You’re in Good Hands

In our Baby House (B.H.) there are approximately 90 children, from 2 days – 5 years old. In Samantha’s area, the 15 babies are approximately 6-11 months in age. Most of these babies seem pretty healthy and well adjusted to their environment, although a few seem to have special needs. When not sleeping in their own crib, they primarily crawl and lay around in two large communal cribs/playpens in a separate play and feeding area. Occasionally, the children get placed in a walker where they are seated, but can wheel around by moving their feet, press buttons to activate tunes and play with shapes, all in their own little car! You can tell the babies spend a lot of time on their backs because they have little-to-no hair on the back of their heads (as you can tell from Samantha’s uneven head of hair.)

While the day in the life of a baby is pretty laid back (here I go again with the puns!), the caregivers have one tough job! There are two women per shift who feed, change, and potty train ALL of these babies! In addition, there are a couple doctors and several nurses supporting the entire BH, who make the rounds administering shots, medicine, vitamins, and breathing treatments (respiratory ailments, including bronchitis, seem to be common). At any given time, at least one child is always sick. There is a highly regimented schedule followed every day. In between the necessary tasks, however, somehow the caregivers manage to find time to provide smiles and hugs to the babies. You can tell the workers truly care for these children.

Early in our visits, the caregivers watched over us making sure we dressed our child warmly enough (i.e., bundled up as if to go outside on a 50 degree day when it’s about 80 degrees inside!), played in the right area of the small room, and fed her enough. At times, we got the sense they were checking us out to determine if we were worthy parents for their child; perhaps they’re a bit attached to these children and want to have a hand in training their prospective parents. However, after a couple weeks, the caregivers now smile at us and we all communicate in a friendly manner. It always feels good when they smile at Samantha, say a few words to her in Russian, then point to us and say “mama and papa.”

We have a great deal of respect and gratitude for these women as they have been responsible for Samantha’s care since she was 5 days old! Further, when we leave without Samantha to go home for approximately one month after court while the paperwork is being processed, these caregivers will once again be her primary caregivers. While leaving Samantha will be extremely difficult, it helps knowing that she’s in good hands.

Visits with Samantha Continue

Here are a few more photos of Samantha. She continues to show more emotions every day and gets cuter and cuter as a result! She babbles (much to John's excitement, "da da" seem to be her favorite words--"da" in Russian means "yes," so mommy isn't so sure that Samantha's really saying dada specifically to address daddy, but we'll let John continue to think these words are meant for him:-) Samantha can creep on her belly, grab toys and play with them, put all sorts of things in her mouth, roll around like crazy, and stand on her feet (with assistance from mommy or daddy). Her favorite activity is "jumpy pants" where she can bounce up and down and then we lift her up in the air (this morning, she decided to spit up on mommy's face upon her decent from the sky). She also enjoys being rocked and sung to (much to John's dismay, Sherri comes up with all sorts of silly tunes which can get old after a while). Samantha is eating very well and continues to put on weight, although, she's still quite a little thing (hence our nickname for her:"Peanut." Tomorrow we will have met our 14 day bonding period (the requirement that must be met before a court date can be set).

Social Worker Visit

Procedures
We have yet to explain the procedural process (i.e., jumping through hoops) that we will have the pleasure of going through during our stay in Karaganda. Within a week after the 14 day bonding period with our child, we will attend a brief pre-court session at which a time and date will be given for our formal court appearance (typically one week after pre-court). Once we’ve attended our formal court session, we should receive the judge’s decision a couple days later. Keep in mind, ALL of these meetings and timelines are subject to change. One Belgian couple we know had to appear in formal court THREE times before receiving their final approval. After the decision has been made, we are then allowed to depart this lovely city for HOME! But wait, there’s more….after a brief reprieve at home (usually 3-4 weeks), we return to Karaganda to pick up our prized possession – Samantha. During this period at home, the Karagandan government is preparing Samantha’s passport and birth certificate, along with a few other legal documents proving that we are her legal guardians.

