Wednesday and You have alot of reading to do

Wednesday and you got a lot to read
I’ve downloaded to the blog everything that I’ve written since leaving the Atlanta hotel in Moscow. I know I’ve given you guy’s a lot to catch up on so what I’ll do is summarize.
We landed in Kharabosky, took a three hour car trip to Birobadijan. About ten minutes outside of town we are stopped at a railroad crossing because a train has broken down and the crossing is blocked. Here we met our new best friends the Jewish Autonomous region mosquitoes. They are big, they are mean and they are blood thirsty and hungry. We are ok sitting in our original spot on line. Our driver sees a spot closer to the crossing and moves up. When he stops we find out why the previous driver left. After twenty minutes of playing how many flies can you swat we move on. The train was still broken, but someone gave the ok to open the gate, and off we fly (hey, I made a joke).
We get to town and turn into this apartment complex and if you want to read about it go to the post, I was a little harsh on it and it did catch us both by surprise. We weren’t expecting it and when we went inside the apartment which is nice, didn’t thrill us because of the outside. We found out later that the town owns the outside and the tenants own the apartments. If someone wants to upgrade the outside they ask the town or do it themselves. Or they can form tenant associations and do it through the associations.
Inside the Apartment, a fourth floor walk up is the person who takes care of the adoptions and assigns us drivers and translators. We take care of a little business and she gives us a tour of the apartment.
On Wednesday, We meet the girls for the first time in 13 months. They were told we were coming and were prepared and met us in the director’s office. The girls for one reason or another were taken out of school so we have access to them at anytime we want. We spent several hours at the orphanage and let the kids have our cameras and they took several hundred pictures of everyone and we have kept the majority. While there and on every successive visit we fall in love with another kid and want to take them home. If any of you intrepid travelers are feeling your home is a little empty and your bank account a little to full let me know and I will solve both problems quickly. There is loads of kid waiting for loving homes here. What awaits them after they turn 18 or 19 I really don’t want to think about.
On Thursday, I put on my finest duds and go to court prepared to make my case for adopting the girls. I do my introduction and the judge asks questions, calls in the girls, asks questions of the older one, Nastia. She then proceeds to ask my wife questions and then she goes and considers her decision. About half an hour later she comes back tells us they are our children and we have ten days to appeal the decision and then it will be final. Did she know something we didn’t?
Friday, I have my melt down. Howard and Marty told us to expect your child to reach a point that everything that he or she has been thinking about suddenly becomes a reality in their mind and they go a little crazy.
Nobody told me it was going to happen to me. Well it did and I didn’t realize it until I reread some of what I wrote. I don’t really know what to say about it beyond if I insulted anyone, I’m sorry. I wasn’t going to publish it but I did.
Saturday was a better day, we spent time with the kids at the music festival (which they did not like) and walking the riverside park (they did like). It was less of a disaster then the day before.
Sunday dinner in Russia, has a nice warm sound to it. Dinner was fun. Good food, good people, good beer. I just reread the post and the day was rough on us and the girls. We have a long road ahead of us and I am very concerned. We will need all the help we can get so please don’t hesitate to ask and if we say no, ask again later. We will need it.
This past Monday, will sound like a mixture of the previous days. We are running out of places to take the girls. We were at the River walk, because we found out the underground playground is closed and we don’t want to chance bowling with the energizer bunnies. We encouraged the girls to run and Elena covered about a mile before she stopped. I think I see an athlete on our team. Nastia is going to be the actress, every time she sees a camera she poses. She will also do impromptu songs and dances.
Tuesday, if I was to tell you what we did you’d say hey are you trying to skip out on writing your blog? You’ve don’t that before at least twice and you’ve had that same fight several times with your wife. At least think up some new lies to tell. Yeah, we went to the pit stop, spent the day there, because it was raining. Had a fight with Nastia, she wanted money, ice cream, more food and Elena wanted the same (Fleas, Papa, fleas) we dropped them off and went out to dinner again.
Now Today Wednesday, the reason you know what is happening to us. We are finally in our hotel room. It is very nice; it is smaller than our apartment. Here are the pluses; we walked home from dinner, we made an internet phone call, hell we have internet access! A TV! (All in Russian, but don’t think it doesn’t matter).
We went to the bowling alley to have lunch with the girls. I felt it was going to be a disaster and said lets go, but we stayed and it was passable. The girls ate spaghetti and a hot dog each. Somehow we got two orders of meat pie so Teri and I ate some and Elena ate some but Nastia refused to she wanted more spaghetti. We then went to the square where the hotel is and walked around. We spent a little time in the room and then went back outside and the girls chased the pigeons (hey, I know I’m repeating myself but it’s what they did and enjoy) Tonight Teri and I went out to dinner alone and since we have both heard each other’s stories several times we ate quietly except for the occasional foods good, yeah, your right. Beer please, haven’t you had enough?

It's Tuesday in Birobadijan and I'm out of witty openings 09-15-09

It’s Tuesday in Birobadijan and I’m out of witty openings
Oh, wait I just got one, let’s see if you get the reference. It’s day eight, America held hostage.


Yah, it’s been eight days in Birobadijan and I have to say I have still not met a person who has been nasty to me. They have been very pleasant and I have tipped well. Is there a connection? That’s just a bad joke the reality of the situation is we have gone to dinner with CJ and Fran and CJ has decided the tip so I guess we can still go back to these restaurants. Tonight was a Chinese restaurant and surprisingly there is little difference between Chinese American food and Chinese Russian food. Maybe they use a little more mayonnaise here. OK, cheap shot, for the uninformed Russians use mayonnaise in a lot of things. If you order a salad it has mayonnaise in it, Russian dressing has mayonnaise in it, and if you want you can get a little mayonnaise on the side with your potato pancakes which are actually very good. All of the mayonnaise based salads are pretty good; there is no salad that I have come across here that has lettuce in it. The appetizers have more lettuce in them then the salads, but it is a garnish and I’ve never been sure if you can eat the garnish. Back to Dinner, We had sweet and sour chicken, a first, it’s been mostly pork we’ve eaten, Pork and something, a noodle dish with clear noodles and a brown sauce, also good and stuffed, fried eggplant, another thing we’ve eaten a lot of was good. We asked for egg rolls and they said they didn’t have them, I thought it would be something that would have gone over big it is cabbage stuffed with pork and other things and it is fried. It should have been a hit. We had beer (CJ and I) and it was the first beer that didn’t taste good, this one was a little skunky. Dinner was quickly over so we went to a coffee shop where we had coffee yesterday and afterwards we swatted mosquitoes while waiting for our ride. It was a good, if short night.
Now about the girls, it was another repeat of the previous day. We went to Pit stop for lunch and while there (we went because it was raining) Yulila went to take care of some of our paper work for the girls visas and passports. We ate met CJ and Fran with Max there and Max and the girls went into the maze and spent enough time there to work off lunch (the girls) or to get so wound up and refused to eat (Max). CJ and Fran left and we waited for Yulila to return. We were at the pit stop until about four when we went to our apartment and received not then, but now the biggest laugh when the girls went ‘wow’ when they saw the apartment; they then proceeded to act out just like they did yesterday at the orphanage. I tried a different tack with them instead of yelling at them and taking stuff away as punishment I wrapped one of them in my arms and said in my best Russian, that Teri had to correct ‘I love you’ I then kissed them and let them go to see what effect it had. It had none. Well none visible, but I will keep trying it for now.
We left to bring them back and on the way we got them some fruit for their group. We have to figure out some way to hold the fruit and let it ripen. They get it and serve it the same day and it is not ready to eat. Maybe we can talk to them about holding it? Maybe.

