Ukraine Travel Journal

Day 11
We visited Timothy at the orphanage. We got to feed him today. I was really surprised at the quantity of food they gave us to feed him. I don't know if they were just trying to impress us but this guy had enough food to satisfy me. He was given a good size bowl of some sort of soup or broth with bread broken up in it. He also had another good size bowl of some sort of grain or cereal with some ground up chicken on the side. He was also given what looked like a cup of tea. We had just given him a banana and a cracker and some juice. He definitely didn't go hungry today. Later in the day we went shopping for clothes. We were shopping outside in an area where there were all kinds of people selling things. It was like a huge outdoor flea market except in the winter. I don't know how these people can stand around in the cold all day trying to sell their stuff. We had to buy everything from a coat and boots to shirts, pants, socks, mittens and pjs. The grivnas were flying out of my wallet. I'm glad our translator was with us. Figuring out sizes in metric was a challenge.

Day 12
On the way to the orphanage we saw an old motorcycle and sidecar cruising down the road. It's not what I imagined I would see in Ukraine in the winter time. We visited with Timothy for another 2 hours today. He is always eager to see what food we have for him. He acts hungry but after the portions I saw him get yesterday, I'm wondering why. We got to feed him the orphange meal again. He had one plate of beets and what looked like a mound of potatoes....not sure....they seemed pretty rubbery. He also got a bowl of what looked like a cross between soup and gravy. It had bread in it again. We fed him until he lost interest. It really was a good pile of food for someone his age. When we got done spending time with Timothy, we got dropped off at the apartment and then went out wandering on our own. We did a little more shopping and found a few small toys to distract Timothy on the way home. These outdoor markets have everything. There were people selling men's suits, puppies, tropical fish, birds, spices, produce of every kind, meat, boots, coats, toys, paintings, crafts and just about anything else you could imagine. Things are going well for us. We're just waiting for the process to end. We are waiting for our documents to be signed at the NAC in Kiev and then sent back here to where we are. If we do have the court hearing on Tuesday, we will then go to Timothy's town of birth to get a new birth certificate issued. We will also have to get his passport. Estimated day of arrival back home is still up in the air. There are just too many variables at this point.

We have decided to name our new son Timothy Daniel. Yesterday we spent about half the day waiting for our translator to process our applications for adoption at the notary's office. While we were waiting, we went for a walk. We bought a tape measure so we could measure Timothy for clothes. Our driver finally picked us up and we had to drive to the notary's office to sign the application forms. Then we drove to the inspector's office to have our documents checked. We drove to the court so our translator could try to set up a court date for us. It looks like it might happen on Tuesday if everyone follows through with what they need to do. We went to another office to find out what documents we will need to get a passport for Timothy. Eventually, we made it to the orphanage and spent about 1.5 hrs with Timothy. We brought him a banana, juice and crackers and he ate like he had missed his last 3 meals. He was more focused on food than he was on playing. We left the orphanage and went out to eat before going back to our apartment. We got more than we expected. When we were almost done our meal, Cindy found a bug in her plate. (and they didn't even charge us extra)

Day 10
We went to the orphanage this morning and spent about 2 hours with Timothy. We were brought to a room where we found another family spending time with a two year old and a three year old boy they were in the process of adopting. They were from Israel. Timothy seemed to recognize us and he was happy to see that we had brought more juice and crackers. I was able to quiz his caretakers on his schedule and the foods he ate. I was surprised to learn that they sometimes give these little guys tea. They also get something called milk porridge which is a mixture of milk with noodles or rice....probably whatever they have available. We're enjoying getting to know him. He seems to be a very good baby. We had to go to the courthouse where our translator met with the judge. He said he would try to arrange to have our hearing on Tuesday but there are no guarantees. Our driver brought our documents to the airport this morning so that they would be sent to Kiev for review. Our translator thinks the director of the NAC will be in on Monday and hopefully will sign our documents so we can proceed with the court hearing. The papers will need to be flown back here to us. Some days we are running around and it is hard to get to an internet cafe. It is not as close to our apartment as it was when we were back in Kiev. We will update the site when we can. I wish I could post more pictures. We'll have to try to figure something out.

