We left for Russia on Monday night, the 16th of November. We got very lucky and were able to get exit row seats, flight was on time and luggage made it all the way to St. Pete. Yay!!
St Pete airport was a little freaky because we had no translator to get us through Customs, but we made it. Amazingly enough, as we were exiting the plane we met a lady from Georgia who was coming to meet her husband who works here and she was familiar with the customs process so she helped us out....God even handles the little details of our lives too:)
Oksana was there waiting for us at baggage claim and Sergei pulled right up and loaded our luggage and then we were off to our Hotel. Oksana came in with us and made sure that the hotel got our visas registered and walked us to our room. She gave us our plans for the following day and prepared us for what to expect from the Adoption Committee meeting. Oksana is a great translator, speaks very good English and is very thorough with her explanations. My only complaint for Sergei and Oksana is that they think my Russian/Georgia accent is humerous.....Sasha appreciates my efforts.
Now as far as our hotel goes....let's just say pictures on the internet are deceiving. I will be adding the Comfort Hotel to my list of things "Not to do in Russia". However, I am adjusting and the people are super helpful and speak good English. If I get a chance I will take a picture of the "Free" breakfast that I don't eat every morning. You've gotta see the sausage and omelettes....and I am going to leave the porridge for the 3 little bears:)
Wednesday was our first whole day here. We met with the committee...which consist of one lady at her desk in a little office with a computer. She read us all of the information that she had for Sasha in the Russian database....basically name, birthdate, parents names and ages, when parental rights were removed, which orphanages he has been in and his health history. We were told not to ask any questions, sign the papers where they asked and say yes to the Russian pronunciation of our legal names. Took about 15 minutes at the most. This visit gave us permission to visit Sasha at the orphanage.
We left the committee and went directly to the orphanage. I was so excited to see Sasha and couldn't wait to see his expression when he saw us. I think he was actually told we were coming this week, but I don't think he knew exactly what day. Needless to say the reunion was priceless!
We went to the Social Workers office, Zanaida, another great lady. She was able to give us more info in regards to Sasha's past. I had a feeling that Sasha had lived in an orphanage his whole life but the confirmation of the details were sad to hear. Zanaida said that at 6 mos old Sasha got very sick and his parents took him to the hospital and never came back. Can you even imagine that? His parents still live in St Petersburg. She also said he has never known any of his relatives and they only have record of a paternal grandmother in St Petersburg.
We visited for a couple of hours yesterday and today Nina, the adoption coordinator picked us up at 11am and we went back for a second visit for a couple of hours. I hate saying goodbye after our visits and I know Sunday when we see him for the last time this trip it's going to be extra hard leaving him....once again. I'll just hang on to the hope that we will all be together really soon, forever!
The visits have been very sweet and I have been trying to take lots of pictures so I can create a scrapbook for Sasha to have for years to come. We have gotten to visit with alot of other children too and today while we were there one of the teachers asked Kevin and I to speak to her class in English...that was kinda cool and they had lots of questions about America. Several of them said they really wanted to come to America for a visit. The sad part is that most of the kids will never get the chance of seeing America or Adoption because these particular children were ages 13-16 and most will be picked over when people adopt. Such a sad reality...Please pray for the children in the orphanage that want a family so desperately. We told them that maybe we can come back again next month when we come back for court and speak to them again.
So today we had a pretty short day with Sasha and when we got back to the hotel with took naps. If any of you have been keeping up with us on Facebook, then you may know that we have not been able to sleep much at night...last night we slept from 10pm - 3pm then wide awake the rest of the time...In fact I think we instant messaged several people at 5am.
Tonight we are going to try to get a full nights sleep because we have to be out of the hotel at 7am to go to a clinic for medical exams....blood drawn, chest xrays, ekg, etc...I'm scared to death of needles, so pray for me.
Tonight we actually ventured a few blocks away to an area called Nevsky Prospect...huge shopping area in the center of town. It was alot of fun seeing the sights. It's about 30 degrees here but the shops we went into were about 130 degrees...I don't know how they can stand it. Kevin said we had to go back to the room when I threatened to start undressing in the last shop.
Well that's all I can think of right now....need to update more frequently so not to be too long, but we've been busy and when we get back to the room my mind is mushy. I'll try to keep up moving forward.
Keep the prayers coming!!
Thanks for sharing your story. It is such an adventure...Sasha will appreciate one day all of the photos you get. Alek still looks at his life book and remembers his favorite caregivers with fondness. We even got a video of one of them giving him a message in Russian talking about how much they will miss him...we also had the translator on video translating it in English (which he will appreciate now since he has lost most of his Russian)! Blessings on your adventure! I found that the word to live by in Russia is "grace"...I needed lots of it from Jesus to be able to show it to lots of people while I was there facing difficult circumstances. Praying grace for you and your family. In Christ, Lynn, Scott, Alek AND Yasha (he got registered for adoption yesterday!)
Posted by: Platter Family | November 20, 2009 at 10:31 AM