The Americans get ugly 09-14-09

The American’s get Ugly
Let’s start at the end of the day and maybe jump around. We just got back from having some cake and coffee at a shop right across from the hotel that is fully booked, but isn’t. We left the café and while walking to get a cab we decided to go and ask if they had any rooms. The lady behind the desk said yes. I am not happy. I have been living in a Soviet Union inspired flat with uneven stairs, a hallway that is both dark and cold and smells of cat pee. On top of that we are paying 100.00 American each night we stay there. The Hotel is a little more, 120-130 American a night. Now the question begs to be asked, do we want to open up a can of worms with one night left after tonight before we move to the hotel? Nadezda is the person who is paid to get things done around here because she has the connections, do you want to piss her off or let it rest until you have possession of the kids? I guess it will rest the one and only reason to go on this trip was the kids. Nastia got stuff she didn’t want to eat and gave it to her sister. We quickly gave up on the Pit Stop and went to the river walk after getting some pictures of the kids for their passports. And also Teri and I had a fight and it will be the first in a long line of how best to raise the girls. The girls chased pigeons and then we went to the river walk so they could feed and chase the pigeons. Sometimes it feels like we are adopting dogs instead of humans because if we let them run they are happier and easier to get along with. I don’t want to insult anyone, not even the girls, but they need to get out and run I think and I also think that Elena has some potential for track. When we let her go for a run she took off on this circuit that was about a quarter mile long and I thought maybe she would do it once, maybe she went around three time and then ran down to the end of the river walk. Nastia did the same distance but she stopped where Elena just ran and ran, run Elena, run. At the end of the river walk we got something to eat, a snack and then picked up some oranges and peaches for their group. On the way to the Orphanage they started cursing and we pick up on it and tried to stop it. In the orphanage they did it again and this time we told them we were leaving. They started to get hyper and laugh a lot so maybe that wasn’t the best thing for us to do. When they start to act up like that it is a sign that something is going on inside of them and it is their defense mechanisms kicking in, the way they protect themselves from hurt, embarrassment. We will try to do better next time.
We met CJ and Fran for dinner again and this time it was at a place called California. It had French fries and Beer. Beyond that nothing to do with California except a picture of maybe Alcatraz. Food was good and plentiful. We spent 1500 rubles with tip for four which in American is fifty dollars.
After that we went to the coffee shop and then the hotel. More about that tomorrow.

Sunday Dinner in Moscow

Sunday Dinner in Russia

A lunch at Pit Stop

The day started off less than stellar. The girls had more energy than con-ed and we didn’t. We picked them up about noon and were told it was almost lunch time and did we want to eat with them. We were trying to be nice and told them we would and they said the girls needed to change. They came out with different clothes on and we left.
We went to fast food; I know it was fast food because it said so on the outside of the building, not because it was. Jenya took our order and placed it. She told us she would wait outside and when we were finished she would meet us there. I like it when she leaves us alone with the girls. I don’t know for a fact but it feels like I’m being graded by her when we have the kids and she is with us. I have no proof and it is in all likelihood my imagination, but I like it better when it is the four of us. Lunch didn’t go well, Nastia got a broiled hot dog and Elena, Momma and I got burgers with cheese. Elena changed her mind and wanted a hot dog, Nastia shared and Elena refused to eat the burger, which didn’t look like beef and didn’t taste like it either. We had fries that were good and soda that was the Birobadijan normal almost cold. Every few minutes someone had to go to the bathroom. I was told it was unisex and a hole in the ground, and some of us will not go in there. After Lunch we were going to try bowling, but Nastia’s arm is still in a cast and they had too much energy to sit around when someone else was bowling. So we chose to go to the restaurant Pit Stop and they could go in the maze while Teri and I sat and talked. Yea right, every few minutes one of the two of them would not show up where they were supposed to be and I would go off looking for them. I found Nastia sitting on one of those rides that you put a quarter in and it rocks back and forth. Twice she must have gotten someone to put a coin in for her because it was going. She’s too young to have men twisted around her little finger. I also found her with gum. She assured me someone had given it to her and she didn’t pick it up somewhere. I yelled at her and smacked Elena for drinking from the bottle everyone was using. They went back into the maze and went to the room right in front of us. It was about 8 feet by 4 feet, where Nastia proceeded to jump up and down kick the wall and then fall down on the floor. None of it was directed at us but was done with us able to watch. I knocked on the glass wall and asked her to come out where I hugged her and kissed her and made nice. She hugged back and when she went back into the maze the behavior changed. I then called Elena and did the same thing, there was no change in behavior’ before or after. She went along like nothing had changed from early in the morning. She’s scary. We stayed there until it was time to take them back at about 4:30.
We went to the CJ and Fran’ apartment for dinner, they have the better apartment, and they cook some pretty good Pasta with bread and beer and other things. It was a good meal. We sat around talking until about 10:30 when we took a taxi home and again it was a nice evening.
There is something going on with our translators, I don’t know what. We were asked what we wanted to do for dinner. CJ and Fran were asked if they wanted to go for Chinese food with the Mullers?
This was before we said we were going for Chinese. Strange goings on.

Comrade, I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a Vodka today 09-12-09

Comrade, I will gladly pay you Tuesday for vodka today.
I seem to be drinking a little more than usual lately. Don’t worry mom, we have a driver.
Today went a little better then the day before and tomorrow will be better then today. Even if it doesn’t happen it makes me feel better thinking it will.
Today was one of those days that makes you feel you didn’t make the biggest mistake of yours, your wife’s and two little girls lives by adopting two little girls who don’t speak much in the way of English. What they understand is Good by, than que,Fleas, Poppa (please Poppa) I would like to thank CJ and Fran for making a rough trip a little easier. It is nice to unwind after a day where you feel that you were never meant to raise kids and the ones that you chose to raise are not really kids, but your punishment for doing something really bad in another life. And I’m not saying that they’re bad kids, they’re just kids with twice to three times the energy of you on your best day twenty to thirty years ago. They’re the energizer bunny and we are not.
Another person who was very patient and helpful today was our translator Yulila, she walked and talked with the girls and every time one of them called her momma she corrected them. I did feel a little jealous when one of the girls would take her hand and walk and talk with her. I reasoned that after we leave Birobadijan the odds were that neither of the girls would save every kopek they could get their hands on to fly back to Russia to live with Yulila, because she held their hand walking one afternoon in 2009. So I let it go. This blog has become a space where if I have a thought I express it that could be dangerous.
We started the day, today at 11am far eastern time (8pm American east coast, yesterday). I just had this thought that if the world ended today like in one of those science fiction films, where aliens attack the world or a plague hits the globe, I’d be stuck over here, forever. Speaking of scary, I have seen no ice and most of the beverages are served warm or near to it. I guess they have enough of the cold to last year around. I guess it’s a lot like Montana Teri. That’s an inside joke so don’t think about it too much.
Big differences between Russia and America, There are glasses put out on the table for your vodka.
What is the same, there are more Yankee fans then Met or Red Sox fans here (In both cases 1-0) Have the Yankees won anything in the last week. I’ve been going through internet, cable and American sports detox for the last week. I did have a Russian ask me ‘how are Joba rules working out this year?’
OK, back to the point of this, we went outside to wait for our ride at about five minutes to eleven. I watched a very old cat that looked like he had mange and he looked like there was stuff stuck to his tail. He was a disgusting cat and you felt sorry for him. As I felt sorry for him I began to wonder if he was the reason for the aroma in our hallway. Living on the fourth floor of a five store walk up you get the chance to do some deep breathing and take in some interesting aromas. What was the name of the old cat in the musical ‘Cats’ that is who this cat reminded me of? Any way all the young cats were running around enjoying the warmth of the day as Teri kept saying “I never had an Orange cat, I want one so I can call him Applezeen (Orange in Russian). Oh look, there is a little kitten, I never had a little kitten, I want one so I can call him…. You get the picture. I ride was late and we got to the Orphanage a little later than we expected. The girls have been taken out of school I guess because it would require a lot of signatures and they are only going to be here for another week or so. So we get to take them at anytime we want to. Is that because they like us or they want to get rid of the girls as fast as they can? Forget I ever asked that question, I don’t want to know.
After we took them Teri and I got out the magna doodles she bought for them and started drawing one them telling them they were ours. They didn’t buy it for a moment. The magna doodles kept them so quiet that I kept thanking my wife for bring them over my objections. I felt that we were giving them too many gifts, maybe so but quiet time is quiet time. We went to a place we’d been before called the Pit Stop, if you watch what you buy it will be hot or cold depending on which way you want it. They have a section of foods that they place about the steam table (it’s only a steam table because if they turned it on it could make steam, the best to be said for the food was it wasn’t as cold as the stuff above it.) I don’t want to sound like the snobby American and I guess if I keep spouting off like this I will insure myself a place if the bad guests hall of fame, but come on, I was once asked by a Ukrainian who had moved to America to go over to the Ukraine and help teach that country about capitalism, I didn’t know how bad it was over here. This place, the pit stop was very crowded. In America it would open its door on a Monday and be closed by the board of health for numerous reasons. Failing that the place would close because they know nothing about customer service. All that aside, the food is good and the food is fairly priced. It’s that cafeteria place I talked about a couple of days ago. After we ate the girls went into a maze, jungle Jim, thing like that was in Jeepers in the Palisades Mall. Cory and Ryan and maybe Bill will remember it. They spent about an hour in there, giving Yulila time to get away for a little while and Teri and I time to just veg out.
After the Jungle Jim they wanted Ice Cream and we went over to Baskin Robins. You know how to say Baskin Robins in Russian? That’s right Baskin Robins; just don’t try to order ice cream without your translator. God I didn’t realize how much I used to read during the day to just get by. When I went out earlier the other morning to get a soda, I could not read the street signs, I didn’t know where I lived, and I didn’t even know what the big yellow and red sign at the end of our street said. I couldn’t even say it was a big, red and yellow sign. I know big is bolshi, like in the ballet, but I don’t know yellow or red or sign. I am getting tired of feeling like an illiterate fool.
After the Pit Stop and Baskin Robins ice cream we went to cash in some money. For some reason 200.00 American doesn’t go very far with two kids. After that we figured we’d try the park and the music festival that has kept us out of our rooms in the hotel again. The girls had no interest in the music so we walked the riverside park again and it was nice again. Nastia kept begging for a balloon. For some reason we drew the line on gifts at the balloon. We have given them a small gift every time we have met, plus today we took them out for lunch and ice cream and it just seemed like it should end. We’ll see how long it lasts. I did make a mistake on the first day by handing out my cameras and letting everyone take pictures. I did get a lot of pictures back and I will keep most of them to give them in later years. I mistake is that every time I take out my camera Elena wants to use it and for most of the first week I had no pictures to say I’d been here. So now she doesn’t get to touch the cameras at all. Maybe once back in America I can sit with her and we can both use the cameras together. Right now they have no concept of ownership or responsibility. If I were to give the something, once they were done using it, it would end up on the floor or broken.
The one good joke to come out of this and Elena doesn’t get it is she will ask for the camera in Russian and I will say no. She will then say please, but it will come out more as fleas. I will say to her that she doesn’t have fleas so quit asking. I guess you had to be there staring into those big soulful eyes when she say with all her heart, Fleas, papitchika, fleas.
The day ended at a Korean restaurant the food was good and CJ and Fran ate with us again, it was fun. The night ended early and tomorrow we will try to have a Sunday dinner over at their apartment. It should be the last night for either of us in the apartments. The Apartments are really not that bad, it’s just that after dinner we could walk home and we could go to the stores alone and we could exchange money with the Russian mafia (I don’t know if they are, but they give a better rate then the banks and don’t reject your money if it is wrinkled in anyway) It’s a Tourists trap and that is what I want. The Owner of this apartment forgot the three rules of Real Estate, Location, Location, and Location. This place got nun of it.
Tomorrow should be fun

