Buon Compleanno Zia Cristina!! xoxoxxo

December 12, 2009

Zdrahst-vooy-tee - Hello!!!
Pree-vyet – Hi!!

This morning I spoke to my mom (Casa) we spoke and she was telling me not to worry about our cat “Sonny”. He’s doing fine, always hungry and is “nu ficha nase”. Oh she also said that my dad brushes him. WOW. Not bad for Italian parents that never had pets and are adapting very well and I think are getting attached to our cat. LOL!!!

This is our 6th bonding day. We were picked up by a taxi and Christoph and Nathalie went with Medet. What a taxi, it’s the 1st time we were in since we’ve been here, the car was very old and felt like it was gonna shut down. WOW!!!! We went for 10:00 am at the orphanage. As usual Dylan was the last baby again that came down, apparently they were feeding him so he came down a little past 10. He’s actually doing a little better. He played a lot today and that was good, he didn’t fall asleep at all. It seems that he is slowly gaining his energy and that’s great. Vera (Co-ordinator) told us that tomorrow we will be going to the Bazaar (flee market) after the orphanage. Also she asked for our passports cause she needed to make copies for the Notary, which we will be going on Monday.

The taxi took us back home and let me tell you he didn’t really know his way back to our house. When we got close to the house I (Fil) was giving him directions by pointing with my finger where to turn. LOL!!!!! We then had lunch and after lunch we had a card game the four of us. We played Crazy Eight. It was fun. After we finished playing cards we watched a movie called “Getting Over Sarah Marshall”. Bah, it was alright, but it was sooooo nice to listen to English words. LOL!! Actually Mary made it throughout the whole movie without falling asleep.

We then prepared supper, tuna salad and chicken soup.

p.s. towing trucks don’t exist here, they use a thick rope to transport a car if it’s not working.

Dah svee-dah-nee-yah - Good-Bye
Pahcha – bye

dah – yes
nyet – no
spah-see-bah – thank you
kahk dee-lah- how are you?
spah-see-bah khan-rah-shoh – fine thanks
skol-kah – how much?

5th out of 14 required bonding days

December 11, 2009


Today was a good day because we finally saw our little sick Dylan. This morning we went to see Dylan from 10:00 to 12:00. We were so happy to see him. He looked good but you heard the mucus in his chest and also when he coughed. We did not remove his 3 layers of clothing because the room they gave us today was a little cold and drafty. As per the doctors orders we were told not to feed him anything to avoid diarrehia or vomiting but I still gave him his multi vitamin when nobody was looking. He did not smile or laugh much today but he played more than usual and he finally held himself up. After an hour and ½ he got tired and fell asleep on his daddy as he was sucking his thumb.…….PICTURE PERFERT!!!! THE MOMENT WAS PRICELESS!!

Later on as we were going home the police stopped our mini bus and our driver Anatoli was fined. He was fined because there was a pedestrian trying to cross the street and he did not let him pass. The police stopped like 5 cars at the same time, but the best part was you could bargain with them. The police asked for $4000 tenge and the driver bargained it down to $1000 tenge (about $7.00) and he paid it right away and there was no ticket, no paper work, no proof… So guess what that means???? The police keeps the money for himself…. Do you believe that??? And to top it all off he also gets a good base salary with that, nice commission don’t you think???? What a corruptive system!! By the way a very good salary here in Kazakhstan is about $500/month. An apartment in a new apartment building (1 or 2 bedrooms) is about $30,000, which most people cannot afford.

There are no garbage trucks here to pick up your garbage, you must put all your garbage in a big blackish brownish container (the same containers our parents used to boil the tomato jars in) and they burn all their garbage in this container. So that smell is everywhere you go.

The teeth fillings or caps are gold and not silver like we have and the gold lasts forever.

Many people still use the bathroom outside with the hole in the ground (squat toilet), we have one too here in case our bathroom doesn’t work…… no thx! (picture of our squat toilet is attached)

The heating system is centrally controlled by the city. (picture of the heating pipes is attached)

The main vegetables here are: carrots, potatoes, beets, peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, garlic and Cabbage.
The main fruits here are: bananas, pineapples, apples, kaki, tangerines, and grapes.

finally!!

