Never Can Say Goodbye

Bye bye Samantha
After court, we had our afternoon visit with Samantha. I don't think she realized what a monumental day it was for her! We told her how excited we were to officially be her parents, played with her for a couple hours, and then quickly put her to bed. We promised her we'd be coming back soon to take her home! Because we were running late to meet our driver, we didn't have time for a long good bye (which was just as well, as we both would have been crying). We printed a few photos of us with Samantha for the caregivers to show her while we're apart for a month, in the hope that she doesn't forget who we are by the time we come back.

Bye bye Karaganda
Our flight home was scheduled to depart Wednesday morning, Feb. 4. But as luck would have it, Sherri came down with a nasty stomach bug the night before. Around 3 am, after a 6 hour bout of barfing (did we mention before that there's a dishwashing detergent here called "Barf?" Totally true...it's too funny to just make this stuff up), she realized she was in no condition to be getting on a plane. She couldn't keep any food or water down and was feeling too weak to walk more than a few feet. As John would later say to her, "you looked so cute...you were so pathetic." "Gee, thanks dear." We were able to reschedule our flights for the next night, which gave Sherri the needed time to recover.

Our 11 pm flight to Almaty was delayed until 1 am. On the way to the airport, we came to a section of the road that was blocked by parked semi trucks and police. Due to high winds and drifting snow, the road to the airport was closed. Our interpreter told us that this road continues on to Astana (the new capital of Kaz), but that there are no lights on the road and therefore cars often run off the road in these conditions. Our driver got out of the car and gave the police his registration explaining to them that he was transporting us to the airport and would be returning shortly. Perhaps knowing that the police were preoccupied at the blockade, he proceeded to drive extremely fast on the empty road, the rest of the way to the airport. At one point, crossing a bridge, he hit a patch of ice and the car skidded a few yards. We yelped from the back seat and thought we were going off the road! Thankfully, we made it safe and sound to the airport.

Bye bye Eric
As we waited at the gate for our flight to arrive, Sherri and John noticed a man who looked familiar. Sitting at the Efes Beer bar (the only place still open at 1 am in the airport), having a beer, was our drinking pal from The Old Windmill, Eric! Once we boarded the plane, we passed by him and said hello. He was happy to see us and was already, shall we say, "relaxed" and ready to enjoy his flight! While we didn't get to formally say das-vee-dania (phonetic spelling of "good night" in Russian) to our Karaganda buddy, he did stop by our row and asked if we needed a car in Almaty. We explained that Chicago was our final destination!:-)