If It's friday it must be Valdgeim 09-11-09

If it’s Friday it must be at Valdgeim (the orphanage) 09-11-09


75th anniversity celibration of Birobadjahn

 Well Popischia (poppa, but with extra sentiment) has succeeded in climbing the first mountain in his way to fatherhood. He has conquered an afternoon with his new spawn and mostly survived. His wife that amazing person yesterday presented him with two daughters aged ten and nine. So filled with all the joy and trepidation of any new father he proudly took his little girls, those angels out to show off in public. He took them to the town’s 75th anniversary; you know that git to gither that has me squatting in some Soviet error (correct spelling) flat, which has no internet and no cable, those barbarians! He along with his long suffering wife have bedded down and suffered for almost a week. In his effort to keep his vast readership informed of his torment he went out and purchased an internet card only to be told it wasn’t necessary to use friendly government internet café (say friendly government internet café with Russian accent) It is only one ruble a minute, very good price (continue with Russian accent).I down loaded my daily doings onto a flash drive and take it down to friendly government internet café and get on computer, find my web site and after getting clearance from comrade Linda to use flash drive I find out friendly government internet café (again with the Russian accent ) is running window 03 and American spy in running 07,blocked again by superiority of Soviet way.
Ok, so I’m getting a little crazy with things over here in the new Russia. I didn’t bargain for living in cold war housing and not being able to hear what the Yankees have done lately. On top of that the girls are so full of energy and are testing us every minute we are with them. I know it will get better, we’ll make it to the other side, I just don’t know what the other side is going to look like and I don’t like that.
It’s five minutes to six Friday morning in New York and the east coast, If this was a week or so ago Teri would be hitting her alarm and going back to sleep, while I had my morning panic attack over my job and what disaster it would bring me today.
It’s not a week ago and it will never be a week ago in the rest of my life. The future will be Teri gets up about 6:30 and I get up and get the girls ready for school and get them breakfast. Sometime between 7am and 8am I will walk them to school, until junior high school, Oh that is assuming that they don’t get thrown out of school for acting up. The judge yesterday told us both that we can’t change our minds, there is no return policy, and you can’t get store credit. I know and I don’t want to, it’s just going to be a rough fall and winter. Things will get better after we get settled in together. Life is going to be a whole lot of fun and having the two girls will add years to our lives because of all the running we will be doing.
Now what we did today.

Mini ferris wheel ride in park

We got up around 8am far eastern time (5pm the day before in America if you’re counting) and I wrote about the day before and Teri went back to bed. She had been up at 3am not being able to sleep, so she deserved it. We ate a late breakfast of cheese omelets and Teri grimaced a little less today. Our driver and translator picked us up at 11am and we went to the internet café in the post office and tried to down load the last three days posts. It didn’t work because they ran windows 03 and we were running on 07. We then went to get gifts for the care givers and had lunch at a pizza parlor, it was ok. I’m starting to get tired of smoked meats. Oh wait that didn’t belong here that should have gone up further. After lunch we picked the girls up and went to a park after they said they were not interested in seeing some dancers. They got a ride on a mini Ferris wheel and had ice cream and chips. We walked along the water and returned the girls to the orphanage about 5:45.
We then had dinner with the Minone’s at an Armenian restaurant, it was good. Yulila told us the driver’s and translators hours were until 6pm so we tipped the driver when he came to pick us up at 7:45. It was not an awful day, but it could have been.