Surprise Visit
As a lead-in to the procedural festivities, today we visited the Social Workers at the Ministry of Education. We knew to expect this visit soon, but without any prior notice, learned this morning that our appointment was a 2pm today. We had been forewarned by other adoptive parents at the B.H., that this would most likely not be a pleasant “getting to know you” experience. After a quick prep session in the car with our interpreter though, we were pleasantly surprised at how smoothly the meeting went. It wasn’t so bad after all.

The Interrogation
The questions focused primarily on our financial situation. They wanted to know how much of our mortgage was paid, were we concerned about our jobs in this troubled economy, how much money we made, etc. The only questions about the adoption/parenting process were: 1. did we have any concerns because Samantha is not Caucasian (of course not) and 2. how do we intend to discipline her (no spankings, just time-outs). In the car, our interpreter informed us that we had “passed” the Social Worker visit! One milestone down…a few more to go!!

Food for Thought

Since we’ve spent the last few days with tummy problems, we thought this an opportune time to share with you what we’ve been eating while visiting Karaganda. While this should not serve (no pun intended) as an all inclusive list of our gastronomical experiences, it does provide an overview of our diet:

-Fried eggs with hot dog pieces cooked into them, topped with dill (dill is big around these parts and thankfully, we like it! We also didn’t mind the weenies in our eggs!)
-Blintzes with strawberry jam or sour cream – yummy!
-Borscht soup – John’s favorite
-Frozen veggies (can’t find many fresh veggies in the produce section of the markets and even if we could, we wouldn’t be able to rinse them in tap water)
-Instant noodle soup
-Pastry pockets filled with meat, potatoes, and some questionable items (perhaps the root cause of our digestive problems?)
-Chocolate (thank God!)
-Cherry juice-delicious
-Smoked gouda cheese strings (pictured above)
-Tea with milk (like the Brits, the Kazakhs take their tea with milk)
-South Beach diet snack bars (thanks to the adoptive parents who previously stayed in our apartment).
-Yogurt (mostly 7% or 5% fat content, so those leftover 100 calorie diet bars are coming in handy)
-Cow’s milk (no skim, mostly high fat)
-Bottled water

By this time you must be wondering… “Wait a minute, John and Sherri are spitting distance from Russia and they haven’t mentioned VODKA?!” Sad but true, vodka has yet to touch our lips. But because we know you all would want us to try some vodka while in Kazakhstan, we’re going to toast, with a shot of vodka, each person that posts a response on our blog. Now, there’s enticement for our friends and family to enter comments-get John and Sherri all liquored up! For my HR colleagues: this is starting to feel like one of those contests Keri and I run at work to encourage employees to attend training. Prost!

Food items available in Karaganda, but that we choose not to partake of:
-Dried fish (e.g., herring, sardines) and lots of it!
-Horsemeat-naaaaaayyyy
-Fermented mare’s milk-sold in tall bottles by old women shivering behind a table on the sidewalk (you almost want to buy some just because you feel so sorry for the little old lady…geez, what a way to make a living)
-Sushi (with the closest body of water being the Caspian Sea on the opposite side of Kaz, and knowing how long it took our DHL express mail to arrive to our doctor in Minnesota (over 1 week!) we’re not touching raw fish!)

Living Quarters

As previously mentioned, we are staying in a small one bedroom apartment. Attached are photos of our neighborhood (John stands elated in front of our building) and an interior shot of our “home away from home.” The neighborhood is a series of unattractive block apartments, many alleys with hot water pipes snaking through to feed the buildings, a school, and grocery store. Lots of areas are hidden behind decrepit, forbidding walls which make our evening walks a little spooky.

Dirty Laundry

While not the most exciting of topics, I would be remiss if I failed to mention cleaning products for my colleagues back home. So for the benefit of my Stepan friends, who are in the “bubble business,” here’s the scoop (no, I just can’t stop the puns). Stores here carry only powder laundry detergent (e.g. Tide), but there are plenty of liquid hand soaps and liquid dishwashing detergents (e.g Palmolive). Interestingly, for a market that doesn’t carry peanut butter, mac & cheese, or microwave popcorn, there seems to be a plethora of cleaning product choices just like we have in the States.

