Happy Birthday Amalia Avino!!!

December 26, 2009

Last blog before we go say bye to Dylan and get on our 10hr train ride!!!

See you all in Canada!!
Mary & Fil!!!

Happy Birthday Amalia and have a great day!!

Christmas day and what a GIFT!!!

December 25th, 2009

Today is Christmas Day and what a delightful gift we received!!!
We went to the orphanage this morning for 10:00 and we picked up a nurse and a caregiver because since we were going to pick up Dylan and we have a mini bus, they came along as well to pick up 3 other children that were at the hospital. We got to the hospital for about 10:30 and the nurse and caregiver went in the hospital and they asked Irina, Fil and I to wait outside. About 1/2 an hour later the nurse, and 2 caregivers came running outside with 4 kids and one of them was Dylan!!!! So I grabbed one child, Fil grabbed Dylan and the caregivers came in the mini bus with 2 other children and we waited in the mini bus.
As soon as we sat in the mini bus and waited for the nurse to complete paperwork in the hospital I looked at the time and it was 11:02am (kazak time) which was 12:02am (Montreal time -->Christmas)!!! I looked at Fil and said it's Christmas in Canada and we finally got Dylan back from the hospital!!!
Is it a coincidence? Is it everyone back home praying for Dylan and giving him positive energy?? Whatever it was, it worked and it was a POWERFUL MOMENT!!
As Opera would say, it was an Ahhhh Moment!!!


I told Fil last Christmas while we were completing paperwork for the adoption and this I promise everybody is the very truth, I told him, "Fil next year will be a different christmas, you watch and see"!!!! Am I the powerful one??? I think I am!!!

We spent about 1/2 hr with Dylan at the orphanage, he seemed better but still had his cough, the other 3 kids that we picked up sounded even worse. Dylan had a little more energy than when we went to see him in the hospital this week and looked more himself!! We were so stressed being in the mini bus with all these sick kids, that have been abandoned by their parents that we didn't even wish Dylan a Merry Christmas!! We'll see him tomorrow morning before we catch the train.

MERRY CHRISTMAS DYLAN KORKEM CASACALENDA & EVERYONE BACK HOME, AND BUON NATALE IN ITALIA!!!

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Tonight we went for supper at a Korean restaurant with the german couple Ernie and katherine. It was a great supper and nice night out. Fil and I were then looking for a taxi to go home because it was very very dark and late and this guy in his car came next to us and said Taxi and we said yes and got in. I told Fil to drop us off at the corner because I did not want him to know where we lived. As we got out Fil and I both looked at each other and said, "this was not even a taxi" he didn't have any taxi sign or anything!! But we got home safe and sound and he doesn't know where we live!!!

December 24, 2009
10:00am
Today we won’t see Dylan again. It’s now 4 days that he’s been in the hospital, ALL BY HIMSELF!!!! Do you believe that a baby is left alone at the hospital all by himself???? I don’t understand that logic, it’s not right, but for now all we can do and all we can hope for is that he gets better!!

Fil and I are fighters and have never given up on our dream but this little guy is a fighter too and he’s been fighting all by himself since the 1st day he was born!!!
WE CAN’T WAIT TO LEAVE, NOT BECAUSE WE WANT TO LEAVE DYLAN BUT THE QUICKER WE LEAVE THE QUICKER WE COME BACK AND BRING HIM HOME WHERE HE BELONGS SO WE CAN SPOIL HIM, LOVE HIM AND GIVE HIM ALL THE CARE HE NEEDS AND DESERVES AND NEVER GO BY ANOTHER DAY ALL BY HIMSELF!!!!!

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It's now 9:00pm and Fil and I just had our Christmas Eve supper. Our roommates left this afternoon and are heading back to Canada, "bon voyages les amies" Our supper consisted of rice,peppers,carrots,cashews,raisins and shrimp with a tomato and cucumber salad with no oil because we ran out!!! The owner of the house brought us a christmas tree which was very nice of him considering nobody celebrates christmas here. However you find christmas decorations everywhere here but they decorate for New Year's Eve!! Some pictures are attached of our romantic supper just the 2 love birds..LOL!!!

We found out tonight that we'll be picking up Dylan from the hospital tomorrow and bring him back to the orphanage!!!! We really hope so, it will be the best x-mas gift ever!!!

Above are some pictures of our house. The lovely bed!!! Wow!!!

Happy Birthday Dr. Nick Casacalenda!!!!!!