Well We Finally Did it 09-10-09

Well we finally did it and god helps us. 09-10-09
Everyone tells us we are doing a great thing and some will go on and say we are blessed. I hope so. It’s one thing to think about the reality of in the distant future of taking the care and feeding of two human lives’s and the reality of really doing it. We are at the point now of being the directors, of being in the driver’s seat, whatever expression you want to attach to it. We hold the fate of these two young girls in our hands. We have sat on the side lines critiquing the way other people have raised their kids and constantly asked the question why they did that, or what’s wrong with them for allowing that to happen. Well I have the feeling we are going to get the answer to those questions real soon.
The day started out like any other day in the last few, I woke up in Russia and it was real early in the morning. I was not sleepy and it felt like I was never going to get back to sleep. I let my mind wander and at first it traveled toward my job and I felt that it was a mistake to think about something that was out of your control and to just hope for the best and that things were working out for the best. I then wandered over to thoughts about the days coming events and began composing my speech for the court. I said a lot of really good things in it and promised myself that I would remember them all when I woke up. Which I didn’t, all I remembered was that I had some really good ideas and if I could only remember.
I woke up late in the morning, I think it was now 5:30, and felt I had slept all I could and began to write what happened the previous day. I began to experience a caffeine headache and knew the only way to get rid of it was to go out and get caffeine. Teri said it was foolish to go out into a country where you could not read the language much less speak it, had no phone, not idea what the address was and even if you did you could not pronounce it. So with all that encouragement what else could a man do but deify his wife and go out anyway.
My wife has asked me how I manage to make it through the day without her and have been told that is a major topic of conversation among women.
I tell my wife I’m going to go out the door to the street and make a left turn and head toward in that direction. She replies that every time we go out we head right. I was very tempted to go to the left but I didn’t want her to be able to say I told you so when she came to get me from the police. I went down the stairs to the road made a right, make a second and was suddenly in the middle of morning rush hour. It was so different from anything I’d ever known. It was people gathering at bus stops, walking here and there. Going into business to get a morning cup of coffee, or as in my case a liter bottle of Pepsi. I find a shop that is open, I go in and try the door to the Pepsi cooler and it won’t open. I try the other side and it doesn’t either. So I leave, victory stalled. I’m walking back without my trophy thinking I was defeated by a stuck door when I get the bright idea to try another street. About half way down I find a store that stocks Pepsi free (again no diet Pepsi) the girl behind the country says something and I reply like I know what’s up and say a bottle of Pepsi. Then my nightmare begins, she says something I don’t understand. (Later it turned out to be 27 rubles please) I panic and tell her I don’t understand Russian, she giggles again and says something, I repeat I don’t understand and I smile. At that point an older lady brings over a calculator which reads the number twenty-seven and that was how I paid for my soda. My trip back to our flat was with minor difficulties, easy. I found the purple wall, the yellow sign and the old brown building. My only problems was when I arrived at our, I guess you would call it our driveway and saw it from a different angle and it didn’t look like it should. About half way down the block I realized that none of the building looked familiar and if I didn’t figure out my mistake I would prove my wife right that it’s a wonder I make it through the day without her and I shouldn’t have gone out in the first place. I turn around and start heading toward the last familiar sign and I’m thinking that I made a turn too early and I need to go over a street when I come across this corner building that from this angle looks like our flat, minor problem solved.
Our Translator, Jenya, that’s how it is said not spelled, picks us up and takes us over to court at 9:20. We arrive nice and early for our court session at 10am. Our support, of Nina from the Orphanage, who is on vacation, arrives, the women from education dept. arrive and we are all set to go.
At ten, we go into the court room and it is small with new dark wood floor white walls that go down to a chair rail and over across from the door is the cage for prisoners. We had been told about the cage and I’d seen enough foreign movies to know about it, it was just odd to actually see it in person and up close. We sat and waited for the Judge to enter the prosecutor came in first wearing a blue color, not exactly powder blue but a light color suit with epilates you know those things that all military people have on their uniforms and he had one star on them. I guess he is part of the military in Russia. He sits down in his chair to the left of the judge’s chair and across from the cage.
We all rise when the judge enters, just like in America, she tells us to be seated. She is wearing a pants suit instead of robes, I don’t know if it was because this was not a trial or that is her usual attire. We sit and the judge makes an opening statement, Jenya translates.
Jenya tells me to stand and read my statement. I begin with my opening “Good morning your honor, my name is Joe Muller, I was born…”. I go right the list like I was told, name, date of birth, place of birth, where I live now and where I work. I stop to take a breath and let Jenya translate. The Judge listens and asks a question. It was what I was hoping for. I felt it would be easier answering her questions then reading a statement and then she asks questions. Her questions start easy, we had been warned that the prosecutor would be the tough questioner and to be prepared, also remember that everyone in the court wants this to happen even if foreigners are adopting their kids.
I have met and interacted with several Russian people in our travels and they have all been friendly and helpful. There have been the few grumpy ones, but no one openly hostile like that nut case Mosha I encountered back in America last year who told me only Russians know how to raise Russian children. I expected more of that resistance, but have found none. We have come across some of the people who we went out to dinner with and have been greeted like old friends and it has made our trip easier.
The Judge gets down to real business when she starts to talk about their medical issues and are we prepared to deal with them. I was under the impression and still am that all of their medical conditions were trumped up to make them available for foreign adoption. They do have issues but they are not life threatening and the worst ones the mitro valve something or other is not serious. The ones I’m concerned about are their eyes, both girls are far sighted and their teeth, Elena still have her baby teeth but they don’t look so good.
The Judge pressed ahead with her questions and I tried to answer them along the guidelines I was given and it got a little rocky but in the end I was told it went well. There was a point where I could read in the judge’s face that she was not happy and she didn’t believe what I was saying. I think it was during the medical portion and maybe that was why she pressed about are we prepared for the costs. The judge even said we were not as rich as some of the people who come into her court to do this. Which if I think about it is true, but we can and will afford this.
Next the prosecutor got to ask questions and his were easier and occasionally the judge would interrupt and expand on one of his questions or switch to some other question.
After I finished they bought the girls into the court and since Nastia was over ten years old the judge had to ask her questions. The Judge was very nice to her asked if she liked us and did they want to go to America and have their name changed to Muller. Did we send them packages and write letters during the time we were apart? She was very nice to Nastia, but she confirmed everything that I had told her earlier about the packages and the letters and our relationship with them while in America. She did a complete job. She just cared about the best thing for the girls.
Next Teri got up did her same intro as me; her name, date of birth, place of birth and so on. The judge asked her questions and at one point I think took a cheap shot at her. Maybe it was a cultural thing and not a cheap shot. The judges asked her if she would be willing to put the girls’ needs ahead of her needs. Anyone who knows Teri well would have never asked that question.
There was another point where the judge asks why are you adopting from Russia aren’t there children in America who need adopting? I was glad I wasn’t answering it because it was a tough question and I had never thought about the reason. Teri did well and got through it.
Then the prosecutor got to ask his questions, there were a few and it was over.
We all stood as the Judge left the room and prepared to wait for her decision. Jenya said we did well and everything was going well.
She was right because within about twenty minutes the judge was back and she awarded the girls to us. She also said that there was a ten day waiting period during which we or anyone else could file an objection to her decision.
It was over, so we went to lunch at the Pit Stop a kind of cafeteria where we got on line and picked food from behind glass. Behind us the Judge got on line and we waved hello and the group of us who were in court all sat together, Jenya, Teri, Me, the education ministry’s representative and Nina from the school orphanage. The five of us squeezed at one table and the judge sat alone right behind us and Teri wanted to invite her over and it would have been nice, but the table was crowded and her suggestion didn’t happen.
After Lunch we went over to the Orphanage to see the girls and we stayed there until about 5pm (2am American) and that was when they went to eat and we went to have dinner in town with CJ and Fran.
Dinner was good and again we drank beer and had some good food and talked and generally celebrated the day.
We got in to our flat about 9:30 Jenya sent her husband to pick the four of us up so there was no talk of taxis. Jenya spent about fifteen months in America and she knows about customer service.

The Wednesday edition of what happened to Joe and Teri today.

The Wednesday edition of what happened to Joe and Teri today. 09-07-09
I didn’t realize how much I would miss the internet until I was without it.
This is being typed on Thursday morning before our court date. Yesterday was a full day. It started with making omelets, my wife, Teri likes her omelet dry. She cooks it up in an omelet pan turns it over and cooks the other side before she adds the middle. I like mine moist, she says it skeeves her. I knew when she said let’s make them together she was asking for trouble. I cooked our omelet on one side then tried to flip it with the top of a pan and it fell apart. I reassembled the eggs as best I could added cheese and I thought it tasted pretty good she made faces and ate in silence.
It was not time for a discussion on omelet quality; we were going to meet the girls today. We had a new translator and driver, the driver doesn’t speak English and our translator, Natasha did introduce him I just don’t remember his name.

They picked us up in the morning and drove us out to the school and orphanage. It was about a twenty minute trip and neither of us felt like speaking, both of us lost in our thoughts. We arrived in front of a big grey building surrounded by a low gate with a path lined by flowers to the front gate. We went inside and upstairs. Howard and Marty spent the better part of a day waiting to see Vanya but I think the dinner we went on in July with them and the orphanage director had a very positive effect the girls were waiting for us in the director’s office. They ran into Teri’s arm and hugged her, then they noticed me and both came and gave me hugs. We spent the rest of the day together in the common room. There were at least three other kids that I saw there that needed me to adopt them. One was a small girl that reminded Teri of her cousin and seemed very sweet. A second girl who was just entering puberty and needed a mother to get her through the rough times coming. And the third one and the saddest one a boy who ignored the whole goings on because you could see he was mad that no one had come to adopt him and he was going to go into the world as an angry adult and it was just very sad.
We bought with us three cameras to take pictures of everything and it quickly got out of hand. Nastia got one camera, then Elena got the second camera and someone borrowed the first so Nastia came and got the video camera and several batteries later with had several hundred pictures of every inch of the second floor and everyone who lived on it.
After our adventure with the girls we had our meeting to discuss the next day’s court hearing for custody of the girls. We went over the girls medicals, the questions we would most likely be asked and how to prepare our opening statement. We were told that the judge, a women whose name I don’t remember might interrupt the opening statement and ask questions and to just go with the flow. I was to write up an opening statement just in case.
After that we went to dinner with the people who are becoming our newest best friends, Fran and CJ Manone. I had French fries and beer, so I was happy. We stayed out too late so our translator who looks fifteen chastised us about it. It was the second time that day she had done it the first time was when we went walking with the Manone’s at the open air market and we didn’t tell her. She did really piss me off when she said that after dinner she would call a taxi and it would pick us up. I thought that was why we were paying a driver and I said I was not comfortable with that and Teri says it’s OK, we’ll figure it out. In the end she comes with our driver to pick us up at nine thirty and that was when we were chastised the second time. We went to bed late that night 10pm.