Fortunately, during our 1.5 month stay, we have a small, front loading wash machine in our bathroom, but it takes 2.5 hours to do a load of wash. You can re-read that again, but it still reads, two and a half hours. “How can a small load possibly take 2.5 hours?” I ask myself. Then I think of my mother who loves to put clothes through numerous washes and even more rinses. It’s amazing her laundry doesn’t come out as tattered rags. Mom: you’d love doing laundry here!

Now, as for drying the clothes, there’s no dryer in our apartment. And from what we can gather, no one else has a drier, either. It’s not uncommon to find laundry hanging outside someone’s window or on an outdoor line tied between a couple trees(even on sub-zero temp. days). That, I just don’t understand...how can you dry clothing when it’s -10 degrees Fahrenheit? Doesn’t wet laundry freeze? What are we missing here, folks?

Weather Report

Oh, the Weather Outside is Frightful

Our first couple weeks in Karaganda were unbelievably cold (even for John who grew up in the windy city). Average temperatures were -10 degrees F. (Today, as I write this entry, it's 0 outside, but feels like -20 F.) Imagine the Siberian desert in winter (which isn’t far from here) and you get the picture. Like Chicago in winter, most days are overcast. The way in which this town handles the snow, however, is different from back home. When there’s a heavy snow fall, a barrage of trucks appears. The snow is plowed and immediately emptied into dump trucks; then it’s hauled away (perhaps to the Siberian desert?). For all but the largest roads however, cars just make tracks and these huge grooves show the way. Imagine a nice layer cake of snow, ice, snow, ice, etc. Needless to say, we’ve seen quite a few traffic accidents.

Walking around Karaganda is not much easier. They don’t shovel sidewalks, but rather leave them to form a nice buildup of ice on which pedestrians can slip and slide. A couple times I’ve seen store owners with a whisk broom brushing off their front entranceways (as if that’s going to melt away the 5 inches of laden ice.) I have only seen 2 snow shovels since we’ve been here! There must not be any personal injury attorneys in this town, otherwise this lax behavior would not be allowed. It’s a miracle we haven’t fallen, yet. In my case, that’s because I’m constantly clinging on John’s arm. Speaking of walking, the crosswalks have countdown meters on many corners. This is helpful in knowing when you can begin your skate across the street.

The Kazakhs don’t seem to be put off by the bitter winter. Men wear the Russian-looking fur hats and almost all women are in long fur coats, with a fur hat. The ladies also parade around in high heel boots. I don’t know how they stay upright walking around in 4” stiletto heels. This must be a skill attained in charm school. John has a theory that the heels actually keep the women from slipping, as they can dig them into the ice to maintain their footing. Even if that is the case, I’m still thankful for my flat, insulated, North Face boots that I purchased just prior to leaving for this trip.

Walking In a Winter Wonderland
One of our winter wonderland outings was traversing a nearby park. This park is quite expansive and runs through the center of town. It has a lake (frozen over), ice rink, and in the summer, amusement park rides. It’s a very pretty area in the winter: with lovely birch trees, walking paths, and ice sculptures. We enjoy walking through it when it’s not 20 degrees below zero. A number of photos we’ve posted to this topic were taken in the park.

Sleigh Bells Ring, Are You Listening?
Note the close proximity of the horse and sleigh to the photographer in the photo above. I hope our readers fully appreciate the risk taken to capture this action shot! As Sherri was setting up the perfect photo of John amongst the snowy birch trees, backing up to get just the right distance…John was saying “Watch out for the horse.” “What, I can’t hear you,” said Sherri, continuing to back farther away. Luckily, I got the message just in the nick of time, as the sleigh whisked by. If nothing else, I was glad to see that the horse was used for transportation. They eat horse meat here!