Our SDA visit

Where does one start???? Very interesting day to say the least. We arrived at the SDA at 9:00 a.m. after a 20 minute walk from our apartment. We were accompanied by Luba our translator, and were met there by Vlad (our facilitator) and his "secretary". We waited quite some time before we were allowed into the office but were given a full hour to look at files. We were shown 11 files of little girls ranging in age between 4 yrs old and 8 yrs old and this took the entire hour. We have been telling everyone that we were confident that once a decision was needed on choosing a child that "one would stick out" or " we would just know". How wrong we were!!! This was gonna be a tough one! Out of the 11 there was maybe only 4 or 5 that we could say no to without having any doubt. Keep in mind when you set a file aside it isn`t just a file, it is a little kids life, so this wasn`t exactly easy. (The other Ukranian. Angel families say that you have to remind yourself that your not giving up on a child, you are letting another potential family have a chance to see that child)We narrowed it down to two children and we are going to visit a 4 yr old in the Mariupol region. We were maybe a little hesitant to visit this child at first because the picture in the file was of an infant and was for lack of a better term, not of her good side. BUT! Luba had seen this child before while at that orphanage and said that "the picture does not do her justice" and over here we have to be willing to go with our gut instincts and what other people say. Now the really good news! (tongue in cheek) We get to go on a 15 hour train ride in the wee hours of the night to get to Donetsk(sp) and hire a driver to drive one more hour to the orphanage. Dr. Yuri will be traveling with us as well as Luba, so all 4 in a 4 person berth for 15 hrs. (Dr. Yuri is a private doctor over here that checks on the condition of the child and makes us aware of any issues that he sees). I have a hunch that this "berth" isn`t a real large area, (might make the airplane seats look pretty desirable) The total cost of this trip for 4 people was 600 Gryivna. Which with the 9:1 conversion rate works out to be just less than $70.00 or approximately $ 17.00/ ticket. If your interested I believe the exchange rate has been down to around 4:1 and has really been rebounding the last several months, so this works real well for us in lowering our costs. We head out tomorrow evening after we go to the SDA for our "referral" tomorrow afternoon. We were prepared for weather like ours or even colder but when we got up this morning it was raining and about 40 degrees. They seemed to think it was icky but we sorta enjoyed it because we have been watching the temp at home on Weatherbug and that looks a little nasty. We are not sure if we will have internet in Mariupol so this may be our last post for awhile. This is our only contact with the outside world so we appreciate the comments that let us know you are thinking of us!

Observations from Gail:

1. 90% of Ukrainains wear black
2. No sunglasses
3. No beards or goatees
4. Men are shorter in stature
5. Very few fat women or men (They walk everywhere)
6. 90% of the women wear heels (Black boots with 4-5inch heels-which they walk very fast even over ice. Very graceful I might add!
7. Most of the women wear fur coats or leather coats with big fur collars. Their coats are beautiful.
8. The women wear narrow legged jeans / short skirts/or shorts with black nylons. All with boots up to their knees. Accompanied with tight fitting tops.
9. Ukrainian women are beautiful-although Craig says if it wasn't for all of their primping the American women are prettier:)
10. A cigarette in one hand and a cell phone in the other hand is very popular.
11. Independence Square is very busy during the day. (I'm wondering when do they work?)
12. Their stores are underground as well as above ground. The stores underground are very nice. Something like you would see at the mega mall. You would never know you were underground.

Well enough observation for now. All I know is when the sun comes out and if Craig puts on sunglasses, has a goatee and stands 6' 4" we will be screaming Americans.:)

My just for fun:

1. Craig is liking it here ( He wants to bring home a nanny- I told him NO!) :) Digger -Craig is still shopping for you! :)
2. I'm feeling a little out of place / some Ukrainians speak English but not many.

TaTa for now-keep the prayers going

Gail and Craig