m not sure that I want to be around anyone who is sick when we have only a few days left.

We had one concern today…as we were bringing Aidar back to his playroom for lunch, there was a family in the waiting area with their coordinator. The coordinator asked in English if Aidar were the child with the problem with his mouth. We said “yes” and heard him telling the family about him as we took Aidar to his room. When we returned, they were no longer there. We went to the grocery store, but the whole time wondered how he knew about Aidar. Our minds went off on a tangent, and we wondered, “Were they the parents who want to appeal the adoption?”; “Are they another Kazkah family who will appeal our adoption?” (Kazkah families are given priority); “Were they given the option of adopting Aidar from another agency?”; “Is Aidar off of the adoption roster now that we’ve applied for a new name for him?” John went back to the orphanage to see what he could find out, but the family was gone, and the director told John that everything is OK (not that she would tell him if it weren’t). I guess we have a lot of questions for our adoption agency.

One thing we’ve learned, however, is to not make any assumptions about anything. We can’t assume that he is definitely our’s until the court makes it official, but we’ll make ourselves crazy if we think that he will be given to someone else. We’ve heard the horror stories about adoptions falling through, but we just have to hope that it will all work out in the end.....

(11:00 p.m.) It's snowing again. I'm ready for NC weather. OK, we saw Olga today and she said that she had no idea why those people were asking about Aidar, and that Aidar is off the roster for any agency. So, he is no longer available for adoption. Phew! We just need a court date now (and an apostilled background check along with a couple of marriage certificates).

We had a great visit again with Aidar this afternoon. John threw snow up in the air, and Aidar got a big kick out of that. He liked having it fall on his head. He liked throwing snowballs on the ground, too. And, they had a little snowball fight J We also played with the balloons in the playroom. Aidar loves to let the air out of them and see them fly across the room. He laughs hysterically. Little cutie!

Marianne and we went to the mall tonight. We ate at the food court, where there is also an ice skating rink. The little girls skating were so cute! It was nice to get out and do something. For anyone who will be traveling in the future, bring a flashlight. The entrance to Marianne’s elevator is pitch black (literally), and the alley to our apartment building can get pretty dark, too.

We’re going to try to change our flight reservations to Friday. The orphanage said that the first day did not count toward our 14-day bonding period. We have yet to have an answer as to why, and it will cost us hundreds of dollars to change our flight, but we look forward to coming home. We only wish we could bring Aidar with us.

Day 15--November 9, 2008

Day 15—November 9, 2008

Let me repeat: we live up NINE FLIGHTS of stairs!

Winter has arrived. Brrrrr!!!!!! It was snowing when we woke up this a.m., and we were surprised to see how much it had snowed overnight. There were a couple of inches on the ground. And it was good snow—wet and sticky—good for snowballs. Everything looked so pretty. We didn’t really bring warm coats, but we did OK. We imagine it is really nice here in the spring. There are a lot of (dead) rosebushes and a lot of (empty) fountains.

We got to the orphanage, and they brought him to us had dressed Aidar for outside, but not nearly as warmly as they dress him for when it’s 50 degrees. He had on a dress shirt, jeans, long johns, a coat and a hat. No scarf and no mittens. Aidar was excited about the snow. He tried telling us the Kazakh word for it, but, of course, we didn’t have a clue. John and Aidar made snowballs, and shook the snow from the trees; we put our footprints next to each other and took a picture. We didn’t make snow angels—we didn’t want to get scolded ;-) We finally went inside when Aidar’s hands started to turn red.

He enjoyed playing with his block set again today. He wasn’t interested in the puzzle, still, so we’re going to give up on that for this trip. He mocked John this a.m. He was trying to get the videotape as John was working with the video camera, and John told him “No”. Aidar looked at John with a big grin on his face, and said to John “No!” He doesn’t yet know when to differentiate when it’s funny (like with me) and when it’s not a good idea ;-)

John has made some fantastic dinners the last couple of nights. One night, he made chicken, a yummy sauce, rice, peas, corn and bread with olive oil. Last night, he made tortellini with shrimp in a tomato sauce, leftover steak, mixed vegetables, and bread with olive oil. This afternoon, he made deviled eggs. Tonight, we had pizza and beer at Marianne’s apartment. So much for hoping to lose weight!

It’s really nice to have Marianne here. She has been a lot of fun. John feels like he can’t get a word in edgewise when I’m with Marianne—I don’t shut up! She showed us the hotel she had stayed in last time, and it looked like it was going to fall down any second. There are no nice places here other than a couple of hotels that are pretty pricey (the lowest price we saw was $150 per night). I guess everyone spends money on stiletto boots instead of a decent place to live.

Marianne gave us some more toys for Aidar. She is so sweet. I know he will be thrilled. Again, for anyone adopting a child older than a year: bring toys (or buy them here). And bring mittens!

We hope everyone had fun at Karis’s and Alexa’s party today. We can’t wait to see pictures and hear stories! Miss you!

