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December 10, 2010

Starbucks Ready Brew Colombia Coffee

Wanted to let you all know that if ever you come across these Starbucks Ready Brew Coffee, Try them!!!! They are absolutely Amazing and fast, easy to make........... Just Add hot water and Voila, AN AMAZING CUP OF COFFEE!!!
Thank you to our friends who gave us some and also who introduced them to us.

Visit at Ulan Orphanage

December 7th, 2010

Ulan Orphanage

Over 1,000 children are helped through Interlink Resources’ work with 7 orphanages and boarding schools in the Taraz region.

About 60% of the children who live in Kazakhstan orphanages have a mother or father that is living. Many have been removed from their homes through legal action or have been given up by parents who because of personal problems or financial reasons are unable to care for their children. Interlink cares for these children by building relationships and meeting physical needs.

Today we went to visit the orphanage called Ulan. There were 7 girls between the ages of 5 and 9 and the rest of the girls were in school. Some of them go to public school in the morning and the others go in the afternoon. They share the same uniform to go to school. One of the girls in today’s group was brought to the orphanage years ago after she was hit by car because her parents could no longer care for her. Today she is doing really well and is very smart and was smiling the whole time we were there.

Ulan was founded in 1994, Ulan Orphanage provides for the needs of approximately 160school aged Kazakh children in the city of Taraz. These Kazakh speaking children live in groups according to age so often siblings are not together. Children at Ulan have the opportunity to learn much about their Kazakh heritage through dance, song, and other activities. A Delegation from the USA is brought to Taraz each summer to participate in Ulan’s summer camp.

Fil and I helped them with some arts and crafts activity that they really enjoyed doing. The girls were very receptive towards us and loved the one to one attention they were getting. We love being with them and to help in any way we can makes us feel good too.

Here are some pictures of our arts and crafts activity and a picture of their bedroom which had 13 beds.

Supper at our American Buddy's Place

December 6th, 2010


Tonight we were invited for supper at Vicki and Beth’s house. We had delicious homemade chilli and corn bread. Of course we were in heaven with 4 kitties and a dog all around us. We did some of our laundry and had a pleasant evening together.

Supper at Walli & Anara!!!

December 4th, 2010

Dylan is doing really well. He eats very well and loves the food we bring him.
As soon as he sees us he comes and hugs us and stays in our arms for a couple of minutes. He then wants to get down and sits in front of our bag and points to our bag and anxiously waits to see what food we take out for him.
We play, dance, sing and have great laughs when we’re together.

Today we were invited to go for supper at our ex-landlords Walli and Aanaras’ house. As usual they treated us so well and had so much food. Their daughter and grand-daughters from Astana were there, Anara’s 2 sisters and brother were there too. We had a great evening together struggling to communicate with each other, but enjoying each other’s company.
We had the traditional Kazakh meal again, “Beshbarmak”
Everyone seated at the table had to make a toast and all of them made a toast to wish us well for our adoption. Every time a new person would make a toast, Walli would fill up our glasses. Walli makes his own home made drink that he calls, “Walli Schnapps” and it consist of lemon and orange peels and of course Vodka. I told him I’m allergic so I didn’t have to drink it but poor Fil had a hard time keeping up with him.
They gave Fil a HUGE piece of horse meat with the bone and a big knife. Fil had no idea what to do with it and the grandmother explained to Fil to pick it up with his hands and eat it. He had such a hard time trying to cut it and made everyone laugh and then he finally picked it up and tried eating it with his hands.
We were all laughing so hard especially meeeeeeeeeee because I could see in his face that he was so lost and didn’t know what to do.

Later in the evening they showed us some traditional Kazakh dance and their daughters and grand-daughters were dancing the night away.

During the day their daughters went shopping and surprised their parents with a new outfit. We did not understand what occasion it was for but Walli and Anara were so happy and touched by their kids’ gesture. They tried on their new outfits and did a mini fashion show to show us what their kids bought them.

What a great evening we had with such a nice and very respectful family.

A Very Meaningful Gift.... something to think about!!

You know there are a lot of children who are not as fortunate as Dylan and many other kids who will eventually be adopted. There are many reasons why kids here will not get adopted either because they are older (less demand) or they are not adoptable because their parents have not signed the consent form to get them adopted or are disabled or have serious illnesses. So MOST of these kids will remain in the orphanage until they are 16 and then let out in the real world where they will struggle to survive. What Vicki and Beth and the rest of the staff at Interlink are trying to put in practice at a very young age are activities and education to try to prepare them for the real world.