December 10, 2009

This morning Mary woke up at around 7:00 and I woke up at around 8:00 cause my mom called. Spoke briefly. Went downstairs and Christoph made me a coffee and I was on the internet verifying emails etc… Mary was upstairs in the room doing some reading while I was washing up. Mary called Vera to see if we can get any news on Dylan. Vera said that Medet will go to the orphanage today and she will call us back to let us know how Dylan is doing.

It’s been very hard for us the last 4 days, we are attached to Dylan even if we’ve only seen him for 4 days (2 hours each day). We just hope that he’ll get better cause the most important thing right now is his health and we understand totally that under these circumstances we can’t see him. So we have to be PATIENT and hope for the best of his health.

Mary and I went for a long walk late this afternoon. We did our own site seeing, took pictures of the city. Actually we went for 2 ½ hour walk. Boy was it getting cold for us, I was wearing running shoes and man I didn’t feel my toes anymore. We were looking for a place to get a coffee or pizza cause they said their pizzas here in Taraz are good, guess what.... no luck. We were looking for a place for Mary to go to the toilet, guess what.... no luck. WOW!!!

So we continued walking towards home and after all said and done we started preparing supper just for Mary and I cause Christoph and Nathalie also went for a walk and called me to say they were eating at a Cafeteria (Restaurant).

We got a call from Vera (Co-ordinator) and she said she had good news for us. She said that tomorrow we can visit Dylan and Jacob for (Christoph & Nathalie). Dylan doesn’t have fever but he’s a little congested and he’s in shape for us to see him. LOL!!! We were so happy and excited to hear this. Our visit tomorrow is in the morning at 10:00 am. We posted some pictures at the request of Robert Zariello, who wanted to see a little more of the city.

December 9, 2009 (no visit)

Today our driver came to pick us up at 11:00 to go to the museum. We visited the museum for 2 hrs with an English interpreter. It was interesting and very educational to get some background on the Kazakhstan culture.

Christoph, Nathalie, Fil and I will not be visiting our child at the orphanage today as they are still sick and they don’t want us to give them any infection…… no comment!! We don’t have any detail on how they are doing or what they have, all we know is they have fever and are sick. They also told us that tomorrow the orphanage is closed because the inspector of the health department was visiting the orphanage. Dec 7,8,9 & 10 no visit with little Dylan, ouch that hurts!! We understand that over here they have a different system, different mentality, different culture and that there can be things that we may or may not aggree with and we knew coming here we had to have lot's and lot's of PATIENCE but it's very hard!!!

December 8, 2009 (no visit)

Well today Mary woke up at 5:00 am and I slept till about 7:30 am. I actually saw snow when I looked outside this morning. WOW!!! It snowed about 3 to 5 cm’s. We both had breakfast around 10:00 am. We then were reading our journal on “Dylan” and were adding some pictures. Christoph and Nathalie had to go see the Dr. at the orphanage to try to get a full report of their son Jacob’s operation, which he had in August in Astana. Vera and Medet were coming to pass by and pick them up.

I decided to shovel the snow outside. I then noticed that the dog that belongs to the owner was missing, his gate was opened. We weren’t sure if he was stolen or if the owner took him. When Vera and Medet showed up, I explained to them about the dog situation and Medet called the owner of the house right away to find out what happened. He spoke to the owner’s daughter Kundiz and she says she probably thinks that the dog was stolen but she would call her dad to find out what happened. At the end of the day we found out that the owner came to pick up the dog because it was too cold for him. We were relieved because during the day, 4 guys in their mid twenties kept coming to our house asking for someone and we kept telling them, “No We Don’t Understand”. So we were happy the dog was okay. We named him Buzz because he’s our alarm system and we cannot remember his real name.