Day 14—November 8, 2008

Day 14—November 8, 2008

Yesterday, John received his first kiss from Aidar, and today, he received countless kisses. John was showing Aidar how to put together a puzzle, and Aidar just leaned in and kissed John on his cheek. John gave him a kiss back, and Aidar kissed him again. They went back and forth and back and forth—I didn’t know who would stop first! It’s getting harder and harder to find a place to play with Aidar; there are three families (including us) that we know of who are visiting children, but only one playroom. One of the children is a baby (8 months), so she can’t do much on the playground. It had rained overnight, so we didn’t play outside. We ended up in the waiting room again. I think it will make the next week difficult.

Aidar wasn’t as interested in the puzzle as we thought he would be, but it had quite a few pieces, and would be difficult for any small child (it was the smallest we could find). He enjoys coloring with the markers. He actually made a little bit of back and forth sweeping motion when coloring instead of making just lines. Unfortunately, we were kind of scolded by the staff because he had ink on his hands yesterday, so they wanted us to wash them before we brought him back today. We’ll have to look harder for crayons.

Our afternoon time with Aidar was inside as well because it was raining. The care takers at the orphanage said that Aidar was not feeling that well. (at least that is what we think they were saying) He did seem a little sluggish but he warmed up after a little bit. We split our time in the playroom with another family. We tried the puzzle again and he still was not very interested. We took an economical lego type building set today and he enjoyed that. We also took a counting book , (1-10) It has the little beads you slide as you go through the different numbers. He did pretty well considering he probably know the Kazakh words for the numbers. We thought these new items would help with the inside time.

We wondered yesterday how much more bureaucracy they could throw at us before this was over, and it wasn’t even two hours before we were told that Almaty (the city we’re in) wants three copies of our marriage certificate. We’re not sure why. We had already had one certificate apostilled, and we have more copies, but our copies are with us here in Almaty, and the others must be apostilled in NC. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could just hand them over while we’re here? It would cost too much money to send them back from Kazakhstan, so our process will be delayed another week so that we can handle this when we get back to the U.S. If we weren’t waiting on another document, we would incur the cost, but it wouldn’t make sense to pay the price if we’re just going to be waiting anyway.

That’s what is happening here. We hate that we’re going to miss Karis’s and Alexa’s party tomorrow. We know that they will have so much fun. Thank you again to everyone who is helping with it. We can’t wait to come home and see everyone. We will have to reschedule our flight, since the orphanage is not counting our first day as part of the required 14 day bonding period. We will try to make reservations for Friday, but we still have a few more days to go in the bonding period, so we want to make sure that no one gets sick before now and then.

Day 13--November 7, 2008

Day 13—November 7, 2008

Today, John received his first kiss from Aidar! Again, it makes everything all worth while, doesn’t it? We gave our coordinator Aidar’s new name: Kai Aidar Stuart Hale. We will eventually call him Kai. It seems to fit him best. We’re curious to know what “Aidar” means. We couldn’t find anything under what we thought was the original spelling (“Aydar”).

Marianne saved the day with her goodie bag for Aidar. She had balloons, stickers (he took all of them at once), a ball, and bubbles. The big thing, though, was that she had a bubble blower that was the kind you put in your mouth; Aidar put it in his mouth, and actually blew a bubble! He put it behind his teeth, whereas we put it just in our lips, and he blew a bubble! He then promptly mocked me, saying “You did it!” ;-) We gave him some markers today and a coloring book. He kind of knew how to hold the markers, but had a hard time coloring. He didn’t go back & forth—only one direction. Maybe crayons will be better for him.

John and I thought that we might be able to speed up the process of our gov’t application by going to the U.S. Embassy and getting fingerprinted there, instead of waiting until we got back to the U.S. We had been digitally fingerprinted before, but they are more than 15 months old, so they wouldn’t accept them as current. We read on the Kazakhstan U.S. Embassy website that they do electronic fingerprints for visas, so we called. The Adoption Dept. only does ink fingerprints. After we had the ink cards sent to the U.S., we were later told by our U.S. contact that they will only use digital fingerprints in the U.S. to process the application. We don’t get it. Our fingerprints from 2 years ago are still our fingerprints. The ones we had today were from the U.S. Embassy. It’s not like if there’s a murder, and the FBI gets fingerprints from the crime scene, that they say “Sorry, we don’t have a match within the past 15 months, so we can’t use these.” We wonder just how much bureaucracy can they throw at us before this process is over.

We’re still waiting on one more document before our dossier is complete and up to date. It looks like our coordinator won’t apply for a court hearing until all documents are received, and we’re told it could take a month until the hearing is scheduled, so we will most likely be home next weekend. We will miss Aidar terribly, just as we miss Karis terribly now. We both have to be present for the court hearing, and then they have a 14 day appeal window before the court finalizes the decision. We both also have to be present for that, but we’re hoping that they will waive the appeal period, and we can do everything at the hearing. We will ask that pictures of his cleft be submitted, and emphasize the urgency in getting him immediate medical help. Aidar does not speak clearly at all—you have to know him to know what he is saying (like when he is mocking us!). He is still very quiet, but we know he would love to be understood.

