Goodbye to Taraz…for now

13 May2009


Last Family Photo for trip 1

We headed to Umit on last time to visit with Lukas Anton. He came in the music room the same as always and didn’t seem to be affected by Sasha’s absence in his group. Poor Sasha on the other hand left Umit with a fever and swollen glands. He seemed a little better this morning when we saw him while waiting for our ride. Wayne showed him pictures of Lukas on the camera and he got all excited and finally smiled.

We learned on our way outside for the morning that apparently almost half of the children were sick with something. The Docter’s only got a 10 minute visit with Simbot as she was evidently one of the casualties of what ever was spreading. So far it appears Lukas has not gotten whatever it is.

Zema let us go with her to take Lukas back to his group at lunchtime and say goodbye. He had just come in for a potty break and was ready to go back outside so he wasn’t too happy about going upstairs. Papa carried him upstairs and he was whining because he wasn’t getting his way. Not exactly how we wanted to end things this trip. We gave the nanny his blanket, bear and photo album and Zema explained what was in the back and asked them to look at the book with him or let him look at it on his own. I left my Russian note that Zema at proofed for me with the bag as well. The doctor was there and I finally learned that Lukas arrived at Umit in Feb of 2008. Right when we signed with Adoption Ark and started the USCIS process for Kaz.

We ate lunch one last time at Medvet and headed back to the room to do one last check to be sure we had everything and checked out. Zema and Janette came to see us off and wish us safe travel. Zema brought each family a fridge magnet and a calendar to mark off the days until we return from court. Janette said we “might” be back as soon as 3 weeks for court. We aren’t holding our breath but it would be really nice. Typically it is around 5 weeks.

We loaded the luggage up into Kuralt and Ernur’s cars at 3pm and headed to Almaty. The road trip back was actually much better than the ride to Taraz. They had actually patched some of the potholes. It was also daylight and sunny so we could see the scenery. It reminded me of driving through Texas in the spring with the big open fields filled with wildflowers. Only difference was it was a sea of wild red poppies instead of bluebonnets. It was breathtaking with the mountains in the background.

The only real incident on this road trip was when we got closer to Almaty on the good road. Ernur discovered to late that there was a dead sheep in the road and ran over it. I thought we had hit a huge pot hole! We arrived at the airport to discover an unusual system. Right as you come in the main door you immediately go through security. All our bags were x-rayed and we went through the metal detector. They questioned Wayne’s multi tool in his toiletry kit but just tag the bag as screened after he explained. I thought they were asking about the 8 inch bread knife we brought back, nope the 1 ½ inch knife on his Leatherman. Go figure!

Once we cleared the entrance we went to wait in line to check-in. I’ll give details of that in a later post when I get home as I have limited power here in the Frankfurt airport. Our flight stopped in Astana to pick up supplies, fuel and some more passengers. We all pretty much slept the rest of the flight to Frankfurt. So here we sit for a 6 hour lay over before heading to DC.

Here's some photos to enjoy from our last visit...
Mama fills empty cup we found with water

Lukas checks it out
Then we dump it
Then we repeat...over and over and over!



Yuckie!!! Get it off Papa!

See you all soon,
Lynda and Wayne

First Mother’s Day with my little boy

10 May 2009


Best Mother’s Day gift ever!

Sc-chastleevi Mat’s Dyen = Happy Mother’s Day
(this is most likely not grammatically correct but you get the idea)

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you mother’s who are reading this today. We hope you have a wonderful, blessed day.

Well, I’ve waited for this day for years and it has finally arrived. Granted, at this point he is not officially ours yet, but I get to spend Mother’s Day with my own little boy. It may only be for 2 hours or so, but I will take it just the same. With any luck we might be here with him for Father’s Day as well having our court date. We have been told that court should be around 5 weeks after our Guardianship Council. Since we are having that on May 12th it would put us at mid June or so for Court.

It’s hard to believe we only have 4 more visits with our little guy and then we will be half way around the world from each other. Hopefully with catching up with work, at home and getting his room ready the time will go by quickly.

Here is a glimpse of my first Mother’s Day with Lukas Anton…

Victory Day

9 May 2009

neechyevo = all gone

First things first, a big happy birthday to Lynda Jeanne!! Hope you have a great day. We threw a parade in your honor today here in Taraz…unfortunately with all the chaos within the crowds this is all I could see to photograph for you to see.










