Moving into the Homestretch 09-25-09

On line at the Pit Stop

It is 9:24 pm; Teri is trying to put the girls to bed after they insisted on taking a shower. Yes they got more water and the water was hot, on the floor then on them. I offered to take over so she wouldn’t get overwhelmed like I sometimes feel, but she said no.
A long day started early this morning when the alarm went off at 7:30. We had gotten to bed late last night. It was a little alcohol and some talking and suddenly it was 1am. I woke up at 4am and couldn’t go back to sleep so I went into the living room and laid down on the pull down couch. I did manage to get back to sleep about an hour later.
Yulila was to pick us up at 10:45 so we wanted to get out to the market early and get a few more things for the girl’s party. We picked up some more chocolate, looked at some fruit, picked up some more bubbles and some nice hair ribbons for the older girls at the party (older meaning 12,13and maybe 14). It was a successful trip and I even traded in some dollars for Rubles.
Yulila picked us up a little late and we went over to the bank to cash in the girls savings accounts. It took over an hour to do three accounts at two different banks. You get on line, or in the Russian way or so it seems you cut in line to the front and get service. Yea, I’m overstated what happened except for us. We always seemed to go to the front of the line. It might be Nadashda’s at work again. After the bank we went back to the Hotel and met Nadashda’s where she gave us all our paper work for Moscow.
We were running very late for the party. It was 2:30 and it was to a have started at 2:00. We still had to pick up the cake and some juice. Yulila called and it was rescheduled for 4pm. We hadn’t eaten yet today and had hopes for a quick bit which didn’t happen. We got to the Orphanage at 3:30 and waited for 4pm.
At 4, we went to the lunch room and they had cut the watermelon and some peaches up. I was supposed to cut the cake and service it after they had their snack, which I did, with the help of Teri and Nastia.
They had a little ceremony where a few kids got up to say something and I think it was basically good luck and we will miss you.
After that there was a little dancing and in less than two hours it was over and suddenly we are getting ready to leave. On the way out a young boy was hiding behind a curtain and I noticed something wrong and I called Yulila back so she could ask him what was wrong? I thought he was upset because the girls were leaving or maybe he was sorry that he didn’t have parents taking him out of this place. It never occurred to me that I might not be to help him with his problem until Yulila had started talking to him. It turned out it was fixable, but a little sadder then what I thought. We had given out toy trucks to every boy who came to the party, girls got dolls and someone had taken his, by mistake or on purpose I don’t but this kid who had nothing had lost his gift, a dumb little truck that cost 40 rubles (about a buck ten). Luck was with us that day because we had one extra truck left over and we gave it to him and I even gave him an extra candy bar. I hope he felt as good as I did.
We next went into the office of the director and signed paperwork saying that we have received all our paperwork and we are going to take the girls out of the Orphanage and bring them to America and I think it said put them in school.
The last thing I was asked to leave the room for. All the clothes the girls were wearing were removed and clothes we bought with us were given to them. Waste nothing, and then we left. It started to really sink in again on the ride home while the girls are starting to act up that we are the proud new owners of two young girls and will remain forever.
It was late and Yulila had worked a long day too so we sent her home figuring we could chance Smock with its pigeon English menu. So they pull out and we walk over to the restaurant and it is having a private party until about 8pm. So we says Ok, let’s go to the Chinese restaurant with the picture menu in the Hotel. We get there and they are having a private party. If we had thought about it there are three or more Chinese restaurants with picture menus.
At that point Teri said “I guess you know what this means? It means we’re going to Pit Stop.” Yes we are tired of the food, but when we went in there several people smiled at us and we could just point at what we wanted and say one or two or whatever and we were comfortable and the girls ate everything they ordered and didn’t ask to play air hockey, which I would have said yes to. It was a nice way to end our Birobadijan adventure. If this had been an adventure story in the background the sun would be setting in brilliant reds and oranges behind big white puffy clouds and you’d know our intrepid adventurers would be save until their next adventure.
Well kiddies this ain’t Hollywood and we still had to put two sugar hyped kids to bed and considering everything that happened today it went real well, The girls took showers and at first were in the same bed and when that didn’t work we separated them and Teri laid down with Elena. When Nastia saw she wanted me to lay down with her and it looked like it was going to work when Teri got up to use the bathroom and I thought that they were quiet enough to be back together. Again at first it worked and then you could feel it begin to build. They started whispering and then a little more and then a little more, then came the kisses good night. First once then twice then everyone had to get kissed on the forehead and then it started over and that was when we separated them again. This time it stuck and we just put them back in the bed together. A strange thing happened when I picked Elena up to bring her to the other bed she grabbed on to the other side of the bed. I wonder what that is about.
Tomorrow, I will be reporting from Moscow, eight hours earlier then tonight. So don’t touch that dial. See you all in Moscow.
In the coming days look for pictures of us in Red square and in front of the Kremlin, can you really believe it? I’m going and I can’t!