I only have 45 minutes to check e-mail and update our site so this will be short. We travelled from 11pm Monday till about 12 noon on Tuesday to get to the orphanage where we were to visit with the little boy we got a referral for. We spent another 3hrs plus waiting at the inspector's office. This is who we needed to get permission from to visit the little boy named Andrew. Late in the day, we finally saw the little guy and we knew instantly he was a keeper. He's very healthy, he's walking, he has blond hair and brown eyes. He is a very happy little guy. It does not take much to get him laughing or smiling. He is the favorite of the orphanage. I'll try to post a picture of him today so be sure to check the picture page. I thought I had packed the cable to go between the PC and my camera but unfortunately, I must have left it behind. That is why you aren't seeing any pictures. We did get a guy at this internet cafe to scan in an outdated picture of Andrew(who will soon have a new name...stay tuned). I'll try to post it today.

We thought today was going to be another laid back day but God had a different
plan in store for us. We got up, had breakfast and arranged for our driver to
take us into downtown Kiev to do some sightseeing. We visited some amazing
churches. The detail inside and out was just incredible. A lot of gold was used
inside and out and the murals on the walls and ceilings were fantastic.

We visited Independence square where the election protests had gone on just days
before we had arrived. There were still in the vicinity of 1000-2000 protesters
in the area with many tents set up. The re-vote is scheduled for Dec. 26th and
the area is expected to fill up with people once again. Everything is very
peaceful here right now so don't worry about us. After our day of sightseeing
we headed to the internet cafe and started reading our e-mail. Only minutes
after we had started our session, our driver came into the cafe and told us we
would be going to the NAC(National Adoption Center) today. It was about 4pm. We
also got a call from our facilitator and translator that we should go to the
NAC right away for an appointment. This was a surprise to us. We were only
expecting an appointment tomorrow(Tuesday). At the NAC, we walked up the stairs
and past a large number of people waiting in the stairway and in the hallway.
We walked into the director's office and an older gentleman was sitting at a
desk. We sat down and started talking to our translator. We were shown the file
and picture of a 14 month old boy. He has dark hair and hazel eyes. It appears
that he has no major medical problems and just became available for adoption
yesterday. We hope and pray that this time the information they are giving us
is correct. He is very cute and he is located in an orphanage about 800 km from
here. The orphanage is in eastern Ukraine and we will be travelling there by
train. We don't know when we will be leaving for the region. It could be
tonight or tomorrow. We asked about siblings but there were just no young
siblings available. We feel very hopeful about this referral. We were told
there are no girls available at the moment. Keep us in your prayers. We miss
Josh and our friends and family very much.

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Day 5
Today was a down day for us. We spent some time on the internet checking e-mail and trying to update our web site. We got some groceries at the market nearby. We took a walk and got to observe how tough some people have it here. People were standing side by side along the sidewalk with a few things on the ground in front of them. Most of them were trying to sell vegetables or homemade mixtures of vegetables. Some were selling pickles, fruit, and unwrapped meat. Most of these people looked old enough to be our parents and they would stand on the sidewalk most of the day trying to sell their food items. We have seen many dogs roaming the streets. The buildings here and the grounds nearby are not maintained. Our building has several entrances and apparently we went in the wrong entrance on the way back from the market. Our translator is not with us this weekend so we are on our own. We took the elevator to the 5th floor but the apartment numbers were all in the 100's. Our apartment number was 285. We got back on the elevator and somewhere along the way, the elevator stopped and the doors would not open. Cindy could feel herself getting stressed. We finally were able to make our way down to the lobby and thankfully the doors opened and we tried to speak with the lady in the lobby. She didn't understand a word we were saying but could tell we were not finding our apartment. Finally I wrote down the number of our apartment and she walked outside with
me and showed me that we went into the wrong entrance. It was a relief to finally find our apartment...ha.

