Diddles in Ukraine :: Sept 28, 2006

[] Diddles in Ukraine Friday | September 29, 2006 Sept 28, 2006 Sept 28, 2006 – Thursday Up by 0730 this morning. Breakfast consisted of scrambled farm (brown) eggs and bread with water and a banana. It was very good. . There is plenty of hot water in this apartment. Nadine has a little concern because the water has a brown tint to it. The hot water for the shower was very nice. The towel is about the size of a dishcloth back home. Maybe we will be able to go out and buy one today. Sumy is a farming city with about 400,000 people. There is no emission inspection, so as you can expect there is a lot of vehicle exhaust. The population does a lot of walking. A lot of bike riding. The people are generally thin. The weather is very nice for an autumn day; The temperature feels like it starts out in the upper 50’s in the morning, and warms up to the high 60’s or low 70’s. Although we left before the leaves turned in the valley back home, we are able to see the changing of the leaves here. Our apartment is on the 7 th floor, facing the main street of Sumy. The main street which has three lanes of traffic going each direction is aligned with two rows of trees, the appear to be chestnut trees. Our lawyer, facilitator and friend, Vladimir took off early today to process legal paperwork. At 1030, he had not returned so we caught a taxi to the boarding school. The taxi was 15 Ukrainian dollars (about 3 US dollars to our destination which was 25 minutes away. We arrived just as the children from 8 different boarding schools (orphanages) where lining up for opening activity for the sports day event. We left the property of the boarding school, went through a back alley to a neighbor park. As we entered the park, an airborne soccer ball was heading my way. With a video camera in one hand, and a case in the other hand, I attempted to give the ball a kick while it was airborne. I was unsuccessful and made the local boys playing soccer laugh. Once the ball was on the ground, I kicked the ball back to the players. We entered a small grove of trees wherein we found the starting and ending points of the race. I am not sure the distance of the run, but it was close to a Ѕ mile. The race started with the youngest children. They ran a player from each school (total of 8) down a path that maybe two could walk along. There were a total of 5-6 races. We were glad to be there to see Zhenya run. He pushed and gave all he had. All the children gave their all to run the race. They did not give any excuse, they were not lazy, they went out to compete, and they did well. Some collapsed at the end, but the school nurse was on hand to assist. I only wished there were water or refreshments at the end of the race for them. In Zhenya’s race, against the 8 he competed with, he came in 2 nd . Overall in his category, he was 4 th . After the competition, we then returned to the boarding school. I went to purchase water and snacks at the corner store. At 1400L there was a presentation of awards to the top 3 runners of each category. The 4 th placement of each team received a certificate. Sumy Boarding School received overall 2 nd place. We spent the afternoon, sitting around the clean courtyard with the children. The children appears to be happy with the little they have, which was each other. They would ask me to repeat words, and I attempted, and the children would laugh at my pronunciation. Overall, the kids appear to be happy, they do mention, that they wish they had a family and a home. During the lunch hour there was a surprised visit by the mother and grandmother of Ruslan. This took us by surprised because we were told there were no parental rights. The mother came bearing gifts that she could afford, ie 1 apple, 1 juice, and 1 candy bar. It was sad. But in talking with the facilitator and psychiatrist, we are not to worry. The state government found Ruslan in a bad stage of neglect, and after a second warning, the courts found she continued to neglect the child, not feeding, bathing or clothing the child. The family had severe alcoholic problems. The mother could not nor wanted to provide for the child and would not do what was necessary for state assistance. Their water, gas and electricity were disconnected and they were living in filth. Our intentions were not to disrupt a family but to provide love; care and help were we could. We shall see what happens. The boys at the boarding school would come up an offer us apples from the nearby orchard. They are still very bitter with a lot of worm holes. However, they feel blessed to have an orchard on the property. We then went up to the dormitory in the mid afternoon to distribute the tokens of love sent by the hosted families. We passed by Zhenya’s bedroom. The room was small with two twin beds and a wall closet for clothes. I sat on the bed, and the weak springs caused the then foam pad that is used as a mattress to sink to the floor. However, the bedrooms had order. We were taking into an upper common living area. There all the children eagerly awaited news from their families. We are honored to represent the hosted families and to bring so much happiness to the children. There was a lot of joy shone in the faces of each children, then I could also see their longing to be with their families. The children were very happy to receive the gifts and send their love back to the hosted and prospective adoptive families. Some of the children asked if the families still love them and want to adopt them. The answer was a loud “YES” We explained that the paperwork process at times is very slow! We could see the yearning in their eyes that they desperately want a family. I think, seeing us again, is relighting a candle of hope for them. I hope so. Just being with them in their humble environment and feeling of their love, warmth and joyful spirit is more reward then I deserve. We departed the boarding school around 1630L. We went to the mayor’s office in search of the final signature. We were unsuccessful. The mayor was in another town dedicating a new boarding school. Due to this, our hopes of cutting our trip 7 days off our stay has been crushed. The courts here receive documents on Tuesday and Thursday. Since the document was not signed today, the earliest will be next Tuesday.(the 3 rd of October) Our lawyer has requested a court date of next Friday. However the court law requires 5 days before court to process the documents. Here are the two daily scenario based on the 10 day legislative requirement. Submit for Court Date 28 September 3 October 5 business day window 5 October 9 October Court Date 6 October 10 October Waiting over 21 October 24October Outprocess Boarding School 22 October 25 October Embassy 23 October 26 October 3 working days 25 October 30 October As you can see, the schedule will be very tight, since we missed the mayor’s signature. After leaving the municipal building we stopped at the internet cafй. We were on for 20 minutes and the cost was 2 Ukrainian dollars (40 cents). It is nice to be able to stay in touch. Not sure if we will get there everyday, since the internet is about a 20 minute walk from our apartment. Our apartment is costing us 48.00 per night here in Sumy. It has a Kitchen, 2 bedrooms and a living room. It came with an automatic washing machine. Yeah! We stopped at the open market and purchased food for dinner tonight. We purchased potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, red bell peppers, ground pepper, flour cucumbers and cauliflower. The vegetables could have been pulled from the ground today. We purchased raised garlic biscuits. We also purchased a kitchen knife and a drinking cup. Vladimir purchased some pork. We returned to the apartments and attempted a stew. It turned out very delicious and good! Nadine is having minor back problems tonight. Will work on the massage skills. Enough rambling.. It was a good day and I hope there was some useful information within this blog somewhere for someone. Posted by at 12:36 in | Link | Comments (0) Comments Write a comment Name: Email: Url: Comment: Remember info? Search My Advertisement Categories Archives October - 2006 September - 2006 Syndication RSS Atom Albums Kiev Sumy Ukraine Part 2 Sumy, Ukraine Random Blog