Well Life Just Got a Little More Interesting 09-08-09

Our Front Door to our Apartment

Well life just got a little more interesting. I don’t want to sound mean but I just came 8,000 or so miles to move into the projects. The Russian projects. The Apartment is actually very nice. It’s a one bedroom with a kitchen and I hate it. It’s just beyond my comfort level, I’m sorry. It’s a fourth floor walk up and it has a solid metal door for the main door. To get in you hold the numbers 3-5-8. So if you want to come and visit you can get in. You then walk up four flights of stairs to get to the door which uses this cool looking key in another solid metal door and you walk in to this nice place. I guess I have to remember where Russia has been over the last two decades. The end of the Soviet Union, the loss of Industrial monopolies, the contraction of its GDP and how it’s come back from all those hard times to regain its place in the world. I guess I’m just a little surprised where we are staying and our apartment is not a place I would want to stay on while on vacation, but I’m not on vacation, I’m here to pick up the girls and bring them to America and be their father, Teri their mother.
I started writing this when we first got here about I don’t know. I’m so confused about things. I know what time it is here, (5:30am, Wednesday) in Moscow (9:30pm, Tuesday, I think) and back home (2:30pm Tuesday). Yes, I’m sitting up in the nice clean, quiet kitchen in my Birobadijan flat at 5:30 in the morning writing this.
We left Moscow and the Atlanta hotel about twenty minutes outside of Moscow on what might have been yesterday. For you it might have been the day before yesterday, I’m so confused. I shower at night, shave in the morning and try to eat breakfast at breakfast and dinner at dinner and I really don’t know what to do. We left the Atlanta at three thirty in the afternoon. Got to the Airport very early (6 hours) to make sure we got on the plane. Life in Russia is different from home and I’ll tell you about that later. We hauled our bags into the Airport and I felt like we were screaming ‘We’re Americans’ with our oversized suitcases and our three bags and computer bag, or maybe I’m paranoid. Here is some of the part where life in Russia is different. We went to put our bags, these bags that were twice the size of most of the other bags on the x-ray machine and we were slow and holding up the line so they started to wave us through. It was only to get into the Airport, but were we screaming, by our bags, we are Americans and not terrorists? Once into the Airport we walked the length of the short departure building and found a seat, got a drink, a Coke light, no diet, just light (its sweeter then diet without the calories) and sat to wait. I guess we figured there would be things to see at the airport, but there wasn’t. So we sat and read and talked and walked to see if a gate had been assigned to our flight, it wasn’t bad.

Moscow airport

Our flight received a gate about seven; it was gates 25-27, so we went looking for the gates. At the end of the building we were at twelve. So I asked information, yea guys can do that. They didn’t speak English, the first we had run into, but she asked some else and they pointed us the way we’d just come so we went back down there with our two oversized bags and our carry on and our computer through this building that was starting to get crowded. At the end I go through these doors figuring I missed something and ended up in an area called flight operations or something like that. I then did a typical man thing and went back out the gates not asking anyone where gates 25-27 are and told Teri, it’s not in there. Let’s go back. What we thought was gates were baggage screening and metal detectors and the gates were beyond that.
We went through with not problems, got to the check in, got on the wrong line, switched to the right she then closes we got on another and finally we get through. We go up to our gate, gate 9 and get on line its 8:15 and our flight leaves at 8:50. We wait and wait and start to question if we are on the right line, it’s now 8:45. Here is where it changes again from being what Americans expect and what the reality is. We started boarding at 8:55 for a 8:50 flight. We went down stairs to wait in a room looking out on the tarmac for about ten minutes. Later when everyone has arrived we board a bus to go to the plane. Some other American family was on the bus and a young boy kept asking momma why there were no seats on the bus. We board the plane by a gangway (gantry?), it’s one of those things you see in old movies when Kennedy Airport was still called Idlewilde airport. We went up in small groups to give people a chance to sit down and in a few minutes we were seated and ready to take off. A few minutes later we did.
We were about half an hour late and later we found out the movie didn’t work, but the plane, another 767 had leg room and looked and felt newer then our first plane. I couldn’t sleep and neither did Teri, so while everyone else did we read and watched the sun come up. Since we were flying towards the sun it happened earlier and quicker than normal. On Moscow time it happened about 3:00 or so. We landed about 5:00am Moscow time, 10pm New York time and 1pm Wednesday Khabarovsk time. Oh, did I forget to tell you we had a three hour car ride to Birobadijan? We found our translator and drive in the small nice airport and left in a car I’d never heard of, but I think it was a Renault remade under license to a Russian company. Three hours later we sat at a railroad crossing for a half hour because a train had broken down and the gates had closed the road. We swatted fly until the gates went up.
We entered town, the sun was out, big puffy clouds in a blue sky and except for the language difference on the signs we could have been upstate in New York. The style of the buildings was different then America but everything else seemed the same.
We met Nadezda at our apartment took care of a little business (11,140 American) and went to dinner.
Now here is another difference between America and Russia. It was about 5:30 or so and first we went to a bank to exchange money. I still had the money in the money belt and under no circumstances was I going to take it out in public so Teri came up with a fifty, two twenties and a ten to present to the bank which promptly rejected the two twenties and ten because they were not crisp bills. We went to dinner at a place with six tables that our driver said was good, it was. Our translator for the day Youlia, read down the menu and we settled on pork with garlic and mushrooms and I think some walnuts. We had a vegetable, served first of eggplant and tomatoes in a cream sauce sprinkled with cheese, good also. A large bottle of sparkling water and the tab was 475 rubles. At the airport I bought a bag of cookies that I didn’t have to ask for, I picked them from a shelf, and I could read the price and could pay for them without talking and looking foolish and paid 400 rubles. What you won’t do for that.
I’ve rambled on for thirteen hundred words so I’ll cut this short and quickly say after dinner we got groceries in a store about the size of a large Bodega and went home to our flat and I took a bath/shower (later) and at 7:30 went to bed, woke up at 11:30 feeling fully refreshed thinking it was almost morning, being disappointed I went back to bed. At 3:30 discovered my wife awake using the compute telling me she could not sleep. Then going back to bed until 5:30 when I gave up trying, later.

It's Moscow and I don't know what time it is anywhere

Our trip had some interesting times. We had two sandwiches, a beer and a martini at Kennedy Airport and spend fifty dollars.
Our plane was a 767 Boeing aircraft and someone forgot to tell the people who put the seats in that people have legs and on an eight hour flight it is not a minor issue. The person in front of Teri put her seat back and it was even tighter. We cruised at a speed of about 625 mph at an altitude of 33,000 feet and if it wasn't dark and cloudy we could have seem Greenland Ireland Iceland Scotland Germany and Norway. The sun came up around Norway according to the graphic they had on the TV. It showed a little plane on a map, sometimes it was a small map of New York and the tri state and sometimes it was of half the world.
They showed this graphic for about an hour then they handed out headsets so we could watch the movie 'What happens in Vegas'. Channel one was in Russian, two was in English.
We took off at 9 pm eastern time, we flew toward the sun and tried to sleep until the sun came up about 3 am eastern time and we were somewhere over Norway at the time. Clouds were as thick and high as whip cream on a Sunday in July. I couldn't see anything until we went below the clouds as we went to land in Russia. Then we could see some houses and some cars on the roads.
It was drizzling when we arrived and we departed the plane last. I think we didn't want to face what was ahead of us. I know I was a little scared of facing a country where I didn't speak the language and could not even guess what the signs meant.
After customs we found our driver who had retro-music on his pioneer radio inside his Hyundai on for us. Then the announcer spoke Russian reminding us where we were. The station switched between western music and some Russian music and our drive was very pleasant and helpful, but I don't think he spoke English.
Our drive was a little longer than I expected and the roads were narrow and some of them had potholes. Near the end of our trip we were in a residential area not too thickly populated and I began to wonder if we might have made a mistake. It didn't seem like an area where a hotel would be and I didn't know if maybe we might of gotten into the wrong car and maybe our drive would turn down a dead end street and we would be met by several large men with guns who thought we would be in possession of a large amount of money and were intent on relieving us of it. Before my mind went into overdrive we turned into a short driveway of this villa type place that turned out to be our hotel for the night.
We went to our room slept for several hours had dinner (Chicken Kiev with spinach, it was good, don’t know how much) then went back to our rooms and are about ready for bed. In America it's 4:34 and the Yankee's might of just finished playing. In Moscow it's 12:30 and I'm going to try to go to bed and see how long I will sleep.

Time to go

It's 3:24 in the afternoon on saturday in America. In Birobijan it is 6:24 sunday morning. We are waiting for the car service to pick us up after a morning and a night of sniping at each other. Do it this way no I want to do it this way type of stuff. All of it to do with the tension of preparing for the trip and anticipation of the trip.
  Teri is down stairs talking with her sister and family, I'm upstairs. All is calm until she misses me and wants to know where I am. We are all packed and I think ready to go. There was a last minute crises when Teri discovered that our homestudy was a year and a day old so it might not be acceptable to the Russian courts and she made phone calls last night and when I got home I made some. About 10:00 we hear from our social worker that it might not matter but to be on the safe side fax over the updated information and she will talk to the bridge of Hope people. Crisis over, maybe.

