2.22.2005
Day 8
Another day, another nice visit with the kids. Justin drank his apple juice and ate his Cheerios while we played with toys, and today Paige successfully ate all her kasha since we transferred it to a bottle, added more milk, and she drink it all down! The caretakers are pleased with our progress with Justin. He’s still pretty subdued, but much better than the first few days with us. We are just grateful that he makes eye contact and giggles when we think of something new to entertain him. He’s not walking on his own yet, so we spend much of our time holding his hands and walking around the room with him. This is by far the most exercise he’s had in all his 17 months, and he can barely stay awake while we feed him his lunch.
Our plans for the days ahead include visiting the Barahoulka (huge outdoor market) the Tsum store for souvenirs, perhaps the opera or ballet, and the Kazakhstan National Museum. Everything we can before we bring the children home. We are going to review our speech for court on Saturday, go over it again with our translator on Sunday, and if it’s okay with the baby house director, take the children back to our apartment next Monday or Tuesday. And if all goes well, court should take place next Friday, March 4.
After the baby house visit Emil took us to the chocolate factory where we purchased boxes of chocolate to supplement the gifts we brought for everyone. The weather is warming up and the snow and ice are melting which makes for lots of muddy puddles. Driving in Kazakhstan is a free-for-all. The roads seem to be one wide lane, and if you want to pass, you just speed up, honk the horn and go for it. We’ve seen several car accidents in our travels, but Emil is a great driver and we feel very safe with him. We asked Emil what people’s feelings are about dogs, since we see stray dogs roaming around everywhere. He said that in the small village of Ecik, the dogs do okay because even if no one owns them, they are kept well fed. However, in a large city like Almaty, the dogs are not as fortunate. Of course it’s breaking Chris’s heart, and she’s dying to take them all in, but there’s not a whole lot to do about it. Maybe we should think about opening a North Shore Animal League Eastern Europe!
It’s tough being away from home, and Chris is feeling especially homesick. Even though we’re in a nice apartment and Emil and Gulnara are so gracious and accommodating, there’s no place like home. The only English-speaking channels are Fox News, BBC, American music videos, and at 4pm we tune into the Cartoon Network and watch The Flintstones!!
Until tomorrow!
Our plans for the days ahead include visiting the Barahoulka (huge outdoor market) the Tsum store for souvenirs, perhaps the opera or ballet, and the Kazakhstan National Museum. Everything we can before we bring the children home. We are going to review our speech for court on Saturday, go over it again with our translator on Sunday, and if it’s okay with the baby house director, take the children back to our apartment next Monday or Tuesday. And if all goes well, court should take place next Friday, March 4.
After the baby house visit Emil took us to the chocolate factory where we purchased boxes of chocolate to supplement the gifts we brought for everyone. The weather is warming up and the snow and ice are melting which makes for lots of muddy puddles. Driving in Kazakhstan is a free-for-all. The roads seem to be one wide lane, and if you want to pass, you just speed up, honk the horn and go for it. We’ve seen several car accidents in our travels, but Emil is a great driver and we feel very safe with him. We asked Emil what people’s feelings are about dogs, since we see stray dogs roaming around everywhere. He said that in the small village of Ecik, the dogs do okay because even if no one owns them, they are kept well fed. However, in a large city like Almaty, the dogs are not as fortunate. Of course it’s breaking Chris’s heart, and she’s dying to take them all in, but there’s not a whole lot to do about it. Maybe we should think about opening a North Shore Animal League Eastern Europe!
It’s tough being away from home, and Chris is feeling especially homesick. Even though we’re in a nice apartment and Emil and Gulnara are so gracious and accommodating, there’s no place like home. The only English-speaking channels are Fox News, BBC, American music videos, and at 4pm we tune into the Cartoon Network and watch The Flintstones!!
Until tomorrow!
# posted by kaztree @ 10:35 AM 