Day 12--November 6, 2008

Day 12—November 6, 2008

Today, I received my first kiss from Aidar J It makes everything all worth while, doesn’t it? I kissed him on the cheek, and then he kissed me on my cheek. Ohhhhhhhhh. He is still becoming the devious little guy who has shown signs of his sense of humor over the last few days. He acted as though he were going to climb over the top of the slide, and when John said “no” to him—three times—Aidar said in his mocking little voice “No! No! No!” and laughed. Agggghhhh! And when we were looking at his photo album this afternoon, he turned to me so many times that I can’t count them, and squealed and clapped. I laughed so hard each time—until John pointed out that Aidar was mocking me because I say “Yea!” and clap virtually every time he moves.

We discovered that he is afraid of bugs and worms. We found ladybugs outside, and he took about two steps back when John and I put them in our hands. Same holds true with the worms. We found one this a.m., and then three more this afternoon. He did count and show on his fingers, though, that we had a total of four worms for the day.

We have to say again that he is dearly loved at the orphanage. Wherever we are—outside, in the playroom, or in the hallway—someone who works there speaks to him and smiles. They all mention “Papa” and “Mama”, so we assume they’re saying good things about us.

Aidar picked a bunch of leaves from the trees for me today. The trees are almost bare, but the leaves still have some color. I put them aside, and tonight took them to our amazing photo guy who laminated them for me. Aidar did look for the leaves this afternoon, and was disappointed when he didn’t see them in the “toy bag”.

He is fascinated by cars. Each time one comes to the orphanage, he stares, points, and says “machine-ah”. It’s hard to get his attention back until the car leaves. He is getting bored with the routine that we go through each day. We’re not allowed to leave the back of the orphanage, and you can only play on the slide so many times when you’re outside almost four hours a day. He is still shy of the monkey bars, but they are pretty high up, so I’ll give him that. We occasionally go inside to the playroom a few minutes early and look at the video that we took for the day. It will be difficult doing the same thing for another week. We have books, markers and coloring books for him, but we think that he is more interested in physical activities than quiet time activities. We also bought some generic Legos for him (the real thing was more than $50 for a medium size set), so we’ll try that soon.

We met someone else today, Marianne, who is adopting through the same agency. She is incredibly nice, and even brought a small bag of goodies for Aidar (stickers, bubbles, a ball, balloons). She is adopting a 3 ½ year old little girl who is absolutely adorable. This is her second adoption; she has a four year old little boy who is a real cutie. Marianne is staying about a block and a half away from us, and has a much nicer place. She actually has an elevator, which makes us that much more envious.

Day 11--November 5, 2008

Day 11—November 5, 2008

Aidar is becoming quite the sly little guy. He loves to scatter his bowling set (something I’m sure that he is not allowed to do inside the orphanage), and he is getting braver about walking away by himself. When we say “Stop”, he does stop, but doesn’t turn around—he just pretends like he can’t hear us. He is speaking a little English; he has “Again!” down quite well. He also says (as he signs) “I love you”. He points out Karis in the photo album, and says “Sistah” and tries to say “Karis”. He really is trying to communicate with us more than he has in the past few days. We’re very excited about that.

He slid down the circular slide today; John took him by the waist and slid him up it again but backwards. After that, Aidar was saying something (we could not make out the words), but he pointed, and we knew he was saying “To the top!!! To the Top!!! To the Top!!!” when John only slid him backwards a little way :-) He loves to let his car go down the slide, and he still loves the bubbles. Again, though, he only likes the really big bubbles, so we have to get skilled at blowing bubbles very slowly. He laughs hysterically when the bubble pops before John finishes blowing it, and John makes a face. We’ll be sure to get that on video for you.

He has been in the same clothes for three days, and that is a bit discouraging, but I guess not unexpected. We’re anxious to get him home to start improving everything in his life.

John and I went to dinner tonight, but had to leave one restaurant and go to another since we (i.e. “I”) didn’t have a clue what was on the menu. We did go back to the first restaurant for dessert. Again, dessert was fabulous. Unfortunately, John is not as good at choosing desserts as I am; he chose an elaborate “Moon Pie” the other night (thinking it was cream, but it was really marshmallow), and tonight he chose what we thought was pecan pie, but was something with maybe a lot of coca in it. It was pretty bitter. We walked for hours today, and I was hoping to maybe lose some weight, but that won’t happen with these desserts.

We’re still working on our paperwork while we’re in Kazakhstan. It’s frustrating, but we’re fortunate that we can do what we need to do during the day, and then take care of things in the U.S. during the evening. We’re up to date on the election, but not on local politics. The U.S. election is on around the clock on the BBC channel.

