Day 3 Kiev: Rain, Rain, Go Away

Dearest Dema,

Great day today - again despite the weather. The rain ushered in a fantastically yucky cold front. It was windy and rainy today with some mist. The wind is wicked here! It has been a great day on a number of fronts but first let’s start with adoption news.

We started out this morning by going to the SDA for our appointment - it went great and we will go back tomorrow for our referral letter. It was very quick and professional. They asked G3 and myself a few questions about ourselves like how long we’d been married and how we met you. I was nervous at first but quickly realized that it was just a formality. We did discover that you have a half-sister Dema (same father, different mother), and we will make sure that we enable you to keep in touch. We were surprised to find this out but will hopefully get more information at the orphanage.  I was thinking we could visit her but Sasha recommended against it, saying that we don’t want to do anything that could jeopardize the adoption. As he pointed out, you might not even know her, or there might not even be a substantive relationship. He recommended that after the everything is done that we can contact her. Sasha was great as usual, helping us out through every step of the morning. We also discovered that the next family in the queue got a date and will be traveling at the end of the month.

We will be going back to the SDA for our referral letter tomorrow and then will be taking a train to Mariupol overnight. We will hopefully be able to see you Wednesday - we can not wait to see you. We did get to see a picture of you that was in your file - you looked so small! It made me so anxious to get to see you and hold you again! (I know, just what a 14 yo boy does not want to hear!)

Now on to the next part of the good news - we saw Alex today! He got back in town from his flight to Vietnam this morning. So after he dropped his stuff off at his apartment, he came and met us for lunch. We had a great time visiting and talking (and a great lunch too!) He came back to the apartment with us and visited for a couple more hours, but he had been on the flight for 11 hours so was tired. We said good-bye with promises to meet again tomorrow. It was so wonderful seeing him - it has been too long - three years since we last saw him. He just fell back in with the family without any trouble!

I have just been spending some time repacking our suitcases - it seems everything has gotten messy and disorganized in the space of just a few days. I am also doing more laundry so we can leave for Mariupol with all clean things. I am going to go cook some dinner in a little while. I am trying to finish up everything in the fridge we bought at the market before we go tomorrow but I think I was a little too good at doing it - we might have not much to eat for breakfast tomorrow! By the way - the food her is fantastic! You can just look at us and know that we know our food! But truly, we have had some great food - and we are pretty picky being vegetarian. I made sure I knew a few key phrases to use at restaurants and it has been pretty easy to find good food at reasonable prices. 

Anyway, I better go and finish preparing for leaving tomorrow! Time is just flying by here - already Day 3 and it seems like we just got here.

Sending love your way!

Bethany, G3, G4, & Amanda

Amanda and Alex - better pictures coming - but had to get at least one in!