March 13&14
March 13, 2005
We spent much of today running errands. Our coordinator advised that pictures of us with the kids would be helpful for the Guardianship Council hearing and Court. We found a Photography shop that could develop pictures off a digital memory card, and I quickly picked 15 or 20 pictures and had double prints made. I left one set for the kids at the orphanage.
We generally do our bonding time in Julia’s “family group” common area, so we can have from 2-12 extra kids in there while we’re there. They love the digital camera, because they can see the results right away. We’ve taken 150 pictures picture of us with all of them—individually, in groups, making silly faces, etc. Thank goodness we discovered Lithium AA camera batteries before we left!
It was rainy and a weekend (no school) so we had a bunch of kids there today. We bought Julia a coloring book today and she shared it and the Crayons we brought from the US with her friends. I now know that it’s possible for 6 girls to work on one coloring book at the same time and not have any squabbles. They also like to practice reading their English, and some of the older kids are not too bad. We had a lot of fun with the “th” sound—there’s no equivalent in Russian, so everything comes out “tr” or “sr”.
I learned, ‘wiz’ great interest, that trouble usually comes in ‘trees’ .
Russ
March 14
We finally got a little break from the rain today. After Brooke and Paige’s ‘school’, we walked to the grocery store to stock up on supplies and had lunch at a local restaurant.
Visiting time at the orphanage today was challenging, but fun, because our coordinator and translator had to make a quick exit to take care of some paperwork and certification that had to be done before our Guardianship council appearance. We did really well—it’s amazing how much you can understand with proper motivation, a picture book and a Russian-English dictionary. We learned that Julia likes raspberries, Vasya likes watermelon and they learned that I grew up on a farm. Julia wanted to look at pictures of her room at our house again and get the English words for what things are so they could start writing down their own Russian=English translation charts.
We really hate to leave the Children’ House when our visiting time is up, and are looking forward to phase 2 of this process where we can have them all the time at our place.
I lost a big chunk of one of my molars tonight while eating a piece of really sticky caramel candy (what was I thinking!) but will have to tough it out until I get home. They don’t appear to do porcelain tooth crowning here, so everyone over 35 has a mouthful of gold teeth. My impression of medical care here was formed as one of our friends was giving me a drive-by tour of the places I would need to know about in Taraz….”to the right is the grocery store… photo place… clothing store. That is the Hospital—never go there”.
Russ
We spent much of today running errands. Our coordinator advised that pictures of us with the kids would be helpful for the Guardianship Council hearing and Court. We found a Photography shop that could develop pictures off a digital memory card, and I quickly picked 15 or 20 pictures and had double prints made. I left one set for the kids at the orphanage.
We generally do our bonding time in Julia’s “family group” common area, so we can have from 2-12 extra kids in there while we’re there. They love the digital camera, because they can see the results right away. We’ve taken 150 pictures picture of us with all of them—individually, in groups, making silly faces, etc. Thank goodness we discovered Lithium AA camera batteries before we left!
It was rainy and a weekend (no school) so we had a bunch of kids there today. We bought Julia a coloring book today and she shared it and the Crayons we brought from the US with her friends. I now know that it’s possible for 6 girls to work on one coloring book at the same time and not have any squabbles. They also like to practice reading their English, and some of the older kids are not too bad. We had a lot of fun with the “th” sound—there’s no equivalent in Russian, so everything comes out “tr” or “sr”.
I learned, ‘wiz’
Russ
March 14
We finally got a little break from the rain today. After Brooke and Paige’s ‘school’, we walked to the grocery store to stock up on supplies and had lunch at a local restaurant.
Visiting time at the orphanage today was challenging, but fun, because our coordinator and translator had to make a quick exit to take care of some paperwork and certification that had to be done before our Guardianship council appearance. We did really well—it’s amazing how much you can understand with proper motivation, a picture book and a Russian-English dictionary. We learned that Julia likes raspberries, Vasya likes watermelon and they learned that I grew up on a farm. Julia wanted to look at pictures of her room at our house again and get the English words for what things are so they could start writing down their own Russian=English translation charts.
We really hate to leave the Children’ House when our visiting time is up, and are looking forward to phase 2 of this process where we can have them all the time at our place.
I lost a big chunk of one of my molars tonight while eating a piece of really sticky caramel candy (what was I thinking!) but will have to tough it out until I get home. They don’t appear to do porcelain tooth crowning here, so everyone over 35 has a mouthful of gold teeth. My impression of medical care here was formed as one of our friends was giving me a drive-by tour of the places I would need to know about in Taraz….”to the right is the grocery store… photo place… clothing store. That is the Hospital—never go there”.
Russ
posted by The Petersons at 7:02 PM
2 Comments:
mon & dad
We are excited! We wait every night at 9:30 to see what you have written. I share the blog site with my friends at work, they seen the site one day and wanted to know, who those kids were. I had a good time sharing your experience.
Love and prayers
Please put Anomymous on Brooke and Paiges site, Thanks
Just got back from Mexico and am having a great time reading all your adventures. Your new family is beautiful..I am so happy for you. You're in my prayers.
Lynette
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