Thanks to mom, Jane & Mike, Lisa and Mike, Barbara, and Marsha & Ray for taking care of Karis. We miss her terribly, and know that she is in good hands. Thanks to Chris for taking care of Boo for us. That is a huge help as well! Thanks to everyone helping with the birthday party. We hate that we will miss it, but know that it will be good for her to see her friends.

Rich vs. Poor

The disparity between wealth and poverty. Unfortunately, we're on the wrong side!

Day 10--November 4, 2008

Day 10—November 4, 2008

(1:00 p.m.) The sun is shining today!!!!! It is the first time since we arrived more than a week ago. It was so nice to be outside. When we went to see Aidar, they had him dressed to go outdoors (we have learned from seeing his written medical records that his name is spelled with an “i” and not a “y”). Yea! We brought bubbles today, and he loved chasing them and trying to pop them J He also liked to pop them when John was blowing them, and getting the stuff all over John’s face. He even pretended like he wanted to lick it. YUK! We also brought another car to him, but he wasn’t as impressed with that. He still likes the little bowling set we bought for him. It probably cost us about $3.00 tops—go figure, right? He figured out that it’s tough to set up the pins on carpet, and it’s tough to set up the pins in the driveway, but it’s easy to set them up on stairs outside. He took that initiative on his own, which I think is pretty smart for a four year old who doesn’t get out much. John took him on the monkey bars and let him hang for just a second, and Aidar got nervous. Wait until Karis shows him how it’s done. She flies across those things!

We learned Aidar’s last name today (it was on the written medical records, too), so it was nice to see that. There are various characters in Russian that don’t exist in English, but the doctor translated his last name for us, thank God.

He is catching on really well with signing, although he does not yet call to us with sign language. He will copy my signs as soon as I do them, and when I ask him to show me something, he does it well. He is learning more everyday. Occasionally, he does get the “enough, already with the sign language” feeling and won’t do it for us. He definitely knows “no”, but does not always respond to it, the sneaky little guy J We’ve shown him “stop”, and he is really good about listening when our tone of voice changes (e.g. when he is about to walk around the corner in the driveway). I’m not a doctor (nor do I play one on TV), but he seems to be very smart, mischievous, and healthy in so many ways.

We went to another grocery store today, and guess what? We found chicken! We hope we can cook it in our (one) pan. The price wasn’t too bad (unlike cereal, which is almost $8.00 per box). We also found cereal bars, a staple of our diet in the U.S., and frozen vegetables. We still don’t know when we should change our tickets to go home. Our documents are not complete (we’re waiting on our home study and background checks), and we can’t get our US gov’t document (Petition for Adoption) until they get our home study. So, it may be a while before we get a date for our court hearing. I would hate to have to come back two more times (and we certainly don’t have the cash for that kind of travel).

(9:00 p.m.) We saw Aidar late this afternoon, and showed him the videotape from this a.m. He was mesmerized. He is becoming more and more comfortable with John and me. He is not as diligent about putting his toys away before getting more (something we’re sure the orphanage instilled in him just to keep order with so many children). And he likes to push the envelope on disobeying us (e.g. turning the lights on and off…and on and off….and on and off).

OK, so you know I can’t cook. Try throwing in directions in Russian and a Russian microwave, and you know I’m in serious trouble. We figured out how to defrost the chicken in the microwave, and we thought it looked like water in the picture for the sauce, so we made due, fried the chicken, boiled the veggies, and it all actually came out pretty good. And we’re ready to try again tomorrow.

Day 9—November 3, 2008

Well today was still cloudy and chilly but it was not raining. That was nice being we walk everywhere. On that note, Cindie wanted me to mention that we walk up 9 flights to reach our apartment on the 5^th floor of the apartment building. She also wanted me to mention that someone smokes in the stair way so as we are breathing heavy carrying our groceries up the stairs, we take in lovely gasps of 2^nd hand smoke. She says that if the stairs don’t take her out it’s the smoke. Smoking is very popular here if we have not mentioned that before.

Anyway, we were able to take Aydar to the International clinic today. We saw a western trained pediatrician Dr. and she examined Aydar. She was able to interpret the medical history summary the orphanage provided to us, and they will translate it to English in written form for us to pick up tomorrow. As we expected, she noted that he is healthy and his motor skills and cognitive abilities are normal. He is behind in some ways due to the impairment of the cleft pallet in means of nutrition and speech as well as lack of Vitamin D from being indoors so much at the orphanage. All of these items we will be able to help him with. With care and nutrition the Dr. felt that all of these items over time will improve and should all fall into a normal range.

We made another trip to the grocery store because it is easier to carry the smaller loads down the street and up the stairs. Being that Cindie has had a hard time finding something she likes, I had remembered seeing some Bacon in the meat cabinet. So I went over to find out about the price. For less than a half of a pound, it would have cost $8.75 USD. Ouch, we passed on that and will try another store tomorrow, maybe some good ole chicken.

