Greetings from Kazakhstan July 23, 2005

Sorry to have to break on Friday, but here is the rest of the story so far…

Joe woke up at 4 AM on Wednesday but Charlotte slept until 6. As we all met at breakfast it became clear that no one had really slept well. We were all anxious to get the show on the road and get the heck out of the Beibars Hotel. We kept joking that it was the hotel from the song Hotel California. We were all a little worried that we would check out and still be stuck there forever. Thankfully our driver, Alexi, showed up on time and we loaded up and went to the orphanage for the last time.

We arrived a little after 9AM and all of the kids had just gone down for their naps. We walked up to Ivan’s room as usual where we were greeted by two of his caregivers. One of them was Helena, who had also been there the first day that we met Ivan. The other caregiver was the older lady that we all refer to as the orphanage Babushka, Svetta. Helena went and woke Ivan up from his nap. Svetta washed his face and hands and then handed him to us. We dressed Ivan in the outfit that we had chosen for his departure day. It was one that Charlotte’s Mom had bought for us and it was just precious. The caregivers ooed and ahhed over it and kept saying how sweet little Tollie looked in his new clothes. After Ivan was all dressed and ready for the road his caregivers wanted to have a few more minutes holding him and the other two boys from his group, Daniel and Ben. Svetta just kept holding them all and talking to them in Russian. Then the tears started. Svetta was crying and telling all of us parents "thank you, thank you" to which we all tearfully replied "No, thank you!" We spent the next several minutes in tears telling each other in our respective tongues how much we loved the children and how much we appreciated the other one and their role in the children’s lives. It was one of the most moving moments we have ever been apart of. As Svetta handed Ivan to Charlotte for the final time, they exchanged a very tearful but heartfelt hug. Charlotte turned and saw that Helena, who always had a warm smile on her face and was quick with a laugh, was crying as well. She told her one more time "thank you" in Russian and we closed the nursery door behind us. We all cried all the way down the three flights of stairs and out of the building and onto the front porch. When we looked back we saw many faces peering out of the first floor windows trying to get one more look at their precious ones. Ivan spotted one face looking at him through the window and he waived as Mommy said "Paka Paka" (Bye Bye in Russian). As if in anticipation of his departure, Ivan started waiving on Monday at our afternoon visit. Now, he waives all the time!

We took a few group shots outside of the orphanage. Then we boarded the chariot for one last ride. When we arrived at the airport there was so much going on that it was very difficult to say any proper good-byes to our driver and translator. In the end this was probably easier on all of us, as there was a lot of emotion in the air already.

Ivan was strapped to Charlotte in the Baby Bjorn and Joe was pulling the luggage over to the check in counter. The airline wanted to have us all weigh our luggage as one group in case of overages. Of course we were over the limit and we had to pay some money (what a racket). So, we all sat around the gate area and waited for our flight to be called. Much to our surprise our flight was on time (from previous adopters we had learned that the airlines in Kaz rarely run on time, often being delayed by several hours). So we walked out on the tarmac and headed for the plane. Ivan was totally in awe of the other planes on the tarmac and was especially taken with another prop plane that had their props running already. We climbed the steps and entered the den of chaos that is travelling without any seat assignments. Thankfully, Joe scored two seats together and we settled in for the flight.

Ivan was wonderful during take off. He just enjoyed sitting on Mom’s lap and watching everything. Mom just shed tears of joy as the wheels left the ground. Ivan was ours now, and nothing could change it. It was a wonderful feeling. We hoped that he would drop off for a snooze, but that was not to be. He was awake for all but 20 minutes of the flight. He ate a little ham, cheese and bread for lunch and seemed content just to look around at the other people on the plane. The decent was a little frightening for Ivan and Mom. Mom hates prop planes and this one was no exception. However, we landed safe and sound in Almaty at 1:40 Wednesday afternoon.

We were met once again by our translator for Almaty, Sonya, and her husband. We all loaded up and went on our way to the Hyatt. Ivan had a brief meltdown in the car when we first got in but he quickly recovered when we started moving. We pulled into the Hyatt about 20 minutes later and it felt as though we had returned to the US. Everyone speaks English here. All of the menus are in English and the prices are definitely American! However, when you are new parents to a 16-month-old, you are just so thankful for anything familiar you don’t really care what the price is.

When all five couples walked into the Atrium, you would have thought that we were the Clampetts the way that we were gawking at everything. I’m sure that we all had to close our mouths a time or two. We checked-in and got everyone’s room number and decided to meet downstairs for dinner at 6. Much earlier than any other night that we had been together that it for sure!

We got into the room and laid our bags down and tried to take it all in. Here we were, alone for the first time with Ivan since he officially became our son. What a moment. After trying to get somewhat situated Ivan started to show signs of wanting to take a nap. He usually gets two two-hour naps a day. At this point in the day he had had approximately 45 minutes of rest and he was exhausted and so were we. We learned (as you saw in the picture) that when Ivan is tired, he puts his hands behind his head. He went down about 5:15 and we used the time to call our parents.

