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