Well that is all for now until tomorrow. Hope everyone is doing well! Give Karis hugs and kisses for us. _JH

Day 8—November 2, 2008

OK, so we have found that Aydar is certainly a mischievous little boy. He likes to take things and hide them, or, like we said earlier, play “keep away”. This a.m., when we went to see him, John knelt down to give him a big hug, and he walked right past him to me with a big smile on his face, like “Gotcha!”. He is really catching on to what we want and ask of him. When we ask for “big hugs”, he comes right to us, and then turns around so that we can squeeze him from behind. I don’t know that he has ever given a hug, but he is catching on to that, too.

He has learned more sign language from us showing him pictures of Karis and from reading a cartoon Tarzan book to him. He knows “baby”, “gorilla”, “girl”, and “please” in addition to “mama” and “papa”. He is working on “elephant”, but that one is a tough one. We have to learn the sign for “boy”! It is amazing how quickly he is catching on, and I know it will do him a world of good to be able to communicate back to people, rather than just having everyone direct him. We’re checking with Amy at church to see if she can teach all of us more sign language. It will be a while, with his surgeries and what not, before he will be able to speak English well.

He still loves John’s phone, and likes to take pictures in addition to looking at them. John showed him a video of Karis on the carousel, and he said “sistah” (sp)! We did take a small plastic bowling set to him, and he was really good with it. He set the pins up, and rolled the ball directly to them. He got a kick out of it one time when I had him roll the bigger ball that we got for him yesterday! John went “Hey!”, and he had a big grin on his face J John and he played catch today—as much as you can in a small room-- and the did a great job. He may give Aidan a run for his money in soccer if he is as good at that as he is at “catch”.

Dinner at home is getting to be more difficult for me. We went to the store that we had been going to, but I don’t understand so many labels. I had a hard time trying to find anything else for dinner. I looked for “tuna fish”, but couldn’t read the label. I was hoping to find some soup, but had no luck there, either. Maybe tomorrow we’ll find something at the “Harris Teeter” of the neighborhood. So, we had fish sticks again (note to those of you who don’t know how to cook them: don’t put a paper towel under them—they come out like rocks), and guess what else: pasta. I think I’ve had pasta everyday.

It’s been cloudy since we arrived (I have yet to wear my sunglasses), and today was a bit colder than usual. It also sprinkled today, but not too badly. John will definitely need something warmer to wear if we’re here closer to December. We do laundry almost daily. We’re lucky to have a washer, and we put our clothes on a drying rack on the enclosed porch. We have looked at pans to purchase, but they’re about $25 each. TV isn’t bad. BBC is about the only channel in English, and that can get depressing if we leave it on too long. What is going on in DR Congo is just too sad to watch around the clock. We saw a debate last night on the US presidential election, and the debate took place in Qatar with two representatives from John McCain’s camp and two from Barack Obama’s. We thought that was pretty interesting. We can follow along the National Geographic and the Animal Planet channels, so we stay pretty entertained when we’re not visiting Aydar (we visit him 10:00 – 12:00 and 4:00 – 6:00, although he is sometimes eating when we arrive). We will be going to see a western doctor tomorrow, but I think he will only confirm what we already suspect: Aydar is a healthy four year old with incredible motor skills.

Day 7--November 1, 2008

Day 7—November 1, 2008

Today we visited Aydar and found that he prefers technology to anything else. We finally found a ball, and he played with it for only a short time. Instead, he took about 50 pictures of John with the digital camera. We also flipped the video screen around to video tape him, and, trust me, we have some VERY close up shots of Aydar! He loves to put the lens cover on the video camera, something that he needs to squeeze and center before it will stay on--impressive for a four year old! He has an excellent arm when it comes to throwing the ball. He threw it to John every time (except when I was trying to catch it on tape), and caught it really well. It truly looks like his fine motor skills are superb.

We also taught him some sign language—he now knows the sign for “mama” and “papa”. We really think sign language is going to be key for him, because he literally does not make a sound unless we are tickling him, and then he laughs out loud. When we arrived today, he was dressed very warmly—a T-shirt, heavy sweater, and long johns under his jeans. And it is HOT everywhere. I blew down the front and back of his shirt, and he just stood still, transfixed like the greatest thing has just happened to him. We opened the windows in the playroom, and were questioned about it, but not told to close them.

We also found a number of stores that sold toys today. Anything American (e.g. Lego’s) is very expensive. A Barbie doll is $80. We stopped in a store that had some toys in the window, but the store turned out to be a shoe store with just a couple of toys. The shoes in the store that we looked at that would have been cute for Karis were $245! Yikes! We found some other toys elsewhere that were more affordable, and passed on the shoes.

The photo developer was closed tonight when we went to have pictures developed. I hope it won’t be a problem tomorrow. I’m sure it closed early because it is Saturday, even though the sign on the door only had one set of hours (9:00 – 7:00). We’re going to have to make sure we get pictures developed after our morning visit to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

We found our “Harris Teeter” of Almaty, that is very clean, bright, and has an excellent selection of food. I am still leery of buying meat—I don’t want to end up with something like horse intestines and think that it’s hot dogs. Instead, we had fish sticks, corn and bread with olive oil. Unfortunately, we have only one pan to cook in for a month. Oh yes, one more thing: they have the market on desserts. Everything is fabulous.