Day 6
It has been snowing all day today but it is not accumulating at all. We have had another quiet day. We just stayed at the apartment all morning. We did laundry in the bathtub and hung it all over the radiators to dry and on a bungy cord. We came to the internet cafe which is a short walk from the apartment. We've been reading and enjoying watching movies on the laptop. Nothing much new to report. We are still hopeful to have another appointment on Tuesday at the NAC.

Today we got up at 3am to be ready for our translator and driver to pick us up
at 3:30am. They arrived on time and we packed our luggage into their car and
took off. The roads looked icy and for part of the trip we saw snow coming
down. We were on unlit backroads most of the time and doing 100km/hr +. We were
passing cars left and right. We spent so much time on the left side of the road
that I was beginning to think we were in England. I was expecting a few more
gray hairs to appear on this trip but I wasn't expecting the chest pains I got
a couple of times during the six hour trip to the orphanage. The more time we
spent skating down the left hand side of the road passing cars, the more I was
expecting to meet Jesus today. I could feel myself perspiring as I wondered if
death was going to be painful before meeting Jesus. Well, we survived the trip.

We met with the orphanage doctor who told us about the little girl we had come
to see. She said the girl was born at about 25=26 weeks. She talked about her
delays. We were shocked when she mentioned that they suspected the girl was
mentally retarded. It was sad and frustrating for us. The National Adoption
Center had said nothing about this to us. It would have saved us driving for 6
hours to the orphanage and 6 hours back. We visited with the girl. She did not
respond to us. She was in her own little world. She did not respond to noises
Cindy made. She did not maintain eye contact with us. It was sad. We signed a
document stating we had seen the girl and listing reasons why we decided not to
adopt her. We drove the 6 hours back to Kiev with more stress. I did get the
driver to slow down some. We were physically and mentally exhausted by the time
we got back to Kiev. We are now at a different apartment. It is very nice. We
received information from our translator that we will have another appointment
at the National Adoption Center on Tuesday. With God's help, this appointment
will go better. Please pray for us.

We were picked up at 8:30 to go to the National Adoption Center. We spent quite a bit of time in the hallway of the NAC(national Adoption Center) waiting for our turn. Things did not start out well because I am always taking pictures and I took several in the hallway of the NAC. They have pictures of adopted kids on the walls. While I was snapping pictures, someone came out of the director's office and spoke to our translator. She told her that I should stop taking pictures. I'm not so sure what is so top secret about the hallway but I just put my camera away and waited patiently for our turn. When we finally got in to the office, we looked at several binders of children. All of the children were either older than what we were looking for or had severe medical problems or had many siblings. We were shown the files of two children who had no siblings. One was a two year old boy who they said potentially had infectious hepatitis because the area where he was located was known for having a high incidence of disease. The second file was of a 16 month old girl who was born prematurely and was not walking yet. The picture we saw of her showed a big belly like you would see on very malnourished children. They did think that she would develop normally if given adequate nutrition and care. Both children had been seen by at least one couple who turned them down. We made the decision to accept the referral for the little girl. Both the translator and the psychologist at the NAC thought she was the best prospect. The decision was a difficult one for us. The choice was not obvious. We liked the idea of adopting a boy and we also liked the idea of adopting a girl. Since we were both struggling, we took into account the advice of the translator and psychologist.

Tomorrow, we will leave at about 3:30am to travel to the region where the girl is located. Once we visit with the girl, we will decide if we want to proceed with the adoption. If we decide to adopt her, we will arrange for a doctor to come to the orphanage to give her an evaluation. If the evaluation goes well, we will start the paperwork to complete the adoption. If we decide to decline the referral for whatever reason, we will head back to Kiev and wait for another appointment which we are told will only be sometime in 2005.

After our appointment, we did a little sightseeing. It was cold today and the wind made it seem even colder. While we were sightseeing, we got a call from home and we were able to talk to Josh. It was good to hear him and talk with him.

