Jeff & Sue - Day 7 - The Paper Chase Part 3 – Mariupol

Jeff – Thursday, October 22, 2009

Day 7 – The Paper Chase Part 3 – Mariupol

I’m writing this on Friday evening at about 6PM local time. I didn’t take really great notes for yesterday, so I’m sitting here trying to remember what we did. It was another crazy busy day – but more for our interpreter than for us!

Our interpreter headed out at about 8:30 to get some paperwork done. It’s all running together for me now. She keeps describing a local resolution, an SDA resolution, and a court resolution – also referred to as an application. I think all of these are being run through the notary bureau now – we seem to drop her off or wait for her outside that office quite a bit.

We were picked up around 10:30 and headed over to the orphanage. We did get to spend quite a bit of time with Nastiya, but we also got a chance to talk to the social worker and the director. The social worker was amazing – she had Nastiya pegged from what we could tell. The character traits and behaviors that we noticed while Nastiya was staying with us were all described in detail by this woman. One of the things that we continue to see is a real caring sentiment and a deep understanding of these children by the workers at the orphanage. It may not be the best situation for any child, but these people are doing an amazing job to make it the best it can be under the circumstances. So we heard about how Nastiya interacts with other children, her teachers and her caregivers. We learned about her learning style and her favorite topics. We were told about strengths and weaknesses. Overall, a very detailed review of a delightful young lady.

Our time with the director was quite inspiring, actually. It was obvious that she knew Nastiya and cared very much about what Nastiya wants and what will make her happy. I can only assume she has this level of interest and detail about all of “her kids”, but it really felt good to know that she had spent time understanding Nastiya’s wishes and was interested in making those wishes come true.

One of the things that we confirmed during the conversations over these two days was that Nastiya has an older brother and a younger sister. The sister has been out of contact for quite some time – no one is quite sure when they last lived together or spoke. But her 15 year old brother has kept contact and regularly visits Nastiya in the orphanage. The director reiterated the fact that the brother has agreed that this is the best thing for Nastiya, but that he wants to maintain communication with his sister. We were extremely pleased to hear this. First because we also learned that Nastiya wants to stay in contact with her brother. Second, for an ulterior motive: we believe that it will be good for Nastiya to keep her native language: well, now she’ll have to. Sneaky, but what a great situation – she gets the benefit of keeping a language and also of keeping in touch with her “brat”.

The other thing that we learned is that we need the approval of the brother, the sister, the director (of the orphanage), the inspector, the SDA, and the local court. Holy smokes! Well, more on that on Friday, but the short answer is the brother, who had kept touch with her and obviously loves her (we meet him on Friday) has given his approval. The rest is easy, right?

When we finished at the orphanage around 1:45, we headed for… wait for it… the notary bureau! Our interpreter ran in, and when she came out, as I wrote yesterday, we asked the interpreter to help us find an internet modem. She went into two stores to look for one, and at the second one she handed me a price list, said we should think about it, but we would have to do it tomorrow if we wanted it. She told us in a very distracted voice that they would drop us at a restaurant. Since we had not been online for days, we asked instead if we could just go to the internet café. Our driver dropped us at the café and we got two terminals for an hour – 5 grivna each – 10 total (about $1.25). We caught up on email, I copied the blog that you read from yesterday onto a stick, which I connected to my internet computer via a USB port mounted on the desktop (no computer was visible), and then I uploaded the text. Truly a pain as the chairs were all of 6 inches apart – so I had to juggle getting my laptop out of my bag, get the stick loaded, the guy next to me needs to squeeze out… It was a fun juggling act.

When our driver and interpreter picked us up about an hour and a half later, our interpreter was still very distracted. She had the driver drop us at the apartment and they took off. We had a snack, chatted, puttered around for a while, and finally made dinner – still no interpreter. Finally, about three hours after she had dropped us off, she came breezing in. We got the whole story – the papers she needed to finish had to be done that night or else we would add three days to the process. Bless her heart, she kept at it until the documents were done. But these documents needed to be sent back to SDA in Kiev, and they were finished too late to catch the bus to Kiev. So she had to have our Mariupol driver meet our Donets’k driver half-way, then do the pony express thing to get the papers to the Donets’k stop on time, then have them sent overnight to Kiev. But she made it! Our papers would be in Donets’k on Friday. No delay!

So we gave her dinner

I spoke to David, and we chatted about the internet card for a while. I’ve decided to buy the card, and we’ll use it the second trip, if I come back with Sue, if not, figure out a way to pass it on.


Sue – Thursday, October 22

Day 7 – Mariupol – Hurry Up & Wait!

Jeff did a great blog! It was one of those days. First, we could sleep in until 8:30, because we weren’t leaving the apartment until 10:00am. So it was leisurely coffee, get ready, then, hurry, hurry, hurry! Then wait in the car for 20 minutes, then hurry, hurry, hurry, then wait in the car, or go in the office, then back in the car, then wait… it was pretty frantic, as other families have aptly called HURRY UP & WAIT.

The description Jeff wrote about the social worker (school psychologist in the USA) was perfect! She cares deeply for her children… she was the one who stopped by several times while Nastiya, Jeff and I were in the outer room, playing Uno, while another family was in the green room with a child. I thought she was just another caregiver, because she was kind and loving, and Nastiya quickly started jabbering to her about me, Jeff, the card game, etc… So I was surprised when she showed up as the “social worker”.

The one thing I have noticed about the caregivers, from the cooks to the Doctor, to the assistant directors, is that everyone has a CONNECTION to the kids – the kids run up and start telling them things about the visit. There is a kindness I didn’t anticipate, but sort of guessed at due to the love and caring I saw when they were out here with a caregiver. It is NOT an “Oliver Twist” type of orphanage!!

We keep seeing children, dressed warmly in coats and leggings, going outside to play. When one of them (that knows us) strays from the pack, to give us a smile or big hug (like O. did every time she saw us… R. L-C, you know who I’m talking about…), the caregivers gently motion to them, never screaming or yelling. These kids DO have rules, and take them seriously. Of course, they have to have rules, there are over 100 children here. They put the children into “pods”, which have around 10-12 kids, best as I can tell… some older, and some younger. This is only for hanging around, not for school. For school, they of course go to their own grade, and we are pleased to know that Nastiya is in 5th grade, which is exactly the grade she will be in San Jose. The translator pointed out the school they attend is only a block away, but we haven’t gone close to it yet to get a photo.

We didn’t spend much time with Nastiya at all – some Uno, some pictures, some candy and gifts, then the Social Worker’s meeting with us took a lot of time (without Nastiya), then we had to leave for the next document chase!

It is still a surreal experience. I am picking up more Russian words. When Jeff and the translator went off to look for, then eventually buy the modem card, it was a lot of time in the car alone with our driver. Well, far be it from me NOT to talk, just because we don’t speak each other’s language… NYET! I dug out the Russian/English small handbook, and we gesticulated, and “flip-flip-flip”, and then find a word or phrase, then she corrects my pronunciation, then we figure out what the heck the other is trying to say… we “spoke” about husband, marriage, children, school, professions, schooling, and families.

She wanted to know if I worked, what I did, how many children, where I live. We talked about her past schooling, her daughter, her grand-daughter, her daughter’s schooling. I spoke about quitting my job to raise my son… about the type of city, with how many people, and she spoke of the population of Mariupol, and yes, she lived here her whole life; her husband was not from here, but a small town not far away. We talked about places we visited, what type of car we had back in USA. This is all with her knowing a very little amount of English, and me knowing even less Russian. We laughed very hard at times, but managed to get 80 percent of what the other was speaking about. Not bad… not bad at all. A rainy but successful day.