We decided to go on down for dinner with the group, however, just before we went down Ivan threw-up his snack from earlier in the afternoon. We decided to try and chance it, but he was obviously not feeling well and so Charlotte brought him up to the room and tried to put him down for the night. He went down fairly quickly and stayed down about an hour and a half. Joe asked the restaurant to send Charlotte’s food to the room, so she was rather shocked when someone knocked on the door saying "room service". Charlotte sat on the floor of the entry hall with the bathroom light on and ate her Cajun chicken burger and fries. This was her first meal as a mother and here she was sitting on the floor alone. Welcome to motherhood she thought. (At least it was still hot when she ate it!)

Shortly after Joe returned from dinner with the others, Ivan woke up coughing. His nose was draining and it was tickling his throat. He was up and he was howling. We both rocked him and held him and put him down, only for each successive cough to wake him up and send him into orbit. He was so exhausted from the day that he was just unable to really let go. We were both up with him until about 2. Charlotte took the 2-4 shift and woke Joe up promptly at 4 and said that she was about at her wits end and needed to sleep. Joe was up in a flash and took over until 6. We finally stopped trying to get Ivan to sleep and just got dressed and ready for breakfast. We went downstairs to the fabulous breakfast buffet. The buffet is included in our room rate, but it is normally around $20 per person. We ordered porridge for Ivan (what we were told he normally eats for breakfast along with eggs). It came and he wanted none of it. We were shocked since he never ate anything for dinner and we were certain that he was starving. We tried some eggs and some bread. He nibbled on the bread, but that was all he would eat.
As we chatted with the other families we learned that none of the adults really slept that night. All of the other kids did, but the adults were all just staring at their angels sleeping trying to believe that all of this was real. We laughed and told them that it was real all right!

We headed back upstairs and tried to get Ivan to take a nap while Charlotte and the other Mom’s went to the grocery store with our translator, Sonya. She showed us all what we would need for the kids and asked our coordinator to pick us up, so that we would not have to walk back with the groceries. When Charlotte returned Joe and Ivan were sitting on the bed watching a Baby Einstein video. Both of them looked totally enthralled…it was hilarious!

We ordered some chicken soup for Ivan for lunch, since he was used to having soup at lunch. He wanted no part of it or anything else that we tried. We were getting a little concerned that the poor guy was going to starve! We came up stairs after lunch and played for a little while. About 2 we decided that Ivan needed to try and take a nap so we all piled onto the bed. We put Ivan in-between us and we all started to drift off. Ivan was still awake, but seemed to realize that we were all going to sleep now, so he drifted off too. The family napped for about 2 hours and we were all feeling better afterwards.

After we awoke we realized that it was Ivan’s snack time. Joe had brought a banana back with him from breakfast because we had been told that this was one of Ivan’s favorite foods. He still had not pooped yet, so we thought that we might kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. He ate the whole banana and drank a glass of Kafeir (a milk yogurt mixture that is popular for young children here in Kaz and Russia). He was a happy man. We were happy parents because that was really the first food that he had eaten since lunch on Wednesday. Later that night, the banana worked it’s magic and all was right with the world.

We went down to dinner and tried some of the jarred baby food that Charlotte had bought at the grocery store that morning. Ivan did not care for it at all. So, we busted out a jar of apple baby food and he ate every bite. We were just relieved that he was not on another hiatus from food.
We went upstairs and gave Ivan his first bath. We know that he got baths at the orphanage, but we are fairly certain that they were not a time for play. Joe got into the tub with Ivan to help him relax somewhat. As soon as he hit the water all we heard until it was over was "nyah, nyah, nyah, nyah". He did not shed any tears, but just crumpled his face and yelled. Charlotte soaped him up and washed his hair. Once it was over and he was wrapped in a towel, he was quite happy. We combed his hair and put on his jammies.

After a few laps around the hotel atrium and lobby in the stroller it was time to put Ivan down for the night. He went right down and only awoke a couple of times due to his cough. Each time he awoke he was easily and quickly consoled and back off to sleep. Mom and Dad were thrilled.
Friday morning we got up about 7:15 and woke Ivan up to get him back onto a semblance of a schedule. We went down to the fabulous breakfast buffet and ordered omelets for ourselves and picked up some yogurt, bread, milk and fruit for Ivan. We all ate a wonderful breakfast and left feeling great. We came up to the room and played for a while and then put Ivan down for his morning nap. He slept for two hours. We went down to lunch and tried a different type of baby food, to no avail. So we pulled out the emergency jar of fruit and he ate that with gusto. He’s already got this figured out. If he refuses to eat his "main course" fruit will be provided b/c his newbie parents want to make sure that he eats. Stinker.

We decided that we would walk over to a mall (this one really is a mall and less like a flea market) and look around. Being new parents we did not have the diaper bag completely ready for an offsite outing, so Dad went upstairs to get the things that we needed. While he was up in the room, Mom took Ivan out of the stroller and discovered that we had a "code brown" situation. Of course right at that moment Dad exited the elevator. We all headed back upstairs and finally left the hotel thirty minutes after we had planned to. This will be our life for awhile, won’t it?