Vera and Medet came in the house and spoke to us for about 15 min about having an extension on Mary and Nathalie’s Visa cause they want to remain here the whole trip, instead of going back and forth. They have decided that it would be too difficult to leave the baby at the orphanage and to say good-bye.

Vera said that it’s better for them to leave at the date we were told cause it would be difficult for them to stay here the whole trip because it will be long, boring and difficult for them to renew their Visa and Mary to renew her passport. But they said they would try anyways, so Medet asked for Mary and Nathalie’s passports and he would go to the police station and find out if it can be done or not. In Mary’s situation it was a bit more complicated cause her passports expires March 11, 2010 and she would have to renew her passport before she can get her visa done.

They left and Mary and I stayed home. I took out some snow again and Mary cleaned the house. Christoph and Nathalie came back home from seeing the dr. and told us that we couldn’t see Dylan again today cause he was still under the weather. This was bad news, another day without seeing our Dylan. Since Christoph and Nathalie were at the orphanage talking to the doctor regarding their son the doctor gave them a prescription for Dylan to give to us. They bought the medication on their way back home for us; thank you guys!!

Christoph and Nathalie left at 3:40 to go to the orphanage and brought the medication to give to them for Dylan. We then went for a walk and went to do some groceries. We got back home and Mary started cooking and I was trying to communicate with the Canadian Embassy in Russia to find out for Mary’s passport. Then I saw Nathalie & Christoph and they came back earlier. Their baby Jacob was sick with a fever so they had to come back home and were not able to see him. Vera came in and said that tomorrow they would take us to the museum at 10:30.

We then had supper around 6:30 pm. After supper Christoph wanted to play cards again (Crazy Eight). So we had a card game and yes Mary won.

On that note it's now 11:00 pm and I will check my emails and go to bed cause tomorrow is another day and sure hoping it will be a better day!!!!!
(we posted a picture of our Kazak dog "buzz" and a picture of our white house where we are living right now.)

bad day!

Dec/07/09
Today is not a good day. We waited all day to go see Dylan, prepared our bag with his food, milk, clothes, toys, diapers etc and got on the mini bus to go to the orphanage. Got to the orphanage and placed our stuff and waited for Dylan. The other 2 couples got their boys but Dylan never came down. Our cordinator was not there to explain and the temporary cordinator that was there does not SPEAK ENGLISH. She came down and said "Dylan not come today,sick,fever"!!! So the driver took us home!! I hope it's only a flu and gets better real fast, poor thing!! We were so Anxious to see him today!! Fil tried to ask if we could at least go see him but nobody understood anything. They could have at least called us so we did not have to go through all this ordeal!!!! Our faces turned red-purple and just dropped to the ground.

Angelo, Sonia & Tina

Dec/07/2009

Angelo & Sonia and Tina

Today we would like to DEDICATE our blog to Angelo, Sonia (Alexandra & Gabriel) & to Tina Giannakakis (Aleksi)

Angelo and Sonia – We have gained a whole total deep admiration for the courage and strength you both have demonstrated for going through international adoption twice. You adopted 1 child and then did it all over again to adopt a 2nd one. Not sure which was harder the 1st time because you did not know what to expect or if it was harder the 2nd time because you knew what to expect. Whatever it is; you did it twice and you have 2 beautiful children to prove it!! Thank you for the advice you gave us and for the advice you continue giving us!!

Tina – The strength, the courage, the guts you had to adopt a child in Kazakhstan as a single parent is over and beyond any expectations. We cannot imagine traveling alone, living alone in Kazakhstan for 2 months, going through the whole adoption process by yourself. I’m sure you had a Great Support system from your family and friends but nevertheless you still did it on your own. We have to say you really did a great job and your beautiful son Aleksi will be very proud of his amazing STRONG Mommy one day!! Thank you for opening up the door to us about Kazakhstan and for all the knowledge you shared with us on adoption. Thanks for all the advice you have been giving us from day 1 of this adoption process. It’s thanks to you that we choose Kazakhstan to adopt.

Love Always Fil, Mary & little Dylan Kaza xoxxo