   While I have a minute, I was thinking about when the girls were here last summer and how everyone chipped in and asked no questions. I did expect someone to ask me if I had lost my mind becoming a father at 51 and for the first time. They all jumped in. I remember the first time I took the girls to go bike riding my brother has a long driveway and I felt it was the best place to go. I had one bike and Eric and Lynn lent me  Dennis' bike with his permission. I was unsure I could handle the two of them by myself and it didn't matter because within a minute or two I had my mother, my brother Eric and his wife Lynn and their two sons and I think my sister Ruth and her two kids, Cory and Ryan and my other brother Karl all seemed to show up. It made it easy and fun. No stress at all. Another memory from that night was that the girls couldn't get the bikes up the slight incline of Eric's driveway. By the end of the month it was no sweat.
  It's now time to go. Talk to you soon.

The Heat is on.*

It is 11:30 on Tuesday and Teri just got finished talking to another couple who is going over to Russia about the same time as we are. That is 11:30 at night, they called at 11:00 I don't mind it's just that this is what our life has become. There is no time for any reasonable life right now. Teri has had her nineteenth nervous breakdown (thank you Rolling Stones) because she is handling everything that I can't or don't have the time for. She has made the travel arrangements, made lists of things that have to be done, make connections with people. Went out and purchased items for our trip. And all I've managed to do is work my job. Not an equal division of labor, I'm sorry Teri.

   I was told I forgot to mention someone who was very important in helping us paint our house last year when we were preparing to receive the girls for the month of July. Well Thasha here is your mention. Tharsha, Tharsha, Tharsha, Tharsha, Tharsha, THarsha, tHarsHa, tharshaa, tharSha, THArSHA, tharsha, THarSHA. Thank You, THank YOU!!
  *Also thank you Glenn Frye

It has begun 08-27-09

We got our court date yesterday. It was a very busy day at work for the both of us, in addation to doing little tasks that we felt we still had time to do before we left now everything is in a rush.
We are booking our flights to Moscow and it looks like we will leave about 8:30 at night on sunday September 6th and land somewhere in Russia, Kharobosk I think it is on the 8th. I don't know if it is our time or their time. It's just going to be a long flight. We will spend a night in Moscow so maybe we'll being in Moscow on the 8th. I'll figure it out later.
Our court date is for the 10th so I know we will be in Birobidzhan on that day.
I just looked up the weather in Birobidzhan and it is 52 and raining. Here it's in the 70's and sunny. Should I bring my winter coat? We are going to be there the whole month.

Arrival

After Arrival
July 10, 2008
It has been a while since I wrote in this. During that time we worked getting the house in order. And last night you guys arrived. Your Mom and I (I figure it’s time to write it that way) were real up tight last night. We gathered up some plastic bags in case you got sick, a change of clothes and a gift, a white rabbit and a bear.
At 7:30 we set off. A quick trip to McDonald’s to get burgers and we got on the Thruway and off we went. We really didn’t know what to expect. We had been told many stories about how the children would act and we were also told they don’t all act that way.
We were told to expect a shy tired 'camper' who had just spent the better portion of their last two days taking their first plane trip and maybe their first car ride. They also might get car sick and if when you got them home don’t worry if they sleep for the next dozen hours or so.

Here is how it went down. And I have the video and pictures to prove it. At about 8:45 we are told that the campers have arrived. I get in place so I can get a good picture of you coming in. There were only four kids coming to this house. The first two came in quiet and tired and shy, just like expected. Next came in one of the hosts who said that our girls were outside still. I felt something might be wrong, like someone was getting sick or something. We start towards the door and to our right comes the sound of some banging on a piano. We turn and you two are pounding on this poor guy’s piano and he trying to get you to be gentle because he had just gotten it tuned. Next the two of you come over and put stickers from our picture on us and give each of us a hug. We move away from the Piano and toward the room where the boys are. I take some pictures. Elena discovers the camera and wants to take pictures. I put the strap on her wrist and she goes around taking pictures of everyone and everything. The both of you eat fruit nonstop. When you are not eating fruit, you are giving it to everyone. I get down facing Nastia at her level when she climbs on my back. I guess that was something you might have done with your birth father. She stays up there for a while and when I put her down Elena gets up and I walk around with her. This goes on for a while until the translators arrive and we want to show you our picture book. Both of your books will go back to Russia and I will try to make up a third one for us. We get out the book and we get about thirty seconds of your time and that was only because of the picture of the dogs.
The time gets on to about 11:00 and we decide it is time to try this on our own. We get you in the car with the help of others and you are told by the translator to keep your seat belts on. We get about a mile down the road and both of you are out of them, a few minutes after that you are out of them again. This time the translator shows up and tells you two to keep your seat belts on. We end up stopping about six times for seat belt discussions and we make one detour for Elena to make a bathroom break at McDonald’s in Ossining. We get you home about midnight and I have to go to bed to get up for work the next morning. I get ready for bed and go. Mama takes care of the two of you. You continue running around after every time we put you back to bed. It gets to be after 2 AM. I tried to let the two of you sleep in the bed with us and that lasted for about two minutes. Finally Mama puts her foot down and puts you both to bed and stands there until you two fall asleep around 2:30. At 6:30 you’re both up and I try to get a last couple of minutes of sleep to no avail. You guys ate breakfast of cereal with and without milk, Fruit and something else I don’t remember.
I leave while you two are being given a bath. About an hour later I call from the parking lot at McDonalds to see how things are. Mama answers the phone and then starts yelling nyet, nyet, nyet. I tell her not knowing if she is listening I’ll be there in ten minutes. When I get there the both of you are in the street wearing your underwear and a shirt. One of you are jumping rope while the other is holding the dog Mama is on the porch and she shrugs her shoulders and says in a voice full of frustration, “I can’t get them in.” I manage to get the two of you in and I help entertain the two of you until Sally comes over to help. This very smart women speaks broken English. There is nothing wrong with the way she speaks; it’s just the way she pronounces that makes it sound broken. She is off the boat Italian. She proceeds to teach you English, providing our first laugh of the day. She also gives you a bike which I’m sure you’ll ride many times while here. The three of us go to the bike shop down from the house, just past the traffic light neat the corner of 303 and Lake Rd. We get two helmets and put training wheels on the bike.
At home we try riding it in the street and in the backyard with little luck to show for it. We eat dinner in the kitchen having hot dogs and pickles as dinner. We then load you two into the Envoy and go to Uncle Eric’s to ride bikes. When we get there the two of you are asleep. We wake you and both are slow to get out until you realize what we are there for. Bike riding for a while, then some slides and an ice pop induced brain freeze late and your day is over. We get you home and you are so tired you put yourselves to bed.

July 11, 2008
We spent the day in a seminar about adoption and the two of you got to go swimming with everyone.

We were afraid you would miss us and get scared and want us to come and pick you up. Never happened.

July 13, 2008 the Weekend
Each day is getting a little better. Saturday we fed you fruit and yogurt and cookies and more fruit and more fruit. We, I had planned a trip to Fairlawn NJ to River Rd where there is a Russian Community and we, I figured we could walk around and you guys could talk to people in Russian, neither of you are afraid of talking to strangers. We plan to leave at 1:30 and didn’t leave until 3:30. Uncle Donald got a bogus ticket on the way there(No seatbelt, state troopers can be real asses) and the trip was long and Mama kept yelling at you guys and in my ear and poor Amanda was between the two of you , so by the time we got there we, I wanted to leave. You guys were awful, just like real kids in the store and the store owner was not like a real owner. You guys picked everything in the store you wanted and he let us give him what we, Mama didn’t want. We then went to Wallmart to get you guys swim suits and sneakers and it was a disaster. There was no foot sizer to find out what size your feet were, the isles were all a mess and there were no shoes of your size. You wanted shoes that lit up when you walked and there were none, you weren’t happy. Everyone was waiting at the pool to swim with you and by the time we made it everyone was gone. Mama went to change and feed the dogs and by the time she got back you two were out. Same with Uncle Donald and Aunt Nancy, So we went home and had dinner, fruit and hot dogs for you guys, pizza for us. You don’t like pizza.
Today Mama planned a dinner for Mema and Pop pop and she said it was a minor disaster. Food was good and we found out that Nastia likes salsa and Mexican and Elena might like it. Both of you love watermelon and you each had several slices and some honey dew and some yogurt and water and milk and… Nastia loves salsa on bananas at least she said she did and she ate it. Its 11:56 and I have to go to bed, first day at camp for you two and back to work full time for me and almost full time for
Teri. Cousin Billy left for Switzerland today to participate in a karate tournament.