We discovered that we can’t have a court hearing until our 14 day bonding period is complete. And I don’t believe that they can even set it up before we have completed the bonding period, so we don’t have a clue when we will be coming home. Please take good care of Karis and yourselves for us.

Day 6--October 31, 2008

Day 6—October 31, 2008

Sorry for not posting a picture. Kazakhstan would prefer we not post anything until the adoption is complete.

(1:00p.m.) Today was an interesting day. We met with the Director of the orphanage this a.m. and received a great deal of information about Aydar. She was very forthcoming, and said that we could have a copy of his file (good news). This is some of the information we received: he has been at the orphanage since birth; all doctors say that he is fine/healthy with the exception of his mouth; he now understands that his speech is different from other children, so he doesn’t say much; he has had two surgeries—one on his lip and one on his mouth; he has had all immunizations (they say the same as American immunizations); workers come to work on the building, and he calls them “dad”; he is very intelligent and makes logical decisions; he stays close to his friend (girl) who has downs syndrome and cares for her; he was born in Almaty; he has no allergies; and he eats everything!

The orphanage was required to show us other children as well in order to satisfy court proceedings. They were very small and did not understand what was going on. Of course, we saw Aydar. All of the children were presented to us twice, once early in the meeting, and then again after the regional director came (she was required to ensure we saw more children than just Aydar). When we arrived, the children were going for a walk, and we saw Aydar in the group. We waved and said hello. Each time he came to the room during the meeting, he came right to me and climbed into my lap. What a sweetie! Bonding is obviously not a problem there. The workers at the orphanage are all caring people who truly love the children. I’m sure it is a mixed blessing for them when a child is adopted.

In other news, let me tell you a little bit about what is going on outside of the adoption. We went for a walk yesterday and found a park with some interesting statues commemorating WWI and WWII. There was a huge, bright yellow building with a decorative rooftop, but we have no idea what it was. The people here ALL dress in black, with the exception of small children. There is very little color here. The women dress in skinny dark jeans, black coats, and black stiletto boots. The women are all very tiny. I’m sure they don’t weigh enough to even give blood; they must eat only on Tuesdays and Fridays. The men dress in dark jeans, black shoes, black shirts, and black coats. The only variation in color is gray. Even when looking in store windows, the clothes for sale are only black. The food here is good, although I don’t venture outside of my own little realm here. At least they have what I like—fish, pasta, pizza, Chinese food. I don’t drink the milk, since it came in a carton that was from a display in the middle of the floor in the store. There is just something not right about that—at least in my head. John says it is good, and tastes somewhat like powdered milk. They have American soda (not Mountain Dew), but they typically serve it warm, so we drink mostly bottled water (although John has found a couple of good regional beers). We’ve been told to not drink the water, but that it’s OK to rinse fruit and vegetables in it. We’re not taking any chances—we brush our teeth with bottled water. People here drive CRAZY. There are at least five cars going in various directions at intersections. NASCAR has nothing on Olga. She is quick, and can get her car through the tightest of places. I just close my eyes when I’m riding with her. We’re living downtown, and there is definitely a split between poverty and wealth. One block may have Dolce Gabbana, and the next block may have a tiny market that no more than five people could fit into at one time. We’re told that teachers and doctors make very little pay, but someone is making money because there are a lot of nice cars here (BMW, Lexus, Mercedes). Everyone here smokes. That’s the one bad thing about going to dinner or to a café for the WiFi. There is no escaping it. We can even smell it in our apartment. YUK! Traffic outside of our windows is rough—people are always beeping their horns, and motion detector car alarms are going off constantly.

(8:00 p.m.) We saw Aydar this afternoon, and had a great visit with him. We played outside for more than an hour. We are putting pictures in a photo album to leave with him when we go back to the U.S., and brought the album to show him tonight. He LOVED it. He looked at it again and again, and then went back to it in between playing.

One thing that is very frustrating to us is that the orphanage said that our 14 day bonding period does not begin until today, but our plane tickets are scheduled for 14 days from yesterday. We’re not quite sure why, other than maybe someone did not know the correct sign in process yesterday, and had us sign a piece of copy paper. We signed a journal today, which seemed more official. We explained to our coordinator that we have pictures with the date on them, but that did not seem to matter. Also, we have to wait until after the 14 day bonding period before we have our court hearing, which means we may have another week here. That will mean almost a month without seeing Karis :-(