Vicki, and her staff at Interlink visit the several different orphanages in Taraz very regularly and do many activities with the kids and caregivers. One of Vicki’s objectives is to teach the caregivers the different types of activities to do with the kids at a very young age to improve their fine motor skills. She also tries to educate them by teaching them to be more independent.

As we’ve mentioned before, Interlink is a small non-profit humanitarian aid organization operating in Taraz to support orphaned kids (mostly older kids who are less likely to be adopted). Interlink works hard to teach these kids and their caregivers self-respect and responsibility, and provides them with stimulating arts and crafts, games, birthday parties, and other activities.

We would like to ask you a small and very Special Favor during this holiday season to make a donation of your choice to Interlink. We know the people who run Interlink and have seen with our very own eyes all the hard work they do and we know that every dollar donated will be put to good use towards these kids.

Being here in Kazakhstan for many months and visiting orphanages and visiting the city it’s hard not to notice the difference of what kids have here and what kids have in Canada. In Canada the kids have the big expensive toys and have the expensive name brand clothes and here they are happy with just the simple little things.

Your donation can be made through this link:
http://www.interlinkresources.org/

Vicki and Beth from Interlink have an Amazing and VERY POWERFUL ENERGY that you just cannot help but FEEL GOOD when you are around them.
We love to hear all their stories about the different things they’ve done for the kids. Some of the stories are happy and some of them are really sad.
One thing I’m sure Vicki doesn’t realize is she is also teaching us to be better people and to appreciate what we have by her sharing all her experiences and her stories with us.

There is one line that she teaches the kids and says all that time and
I WILL NEVER FORGET THESE WORDS FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE!!!!


You have two choices in life:
“You can either Live Your Life Focusing on What You Don’t Have or
Live your Life Being Grateful and Thankful for What You DO Have.”

We would like to Thank all our readers, family and friends who have been following us through this journey and Dylan would like to thank all of you who will be making a donation to help out all his buddies left behind.
Spasiba = Thank you in Russian
Rahmet = Thank you in Kazakh


P.s. Today December 2nd is one year we met Dylan for the 1st time. One year is a long time but we remember that precious day like it was yesterday.

The 1st picture is Vicki Charbonneau who is Kids Connection Facilitator / Artist
and the 2nd one is Beth Turnock who is the Taraz Dirctor at Interlink.

Another Visit at Saramoldaeva Orphanage

Today Vicki asked us if we wanted to go with her at the Saramoldaeva orphanage to do some arts and crafts with the younger children.
We gladly accepted and went along with her. The kids were very receptive towards us and they really enjoyed doing arts and crafts with us. Even if we don’t speak the same language we understood each other with sign language and had very good laughs together.
Today’s topic was about giving. So we all made an ornament made out of beads to be given to someone of our choice.
We spent most of our morning with them and towards the end some of the older kids about 6 years old were changing and got all dressed up. I asked why are they dressing up? Vicki responded, they were getting ready to go to school. The kids go to public school which is about a 10 minute walk.

Then I thought to myself, I wonder how these kids feel that their parents don’t bring them or pick them up from school just like the rest of the kids. Kids can be cruel sometimes and I said I hope the other kids don’t make fun of them. I wondered what these orphaned kids tell their friends about where they lived and what happened to their parents.
Then again this is probably something very normal for all the kids in Taraz, that they are all used to seeing every day.

We felt really good helping these kids and giving them some attention. We will be doing this more often and going to the other different orphanages.

Here are some pictures of our arts and crafts, some of the kids changing to go to school and also a picture of their bedroom that I was able to take.

Our Apartmant at Interlink Office!!!

December 1st, 2010

As most of you know this is our 3rd trip to Kazakhstan. We have been very fortunate to have lived in very comfortable homes while in Kazakhstan. Our 1st trip we lived in a big house with another Canadian couple, our 2nd trip we lived in a very big apartment and now our 3rd trip we live in the guestroom of the company Interlink. The Interlink office is a Huge 3 storey house with offices on the main and top floor. Interlink office also has a security guard in the basement 24 hrs 7 days a week. Our apartment is upstairs and it consists of 3 connecting rooms. We walk in through the bathroom and then into the living room & office and then into the bedroom. It's spacious, very bright and clean. The kitchen is on the main floor and we share it with the staff during the week. We are very comfortable and very happy that Vicki and Beth offered us this place. We don’t have a washing machine but we really don’t mind washing clothes by hand because it gives us some work to do during the day. Here are some pictures of the Interlink office and our apartment on the top floor.