July 15, 2008
It only took about an hour yesterday for the two of you to get kicked out of the town of Clarkstown camp. We should have expected the outcome but like all endeavors concerning the two of you we underestimated the situation.

It was raining and not the type of day for kids’ to be playing outside. The two of you get worked up in new environments and we blindly went in and dropped you off late. IF we had gotten there early it might have been different. Mama says it was more inexperienced kids’ babysitting two kids they weren’t prepared to handle. We were very upset over the incident. Why, you might ask and you would have a good point. I think we were starting to feel overwhelmed and feeling we had made a mistake that we were no longer the proper age to be first time parents. I’ve had my little brother lecture me on raising kids and even though long ago I realized he was a smart person and had a lot of good knowledge, this little talk he had with me still hurt. Anyway, we picked up two up and Mama missed another day of work and I missed half a day that I didn’t tell the boss about. In desperation before you were picked up by Mama I called Anna a women who I hope has the time to become part of your family and asked her to speak to the two of you and get you to act like you can and I have seen you act. She did, but it was too late. Mama drove you guys over to Tolstoy nursing home and she talked to the four of us giving Mama and me encouragement and telling the two of you that you were not acting properly. She then offered to come over on Tuesday and spend some time with the four of us and to talk to the two of you. Mama went home and I went to work. Later in the day Mama got you into a camp for gymnastics that the Bridge of Hope people knew about and said spoke Russian.
The Next day Aunt Nancy came over, Amanda was in summer school and Uncle Donald was working, and her and I brought you over to the camp and got you signed up. Right away you start the same antics. You found lollipops again just like in Clarkstown , but this time I stopped the two of you and with my permission the owners wife I think, a tall blond women who I thought would speak Russian to you scolded you in English saying no,no,no,no…and the two of you stopped. Next a small girl about your age or so who spoke Russian was told to take you into the back room and prepare you for class. Aunt Nancy and I watched for about twenty minutes and the two of you were great. You followed the instructor and I kept waiting for one of you to rush off and do something dangerous.
Later that night Anna (Aunt Anna?) came over and talked to you and we found out that you both read very well and Anastasia claims to remember nothing about her mother. I will pry further later. Anna and Galaxy Gym are looking to be God send and it may enable us to adopt you two and feel that we have not made a mistake. We are so concerned about your behavior that we are spending a thousand dollars to have you two tested. It will happen on the 23rd of the month. You will get to play for several hours and a doctor will watch and talk to you one at a time, what a country, what a racket. It’s 11:06, Mama is in your room watching Bambi with Elena, while Anastasia tries to sleep and you know what Anastasia will be up at 6:30 and Elena will still be sleeping at 7:00. I imagine this to be the future.

Mama’s letter to some friends:
Some of you have already heard the story but I figured you'd love to hear it again.
Now picture this… At ever
y workshop that Joe and I attended the message was clear, many of the children are not used to a lot of things that we take for granted. They will probably be shy, very quiet, and not want to communicate with us. They might be afraid of everything, even the telephone. The profiles we received on the girls both said they liked to sit quietly and do arts and crafts play games and read books. Our instructions were that instead of picking the children up at the airport which would be too distracting we were to meet them at a coordinators house in Westchester which would be a calm, quiet setting. There's two other families involved each one getting a little boy. We were all hanging out in the kitchen waiting anxiously. At about 9:00 PM the van holding the kids and the coordinators showed up. Two little boys walk in, so sweet, so innocent, so quiet, and so calm. They're introduced to their parents and proceed to sit down and look at a picture album each of the parents brought for them. At this point we got a little concerned and asked one of the coordinators if they forgot our girls. We were assured that they would be in shortly, so we continued to watch the front door. Then all of a sudden the door opened and there was a flash of light and another flash of light both of them taking off to a room on the right (it wasn't the kitchen!) They found a piano. One of the coordinators told them to come meet Mama and Papa, and the flashes of light come running into the room recognizing us immediately, jumping into our arms, onto our backs, trying to get onto our shoulders. Then they see the bird, try to grab it, then they see the fruit, then they see the toys, then they jump up into our arms again, then they see the cheese, then they put their hands in the dip, then they go for the bird again, then they crawl up Joe's back, then they're back at the piano again, then trying to go upstairs, then they're opening all the drawers in the kitchen, then they finally sit to look at the album. After about an hour of this it was time to leave. Now keep in mind most orphans from Russia are not familiar with cars. Ours are. They were fighting over who got to sit in the front seat. I won! Then we fight about the seat belts. Nobody wants to wear the shoulder strap. We get it on them and we start the trip home. Halfway down the driveway they have the shoulder strap of the seat belt behind them, so we pull over and put it around them. Then we get onto the road and they did it again. So we pull over again. This time one of the translators that was at the coordinators house pulled up alongside us and told them that they had to wear the seatbelt properly. That lasted until we got on the highway. We weren't on the highway 5 minutes and they had to go to the bathroom. (Yes I did make them go before we got in the car!) So we found McDonalds. They did what they had to do and we started the whole process again, from fighting about who sat in the front and seat belts (I won again). We got them home showed them the house and introduced them to the dogs. Got them ready for bed, it was after all after 11:00! Joe had to go to work the next day. They jumped on their beds, they jumped on our bed, they played with the TV, the lights, the ceiling fan controls, they ran upstairs, downstairs, in their room, in our room, jump on the beds again. I finally passed out at 2:30; I don't know what the hell they did after that.

They were up the next morning at 6:00 am. I gave them cereal for breakfast, a piece of fruit and milk. I had my coffee and considered hitting the wine but thought better of it. I figured I'd get them dressed and put them in front of the TV while I took my shower and got dressed myself. Well I got shirts on them, then they found the jump ropes and decided they were dressed enough, ran down the stairs unlocked the front door and ran down the front steps and proceeded to jump rope in their shirt and underwear, in the middle of the road. Let's just say they were better dressed than I was. Of course the front door didn't close properly and the dog decides to join the party. So here I am not properly dressed running after the dog, running after 2 girls and of course some guy from up the street decides to stop me and ask if I've seen his freaking Chihuahua!

Let's just say I was extremely frustrated!!! As I got them into the house the phone rings its Joe asking how everything was going. Through the sobs I was able to tell him. I call my girlfriend to get over to the house as soon as possible with her mother in law Florence, who speaks Russian. She tells me they'll be at the house as soon as possible. Joe gets home. Watches the girls so I can shower dress. As I'm debating on whether I should take the bottle of pain killers now or wait until later, there's a knock at the door. Joe's running to the door shouting with relief "Florence is here, Florence is here!" Well it wasn't, it was my girlfriends "off the boat" Italian mother bearing chocolate chip cookies. I had the freaking League of Nations in my living room!
Needless to say we finally made it through the day. Because they are escape artists we padlocked the three gates in our fence that surround the property, I can't get out, but the girls are very good about climbing fences.
They managed to get themselves kicked out of the town camp within an hour, but we found a gymnastics boot camp with some Russian speaking students and coaches. And we're finding ways to communicate with each other (I yell and they laugh)
All in all the first week has been an adventure!
Teri

July 20, 2008
It has been an interesting weekend. I must say I do create my own problems, back to the beginning. I don’t remember when or why, but I went out and made a contact with a Russian speaking person at Tolstoy Nursing Home. She promised to help out whenever necessary. On your first day of camp it was raining and you guys do not, at the time react well to being confined and to new situations. I have been told that you started before you got on the plane and continued all the way to 2:30 in the morning after we picked you two up.