We walked to the mall and looked around quite a bit. We bought a tiny brush and comb for Ivan because we had forgotten to bring one. Then we went into the grocery store where we bought some more baby food for Ivan and an apple, his other favorite fruit. Then we walked back to the hotel. Ivan fell fast asleep on our journey back so we stopped and chatted with Lorraine, Alan and Ben. They were just getting lunch since Ben went down late for his morning nap. Once we returned to the room we made a new parent mistake…we took our sleeping child out of the stroller. Of course he woke up and refused to go down for the rest of his naptime.

We played and had a snack and then played some more. We went to dinner and decided to eat outside at the "Beer Garden". We split a delicious grilled pork chop topped with sautéed greens and sundried tomatoes. Charlotte enjoyed a nice glass of red wine and Joe had a glass of Kazkh beer, something that he has really come to enjoy during our time here in Kazakhstan. Ivan enjoyed some baby food and some pears and a bottle of apple juice and water. The weather was just perfect in the 70’s and low humidity. We all really enjoyed ourselves. While we waited for the bill to arrive Ivan began to get a little fussy so Mom strapped him into the stroller that we purchased and made a few laps around the garden before we all headed inside.

Ivan slept from 8:30 until 8:15 Saturday morning and so did Mom and Dad. We were all still tired from our adventure on Wednesday. We headed down to breakfast as usual and met with all of the other families. Apparently, everyone had slept in a little that morning. Then it was back upstairs for a little while. We wanted to keep Ivan up until after lunch because Charlotte was going souvenir shopping with our translator at 1 and Joe was planning to stay "home" with Ivan for the afternoon. Our translator and coordinator are very strict with us about taking the children out. When they are around we keep the children close to the hotel. They are worried that the children will get over stimulated and exposed to too many unknown germs etc. They have a good point and we have all tried to be respectful of their opinions, however, when you are living in a hotel with a 16-month-old, you need to get out from time to time.

So, Charlotte left for the afternoon to find some "Gotcha Day" gifts for Ivan. Our hope is to present a little token from Kazakhstan to Ivan on July 18 as a little reminder of where he came from and how proud we are of his homeland. Ivan went down for his nap fairly quickly after Mom left and Dad was able to get some laundry done in the bathtub. We were planning to send out some things to be laundered, but when we discovered that our underwear alone was going to be close to $50 we decided that we could wash it in the tub with the Woolite that we brought.
Ivan woke up about 20 minutes before Mom returned from her shopping adventure and he and Dad decided to go for a stroll. By the time they were all ready to go, Mom was home and met them at the elevator. We went back to the room and played some more with the stacking cups that we bought a few days ago and of course the puppy sorter.

The group decided that we would meet for dinner around 6 because it was Mary’s last night. Sunday morning she was leaving to fly back to Ireland. She and Austin have been away from their daughter Maria for over three weeks now and they were ready to get someone home. Austin’s Mom who is keeping Maria is probably ready to have one of them home as well. We ate inside and decided to split a pasta dish. It was penne pasta in an Alfredo sauce with sautéed spinach and chunks of tuna. It was wonderful. We ordered some potato soup for Ivan, but he did not want it. He ate some baby food and enjoyed a bottle of juice and water as a dessert.

We all enjoyed ourselves and decided to go for a little stroll after dinner. We said our good-byes to Mary and turned off at the store to buy some water and Cokes for the room. By the time that we had returned to the room Ivan was fast asleep in the stroller. We took him out of the stroller and put on his jammies. By the time we novices got Ivan into the crib he was wide-awake. He decided that this was the perfect time to work on something, so he did. He lay there happily grunting away and stood up when it was all over. We changed his diaper and went to put him back down. Oh no he said I am ready to play. Ivan was in the best mood that he has been in since we left the orphanage on Wednesday morning. He played and played and played until we MADE him stop. Joe took him out for a stroll around the floor and he finally started to relax. However, the minute that they returned to the room, Ivan started howling. He did not want to go to bed yet. We put on a Baby Einstein and put him in bed with us. He was really relaxed when the video ended, and Joe put him down. He played quietly in his crib for another 20 minutes and then dropped off to sleep. Unfortunately, he awoke at 4 this morning and was ready to roll. Ivan and Dad strolled the corridors for over an hour and they both got back to bed about 5:30. We all slept until about 8:15 and then we went on down to breakfast.

The hotel has a little outdoor play area set up on Sunday afternoons for all of the adoptive families. We ventured out there this afternoon after lunch with Ivan and Daniel. Austin needed a little break, so we volunteered to take Daniel with us. We strolled around the grounds a bit and then hit the play area. Ivan is a little small for most of the toys, so he hung out with Dad in the shade, while Mom and Daniel hit the swings and the slide. Ivan has finally hit the sheets for his afternoon snooze, so we will sign off for now.

We thank you again for all of the love, prayers and well wishes. We will try to write again soon, but as many of you know, life with a 16-month-old is a little busy. Have a great week and we hope to be home before it is over!

Much love,
Charlotte, Joe and Ivan