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We haven't adjusted to the time shift yet. We woke up around 2-2:30 this morning. I was wide awake and decided to stay up and do some journaling on the laptop and get some questions ready for our translator. Cindy stayed in bed and eventually fell asleep again around 6am. We took a walk to the mall and looked around. We went with our driver and a translator to a notary to get a new power of attorney since the ones assigned to us were still working with other families. That was the beginning of our sit around and wait that we've heard so much about. We arrived around lunchtime which for them was around 2pm, so we had to wait until they had lunch before proceeding with the business at hand. We eventually got out of their office after 3pm and then we went out to lunch. Our translator was dropped off at the National Adoption Center to do some business and we ate out with our driver. The restaurant was caffeteria style and the total cost for all three of us was about $10. and I ate plenty. The highlight of the afternoon was driving through Kiev. The traffic is like Boston or New York at rush hour but the rules are different. What rules??? Our driver knows exactly where the front and sides of his car are and is not afraid to bring his car to within an inch or so of other vehicles. There is constant weaving in and out and very assertive driving. I didn't see any fingers flying but heard horns blowing.

We received a call from our facilitator this evening telling us he would pick us up tomorrow morning around 8:30AM. Our appointment with the National Adoption Center is at 10AM. There are about 4 other families before us. Please pray that the appointment goes well and that God would make the child(ren) available that he would like to have join our family. Everything else has gone well up to this point. God has provided everything we need here. We are having difficulty dialing home using the AT & T calling card we have. I got detailed instructions from them before we left, but they are not working. We have not heard from the Morrells about Josh. If someone who knows them reads this, could you tell them they have to dial 1-800-840-7438 and then wait for the prompt to enter our number which from the US is 011-38-050-285-2571. They need to call from our home phone which is set up for pinless dialing. That's it for now!

Well, here we are sitting in an internet cafe in Kiev. The flights went well. I was suprised when we landed in Kiev and people on board our plane started applauding. Maybe safe landings are unusual in Ukraine? Yesterday, we spent some time with my uncle Harold who met us in Frankfurt. I felt like Alex Haley returning to his roots. The people looked like me! Imagine that! My uncle gave me a tour of Frankfurt. We took the train(maybe more like a subway) into town and did a lot of walking. Afterwards, we boarded another train to head home. We had just gotten onto the train and were waiting to leave when my uncle decided we were on the wrong train. He turned and walked out the door. As I proceeded to follow him the doors decided to try and cut me in half. I expected to lose some weight on this trip but I wasn't planning to lose half my body weight in one day. I had this picture of a super hero in my head as I tried to force the doors open with my hands. I was thinking this wasn't going to be good if the train started heading out of the station as I was playing superman. Fortunately, I got myself unstuck and out the door before I got dragged to the next small town. My german taste buds were overjoyed at the lunch we had where I ate bratwurst, saurkraut and red cabbage. Cindy was glad they had normal food. She had steak. She's quite the adventurer. She was especially happy to see the golden arches here in Kiev. I think I overdressed for this place. I've been sweating ever since we got here. I had to take my jacket off at the airport. The temperature today seemed on par with what we might expect at home. We purchased the VIP service at the airport which means we basically went to the head of the line. Customs took us about 2 minutes. The security people don't appear to have a sense of humor. We got stares from several people and no one was smiling. Our driver met us at the airport and we did some shopping before bringing our stuff to the apartment. We picked up groceries, exchanged some money and bought a cell phone. The apartment is much bigger than we expected based on reading other people's stories. The apartment has two bathrooms with real toilets! Woo hoo! We were pleased to find a washing machine. That should make life a little easier. Later today, we will meet with our translator and come up with a game plan. We miss Josh! If any of you see him, give him a hug for us!

We will be leaving for Ukraine on 12/12/04. We will overnight in Frankfurt, Germany. We arrive in Kiev on 12/14/04. Our appointment with the NAC is on 12/16/04. Stay Tuned.