Not stopping, well this camp was also run by a twenty two or so year olds that had a staff of teenagers, well intentioned but teenagers. Whose experience must have been babysitting the neighbors sleeping brat. You two were tossed in under an hour. The next day your mama has a new camp, a gymnastics camp, with councilors who speak Russian and will not take your crap. It works out very well. They make a request and we make changes, like instead of sugary drinks it’s now water. Ok, where does Anna fit into all this? When the two of you are tossed from camp mama and I are overly upset and I am trying to find a person to talk to you two because Florence, our interpreter is with her mother at the doctor and I go to Tolstoy and ask Ann to talk to the two of you. It’s too late so she says to bring the two of you by and she will talk to you. Before you two arrive or maybe it is at the introduction, I think it was the introduction, a guy named Scott asks if he can give my name and number to a women named Masha( pronounced Ma-Sha) who came over to America and didn’t speak a word of English and learned on her own and would love to help. We talk on the phone and I get the impression that she is a nervous person and she talks real fast and kind of rambles. I think maybe we can be friends. She calls three times in an hour and really wants to help. Anna had asked if it was ok to talk to you two about religion and we said yes we were curious about your religion and wanted to continue it. If we don’t this is the reason why. Anna said one of you was baptized and the other was unsure, but were Russian Orthodox and wanted to go to church. Mama and I made vague plans to go. Now along comes Masha and Elena’s walking on the porch roof. Saturday morning Mama and I are enjoying a quiet breakfast with the two of you upstairs and it was quiet, too quiet, so I go up and find Nastia trying to open the bathroom window and Elena outside on the porch. I freak and yell at Elena who runs over to Mama’s window in the bedroom and is inside. My heart is pounding, I feel like I almost lost one of you, a total over reaction.

I did the same type of stuff as a kid. It’s you just never think of falling off the roof until you do. I grab Elena and can’t get a hold of Luda (a friend from Consolidated Dairy days) I don’t think of Florence, but wait there is Masha and her number is on an e-mail. With Elena in my lap I call her and tell her what happened and ask her to tell you never to do it again. She talks to you and of course being just yelled at you doesn’t answer her except to say yes to her question about going to church. Where the hell that question came from I don’t know I didn't ask it and I didn’t care at that point. I wanted you off the porch roof. Elena hands me back the phone and in all her brilliance Masha says Elena is depressed and might be suicidal and needs to come to Church tomorrow so I can talk to her. Twenty minutes later after she informed me she might have to take action if we did not show up on Sunday and that she did not approve of Americans adopting Russian children. Even if you learn the language, perfectly, there is a cultural difference which you can never know about she spouts. She was more interested in Russian children being raised Russian then in having parents and being happy. If you never set foot in a Russian church it is her fault. Mama and I believe religion is important, any religion is as good as any other and we respect them all. We both just hate zealots, people who think there way is the only way. Too many wars have been fought over this and we will not indoctrinate two more into the cause. Respect others, but be careful of their motives. Masha had a program and she may have felt it was in your best interest, she just could not see that her methods were wrong and maybe even evil.

That was Saturday and on Sunday morning at 11:15 she called looking for us I hung up on her, she called back, I hung up she then called the home number which I never gave her, I hung it up before either of you got it. She called again and it went to the answer machine, where she proceeded to leave her threat to stop your adoption. She may have at one point had good intensions, but not in her message that morning. I then called the police and they said to call her and tell her to never call again and if she does call them, which I did. I told Masha, in a calm, clear voice to her answer machine, because she did not pick up to never call me again, to never call my house again to never talk to me, my wife or my kids. I would appreciate her respecting my wishes, thank you. I then hung up. And you though all the crazies lived only in your time and nothing happened before you knew about it.

After all that we went to the Bridge of Hope required picnic in Katonah, where we proceeded to tell everyone in the bridge of hope program about our very own psycho and got advice from Patrice (Runs the program, a good person with the best of intensions) on how to handle it and how she could help. I’m talking to Anna and Scott tomorrow and I hope that will end it all. I don’t think her threat of when she goes to Moscow in August, where she will do everything to stop your adoption will get very far. I hate to say this but you were available to any Russian first, we are last on the list and we can lose you if anyone, family member, another Russian whatever comes along so, unless she knows someone who wants to adopt a couple of terrors you’re ours.
Mama and I and the two of you did a good job at the picnic, everyone loved the two of you and talked about how you were a handful and wished us luck with the two of you. Mama and I were a little scared we would have some problems with the orphanage officials, I don’t really remember why.

July 21, 2008
Well, we got a good review from the orphanage director, she could see your Mama really loved the two of you and was impressed with the way the two of you behaved. I don’t think congratulations are really due us. The improvement in your behavior is due to just a little attention by two people who care.
I went to talk to Anna about Masha today and she was surprised that Scott had introduced us to her Anna described her as vicious. I felt she was overly nationalist. Either way Anna said she would talk to either Scott or Masha and hopefully put an end to all this stupidness.

The two of you were talking and it is late (9:50, bedtime is 8:30, yea right) and I just stopped writing to quiet the two of you down (really it was Elena, she never wants to go to sleep, Nastia goes to sleep when she is tired and usually gets herself up at 6:30) Elena said something I didn’t understand, but it didn’t matter she kept right on talking, waved me down and kissed me. As I left she blew me a kiss. Nastia said good night to me in English. You little buggers get under the skin quick.

July 23, 2008
We took the two of you to a Doctor today to have you tested to see what crap is going on in your heads. The results were not as bad as we felt they would be and we were happy. There is a good chance that one or both of you have ADD or ADHD. Both of you have poor eye sight and refuse to wear glasses. There is a problem with Nastia’s Thyroid gland causing several things, one being sensitivity to cold. There is a possibility of your birth mother drinking before your birth and both reports will be included in this. We went to lunch at an Italian restaurant where we found out Nastia likes spaghetti.

July 27, 2008

Yesterday we went to a friend of mines who speaks Russian. Her name is Lyuda. She lives in Princeton NJ, which is an hour and a half from here. The trip down in the mustang was pretty good until the end where the two of you got into a quick fist fight. We had a dinner with Lyuda and her husband. Afterwards we sat down and asked Nastia questions. Some of the answers were surprising, other were disturbing. We learned that

Nastia doesn’t remember her birth mother’s name, neither did Elena. Nastia described her father as a suit wearing man with brown hair and you had spent four years in the orphanage up to this time. Nastia called her mother a crazy drunk and said there was an older sister that works but we didn’t find out if she ever came by to visit. Nastia asked Lyuda’s husband if he was a drunk because he was drinking a beer. It was a nice time until the trip home. Up to this point I was not a believer in sugar and hyper activity, but the trip home changed all that. The two of you sang, talked giggled, screamed, everything imagined to the point that I pulled over and had my hand out to smack the crap out of the two of you. Mama stopped me. For the rest of the trip home I ignored the two of you. I was so furious that it continued into the next day as more of numbness. By the end of the day after some swimming in Uncle Eric’s pool and some dinner at the Hard Walk restaurant and some hugs and kisses from the two of you it began to lift. Then the realization you were leaving on Saturday has started to set in and both of us are not going to take it too well. The families are going to take it better, but not too well.

You have gotten under everyone’s skin and it’s not going away. WE are going to try to pay a lawyer here to talk to a lawyer there and pay the right official to get you back as soon as possible. We want you back by December 1st, but feel it is a long shot. We’ll see.

July 29, 2008
Well you got thrown out of camp yesterday. We took it better then when you got thrown out from the first camp. And today you got thrown out again. Both times for acting up and not listening to the leaders of your group and for biting and running around and for cursing and for running outside. When asked by Aunt Lyuda why Nastia said it was because you didn’t like the camp. Since we are down to the final few days Mama will work from home and you will not go to camp anymore. You will most likely go swimming for the final three days. Good for you a little rough on Mama.

August 01, 2008
Well, it’s finally here and the two of you are gone.

The day went more or less as planned, except you didn’t go swimming as we had hoped. It started to rain just as we left and kept going for a while. You would have only got to swim for a short while because we had planned a little lunch with the grandparents at noon at the pancake house where we found another person who spoke Russian. I’m amazed at how many there are in the area when you look for them. After lunch we went to liquidators to pick up luggage with wheels on the bottom so you would not have to carry the bags which seem to have gotten a lot heavier. We got over to Yorktown Heights about 3:10 they loaded you in the car about 3:45 and off you went. Everyone commented about how well you behaved today as if we had done something wonderful with the two of you and I can’t think of anything special we did except act like caring people toward two really wonderful kids who stole our hearts and who we dearly miss after they have been gone only three hours. The house is so quiet that I am going up stairs to check on Mama because I have no one else to check on.

Back to Yorktown Heights, we get out of the car and the others are there and we stand around talking and the two of you are horsing around just a little bit and I’m thinking that it will be a repeat of the first night we met you, but it wasn’t. The highlight was when Nastia climbed on rooftop of I think Liz’s Mercedes SUV and I pick you up and take you off and sat the two of you down that is when people were impressed with us. We watched you go down the driveway and waved at you the whole time. I’m going to treat this enforced absence like the two of you are at camp and will be back at the end of the summer.
Some stories I might have left out:

The first one is when Elena got a real kick out of giving Mama the finger and how it lead to them being closer