The celebration last weekend was much better since most of the residents were in the parade you could get a good spot to see the festivities. We started out up on the square which is evidently where all the good action and the people part of the parade took place, however, long before the parade started we had been pushed from almost at the front to about 10 rows deep. The people just push you out of the way or walk around and walk up in front of you. The poor police and guard units were trying to keep people from cutting in front and crossing the parade route but it was a lost cause. The people just totally ignored anyone in uniform for the most part. We finally got a spot along the main road but once the motorcade went through (at about 30mph no less) the crowd ran into the street from both sides and started pushing towards the square as a mass. We gave up. I would have liked to have seen the folk dance I saw them rehearsing earlier in the week. I did get 1 photo of two dancers walking down the street.


We headed to Medvet for lunch and I actually managed to order a steak completely by chance. We had figured the menu out to know that meat was on one page, lamb on another, pork another, etc. I decided to branch out and try something new and just pointed to something. I had no idea what I was in for and was quite surprised to see a steak hiding under grilled vegetables. I convinced Quentin to do likewise and he ended up with a veal cutlet au gratin.

We had what I guess will be our regular afternoon visits from here on out. Aima was in town and went with us so we managed to get some information out of her. We will visit everyday until the day we leave to come. Our last visit will be Wednesday morning and then we hit the road for the long drive to the airport. Zema will be back with us tomorrow. Based on the extra fees for additional days of driver/translator Zema will be going with us everyday until we leave. We are scheduled for Guardianship Council on Tuesday at 4pm (that’s 8 am EST) along with the Docters, we don’t know who will go first. Aima said it is very easy and they just ask basic questions. I gather it is more of a formality before court, but just the same be praying for us then. Since Aima is coming to the USA the end of May to stay for 4 months she used the opportunity to ask us questions about the east coast and the states in general. Her brother who met Wayne and I at the airport is going to Seattle, WA with the same work abroad program so she was asking us questions about Seattle as well. My many trips to Seattle came in handy.

Now, what you have been waiting for, your daily fix of Lukas Anton photos…







Lukas Anton pointed out this old photo of him to me yesterday and we took a snapshot of it today…


He is the one in the stripped sweater holding the nannies hand. This was taken in the common play area in their wing.

Debbie, I have a project for you if you are up to it. There is a piece of artwork outside the music room that Lukas Anton is very fond of. Below are some pictures of it. It is made out of some sort of vinyl tape but I was wondering if you might be able to put your painting skills to work and recreate it in a smaller size so we could put it in his room so he would have something familiar around him.




Paka,
Lynda and Wayne

Pre Holiday Blog

May 8, 2009

Moozyay – museum

It’s a bright sunny but breezy day here in Taraz. This morning we went with the Docters to a museum up the street. It cost 150 Tenge per person to get in, that’s $1.00. It consisted of three floors that pretty much went from early Kazakhstan to present day. It also had a section on the history of Taraz. It was pretty interesting, especially the fact that you make up what stuff is in you’re head. There’s only a handful of English on any of the exhibits and no English guides.

We then had lunch and headed back to the hotel to wait to go see Lukas Anton. When he came to us he had just gotten up from a nap. Oh joy!! He walked in with 2 cookies and plopped down and our first 15 minutes of quality time was watching him wake up and eat.

We then played outside and all in all he was in a pretty good mood and we had a good visit. We go see him tomorrow at 3pm and our Aima will be with us since Zema will not be back yet. We feel fairly certain that our guardianship council hearing will be on Tuesday May 12. They asked if we wanted to leave Tuesday evening or Wednesday after lunch. The hotel is cheaper here so we will head to Almaty on Wed during daylight and go straight to the airport. So it looks like we will definitely be home Thursday, a day later than planned but still next week. They have decided to close on Monday 11 for Victory Day which will be celebrated tomorrow May 9. Confused, I would pull my hair out if I had any to spare.

There promises to be a lot of cold war machinery rolling up and down the streets tomorrow. That’s all these roads need, tank treads rolling on them.










Paka,

Lynda and Wayne

The many faces of Lukas Anton

7 May 2009

Nan nakatan! = ?????? (your guess is as good as ours)

The word/phrase for the day was the chant from our little boy today. We saw a very silly side to him today. He was in a great mood and we didn’t have any pouty sessions…we’re wondering if they gave him some sort of silly juice and if so can we have a bottle to go. We were wondering if Lukas Anton was going to have a buzz cut today. His class came out before we left yesterday and they had all had a haircut, the same one, whether boy or girl. All buzzed off except for short bangs in front. We’re short on what today say about our visit other than it was a great day…I think the pictures today pretty much say it all.

















We go again tomorrow at 3pm, still no word on Guardianship Council.

Paka,
Lynda and Wayne