December 24, 2009

Thank you for all your medical advice, for your words of wisdom, your support and encouragements throughout this difficult journey, Thanks for sharing your Beautiful, Positive and Intelligent Mind with us!!!
Have a great day and a fantastic birthday!!! xoxoxoxoxoxxo

Happy Birthday Annie Campoli

December 23, 2009

Walk around Taraz

December 22, 2009

We did not see Dylan today so Fil and I went walking around all day LONG. We were told of a place that made espresso, café au lait and cappuccino with Lavazza coffee, so we took a walk there. Got to the counter and wanted to order a café au lait, the girl responded nyet (no), I then asked for cappuccino –> nyet, espresso –> Nyet!!! So I looked at her and said, kaffe? She sticks out an envelope and in this envelope is instant coffee with coffee mate, I started laughing and I ordered an orange juice!!!! I think their machine was broken. Can you tell I’m in desperate need of a real coffee?? LOL!!! I ran out of Tim Horton’s coffee after 1 week here and all they have here is INSTANT COFFEE and all the teas that you can think of!!! Actually we found Ethiopian espresso coffee that we use in my 1-cup filter gadget and it’s not bad but an Italian coffee would have been really nice! My roommate said I would probably have been disappointed anyways if they did have it, and I said yes that’s probably true, because I’m a Diva….a coffee diva!!! (the picture of my 1 cup filter coffee gadget is attached)

We then continued walking and tried to look for stores to buy something for Dylan’s room that represents Taraz, Kazakhstan. We couldn’t find anything interesting and we were close to our house and decided that we wanted to go to a market called “Small” which is equivalent to our Wal-Mart. It was a bit of a long walk and decided to take a taxi. WOW!! What an adventure. We called our co-ordinator and asked her what to tell the taxi, she responded tell him the market called “Small”. Fine. So Mary and I started to kind of hitchhike to get a cab. Lol. So we were walking and this taxi driver stops and he already had 2 people and wanted to pick us up as well. We were both laughing and said no. lol. Finally a taxi stops and I told him to go to the market “Small”. No reaction came from him and didn’t know if he understood me, so I called back Vera and she spoke to him and told him where to go. It was so funny. Before she hung up she told me it shouldn’t cost more than 300 tenges equivalent to $2.00 canadian. Wow. He was a nice gentlemen and only charged me 200 tenges ($1.25 canadian). Oh the drive was between 5 to 10 minutes.

My bladder……yes I have a weak bladder and I need to go to the ladies room pretty often and it’s very interesting the toilets that I have visited here. 1st of all they are all "squat toilets" but that’s ok I’m used to them now but the best one so far is the one I went to today. I had to visit the ladies room and as I walked in, there were about 6 to 8 stalls but the only problem was that the walls were about 3 feet high and you had to go up 2 steps to get in.. Ok enough with the details, what I’m trying to explain is that when you go up the 2 steps to go into your stall you see everyone else in their stalls….and NO I did not turn around and leave, I did go………BUT there was nobody in there when I went in…… it was really funny, I guess you had to be there!!!

"BIG DAY"

December 21, 2009

Today we went to visit Dylan at the hospital for about ½ hour with Irina our translator and the doctor from the orphanage. We had to go buy masks to wear at the hospital. Once we got to the hospital the doctor there did not really want us to go visit Dylan but then finally gave the ok to go see him. We saw him in a little waiting room at the end of a hallway. He was calm and tired. He fell asleep in my arms. They had given him treatment through I.V. We were not told what he had but said they would do x-rays on his lungs. While we were visiting him the nurse asked for diapers and Irina had to go buy them for us. We were also told that we would not be able to see him tomorrow and that maybe we would be able to see him on Wednesday and if he was better we would be able to take him back to the orphanage.

Today was a big day for 2 reasons. #1 we went to visit Dylan in a children’s hospital and #2 we had an appointment at the Municipal Ministry of Education. Most couples are usually nervous about going there because you are in a room with 4 to 5 people from the board of directors of the Ministry of Education and they ask you questions about the Adoption. We really were not nervous about their drilling questions because we know we will give Dylan the best life for him. There were 3 people from the ministry of education and Vera who was translating everything to us and to them.
The questions they asked us were:

1- If we knew about his medical diagnostics and to name them
2- Who will be taking care of him when we both go to work
3- He asked if there was enough income coming from Fil as I will be home raising Dylan
4- They asked us if we were presented with more than 1 child on the 1st day at the orphanage and Why did we choose "Korkem"?
5-- The final best question was ->he asked if Fil was a hockey fan!!!!
He asked him between Russia and Canada who would win in the world cup? Fil responded the best answer ever………….”50-50 chance”!!! There was a big laugh in the room and the V.P. finally responded that Russia would win 4 to 3 against Canada!!! Fil responded…Maybe, we'll see!!!! Lol

He then gave us a speech to tell Dylan where he comes from even though he will be a Canadian citizen, teach him about his culture etc. He also said that Dylan looks like me...(Mary) how nice!!!!

It went really well and it was so easy because we were really confident and we refused to let them intimidate us, But they were also so very nice which made it easier!!

After that we all went to a "Georgian" restaurant called Sakartvelo to celebrate, Anatoli our driver, Vera & Medet our coordinators, Irina our translator, Elena the German couples translator, Catherine & Ernie the Germans, Christoph and Nathalie. We must say that the food was fantastic and the dessert was great. The 3 couples split the bill in 3 to thank them for all their great work!! The bill came out to $50.00 per couple. The restaurant was amazing and we really all had a great time.