Day 5--October 30, 2008

Day 5—October 30, 2008

Today was a big day for us!!!! We finally saw Aydar (pronounced “I-dar”, rolling the “r” on the end). He was absolutely adorable. He was shy at first, of course, and we stayed in an office for a while until we asked if they had a playroom. The playroom was small, but had huge stuffed animals (like from a carnival) and some baby toys, and a car, which he enjoyed playing with for a while. He loved John’s camera, and was excited to see a picture of Karis on the carousal. He smiled and said “Aht!” (sp) for “horse” . They have a horse statue made of wire on the grounds, so he was familiar with it. We showed him several pictures of Karis, telling him “sistah” (sp) for “sister”. He will definitely know who she is when he meets her. The biggest toy of all for Aydar: John’s camera! When John showed him pictures of Karis and Boo, he started pressing all kinds of buttons. John’s phone is a PDA phone, so it started gong haywire with all of the different functions Aydar was selecting J. We took pictures while we were there, and showed him the pictures on the camera. He got a kick out of that. We bought two photo albums—one to fill and leave with him when we go back to the U.S. (the orphanage said that children are sad when the adopting families leave), and one to fill and take to court with us (and, of course, to take home to show everyone). For those of you with boys, you will be happy to know that we got a taste of what you’ve been telling us—he had a stuffed caterpillar, and started banging it on the stuffed dog. He’s all boy! We wish we had brought toys with us. We mistakenly thought that the orphanage would have toys, but they didn’t have any that were age appropriate in the room where we played. There is one toy store nearby, but most of what they had were hard plastic toys—difficult to take back and forth. We found a couple of other stores with a small selection of toys. We searched for a ball, to no avail, believe it or not. John bought a couple of Matchbox cars, and we’ll walk further tomorrow to shop to see if we have better luck. We’ll upload pictures from the nearby café that has free WiFi. I’m sure it will take a while. We hope to take him to a Western doctor soon and get a physical to confirm his health. We will visit him again tomorrow (and every day until we leave), so we’ll send another update.

Day 4--October 29, 2008

We did it!!!! We received permission from the MOE today to visit the orphanage (i.e. Aydar!!!). It was a very long day. We were told to be ready for an 11:00 appointment. At 11:15, we were told to go to lunch, and come back at 12:30. At 12:30, we were told to come back at 2:30 (we were getting nervous at this point). At 2:30, we waited…..and waited…..and waited. Oh yeah—we were waiting by the front door all of this time. We saw men in uniforms go into the building, and learned that they were “prosecutors”—in other words, auditors. So, we had to wait for them to finish, although we had no idea when that would happen.

Finally, at 6:00, John and I were told to go in. Olga (our coordinator) and Assya (our translator) were in another room on the phone. John and I were useless in our own defense! We gathered them, only to find that Olga was not on the invitation, so she could not attend the interview. Yikes! So, John, Assya and I went up to the Ministry of Education, where we were promptly told (twice) that our visas were incorrect, but that she would accept them because we had waited so long (our visas were written in Kazakh for the “Dept. of Education” instead of “Ministry of Education”—an old template that our adoption agency used when applying for our visas). We answered a few questions…what are our occupations, do we know that they have no healthy children, do we have any biological children, do we believe there will be jealousy between the children, who will stay home with the child and for how long, etc.

Finally, we were told that they would send permission to the orphanage for us to visit, and that they should have the permission by noon tomorrow. Assya is a college senior, and had missed two classes for us. She just made it to a 7:00 exam. We truly appreciate her dedication.

We had a great dinner to celebrate, and are going to call it an early night. We are very excited to see Aydar, and will take a lot of pictures. Miss you all! Give Karis big hugs and kisses for us! Goodnight.

From John (Day 2--Sorry it's out of order)

Dobre O tra, (my phonetic spelling for Good Morning in Russian) I have no idea in Kazakh,

We are on Day 2 in Almaty,Kazakhstan. We are doing well. Cindie still has a bit of a cold. She is resting today. We are 10 hours a head of North Carolina (EDT)

Tell Karis we said hello and we love her and miss her!

It was a good trip over, we made all plane connections with no problems, well...... As some of you may know, Cindie is not a fan of flying, she does it because it is a better way to travel, but it is not something she enjoys. We traveled in the air for about 20 hours, and on the 3rd and last leg of the trip, we started in on descent on Luftstansa air(aGerman air line), it is dark, almost midnight in Almaty Kazakhstan. Then we noticed, as frequent flyer's may know, the engines roared and the airplane nose went up drastically, but we felt as if we were now ascending up. Again it is night, we could not tell how close to the ground we were. By this time my hand is turning white. Not by my nerves, but by the grasp of Cindies hand clutching mine with nearly all her strength, as the Pilot comes over the intercom, IN GERMAN. At this point we knew we were not landing, and the plane, still ascending, starts to turn, all while we are still listening in German to this announcement. However, we did understand one word in German he said, 'PROBLEM'. Apparently that is an international word. Then the pilot begins to translate in English, at this point my hand is just about numb, again from Cindies death grip. The problem seems to be with the front landing gear and they should have that corrected in 20 minutes, he says. OK, it's just that, no problem.
Well we finally landed after circling the airport, and everything worked correctly. A bit nerving though.

We have not met Aydar(the child) yet, that will probably not happen until Wednesday. We meet with the minister of education tomorrow at 3pm for our first interview. We would appreciate the prayers.

Well, I need to get back to the apartment before it gets dark. It took us a few days to get connected to the internet but I think I have got it now. I found a Cafe with Wi Fi, and at night we can dial up from the apartment.

I forgot the phone number at the apartment but we gave it to Cindie's mom last night. We will try to make some phone calls tonight, your morning. You can forward this message on to others I missed, Cindie has most of the email list in her email.

Day 3--Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Today is a discouraging day. We received a call from Sasha this morning that our 11:00 a.m. appointment with the MOE has been cancelled. It is 7:00 p.m. right now, and we have not yet received another call saying when it will be rescheduled. If we don’t meet with them tomorrow and visit the orphanage tomorrow, we’ll have to extend our trip in order to satisfy the 14 day bonding period. And that creates a whole new host of items to be addressed in the U.S.

We slept the day away, since we’re still not used to the time change. The people here aren’t rude, they’re just not friendly. No one has smiled at us since we arrived, people walk right into us, they cut us off where ever we’re standing—just not something we’re used to (especially having come from the South).

Cooking is sparse, since we have to turn the gas on and off for the stove, otherwise the gas leaks. Everything in the apartment needs to be cleaned, and somebody’s clothes, slippers, etc. are anywhere we might want to put our things. We had planned to pay for a hotel with our credit card, and now we have to come up with money to pay for the apartment. It would have been better if we had known in advance that we’re staying here and could have planned for it, because we’re not sure how to get more cash. However we do it is going to cost us.

We also don’t know how to turn the date on for our camera—the instructions just aren’t doing it—and that is something that is important for court. John has been great at figuring out the monetary system, getting pictures printed, paying for groceries, and even speaking Russian. I don’t think I would have been able to get by on my own. We think we have a workaround for the pictures. We’ll have to see.

I hope tomorrow will be better. I apologize for being so glum.

Days 1 & 2

Day 1--Sunday, October 26, 2008

We arrived in Almaty late last night. We got some sleep, but it never seems to be enough. We had asked for a hotel, but were taken to an apartment. It’s not too bad. Olga, and her son Sasha, came over at noon to lay out the week for us, and to take us to the grocery store. We could not have asked for nicer people (Sasha translates for Olga). They helped us to figure out what was what in the store (e.g. what I thought was butter turned out to be mayonnaise), and how to use the tenge (Kazakh currency). Olga told us that we were given an apartment because it is less expensive than a hotel, and it is within walking distance to the orphanage. They also told us that it might be a month to one and one half months after we return to the US before we can come back to pick up our son. I hope it’s not that long. We were hoping for just 3 weeks. Olga also gave us a cell phone to use while we’re here, and took us to get an international calling card to use both with our phone and our PC. There is a café nearby (I’m not sure where yet) that has WiFi, so we’ll let you know how that goes once we find it. Tomorrow is a holiday for Kazakhstan, but Olga will still speak with the Ministry of Education (MOE). We will meet with them on Tuesday, and finally go to the orphanage to meet Aydar on Wednesday.

Day 2--Monday, October 27, 2008

First and foremost—we miss everyone terribly and appreciate your help while we’re away. Please give Karis big hugs and kisses for us. There are no words to describe how much we would like to be with her.

Sasha came today and showed us where the orphanage is—just a quick 10 minute walk from our apt. There are a number of children’s play items along the way—some like elliptical machines, swings, etc. We have an appointment tomorrow with the MOE (Ministry of Education) at 3:00. Olga will go with us, but we’re still nervous. They will ask us questions about our income, why we chose Kazakhstan, if we realize that Kazakhs have the right to adoption first, etc.

We bought calling cards to call everyone as well as to dial into the internet. Dial-up is incredibly slow, and we couldn’t read the instructions anyway once John dialed into the server (e.g. we had to input the card’s serial number and password), so John went exploring and found the café with WiFi. Sasha has been incredible—he has helped us with these tasks as well. I’m still sick (can’t seem to shake this cold), so I stayed at the apt. and took a much needed nap while John was out. There is a 10 hour time difference between Kazakhstan and the East coast of the U.S. John has adapted well. He took some great pictures while he was out. We’re not sure what the structures are (“Was that a school or a prison?”), but they’re interesting. We need to have the date printed on our pictures for court. We’re still trying to figure that out with our camera. We think we may have it, but we won’t know for sure until we print some more photos.

We couldn’t cook last night because the gas wasn’t turned on for the stove. Olga called today for us and found out the valve is behind a kitchen drawer! We had eggs for lunch, but by the time John came home this afternoon, the kitchen smelled like gas, so we turned it off again. John is making dinner as I type this. Oh no! John is cooking horsemeat for dinner. I have to go hide! Goodnight……