This morning started out poorly. Sergei would not get out of bed and get dressed. I let him sleep as long as possible and then tried everything I could think of to get him going. It was not working. He seemed to have no desire to cooperate. I guess he was getting scared as it was so close to leaving everything he knew to come to America. And as we were finishing up with all the paperwork, it was becoming very real. Nastya called to let me know that she was almost there, and I told her about Sergei. She said she would try to find a place to park and come up if she had to. She spoke to Sergei and told him he had to get ready...it did not help much. He was still not moving. I could not do anything to get him dressed, he was too big for me to wrestle into clothes. We waited as Nastya got closer and when she called back again, he had started to dress. She was outside our apartment when we finally got him out the door. This episode was not a good sign for what might lie ahead. I hoped it was just nerves and that all would work out. Nastya talked to him in the car and tried to help him understand the situation. We got to the medical center in time to get their physicals done. While we were there, we met up with another mom who was adopting one of the boys they had hosted that Darren and I had met on the interview trip. He was the only black boy that we had seen at the orphanages and a black family from Georgia (I think) was adopting him. I was very happy to see him. He did not remember me at first, but as we waited together for several hours, he did remember me and Darren.
The boys checked out healthy, but needed to have a couple of immunizations done. Nastya took me to pay for them and then we went back down to wait some more. Once we got all of the paperwork back for both families, we all went to lunch together. We all had to go back to the Embassy shortly after lunch, so we stayed together for lunch and the Embassy. It was nice to have someone else to talk to and share our experiences.
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| Cool giant clock on the ground |
At lunch, Sergei was not very hungry, but he seemed to be a little more emotionally okay. After lunch we went to the Embassy and had to wait until last to get our visas. There were several other American families there with us. The other three got their paperwork quickly, while we waited. It seemed like a long time until they finally called our name. We got everything that we needed and Sergei cooperated with the signing and agreeing to all that had to be done. It was such a relief to have everything completed and know we were ready for the airport the next day.
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| Interesting fortress off the beaten path |
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| Mom in one of the monuments |
We had a little time to get some souvenir shopping done once we got back to the apartment. Sergei did not want to go, so we left him in the room to play games on the super slow internet. Yarik had some items that he was looking for, so we tried to find what he wanted. It was late in the day, so we did not have much luck as the street vendors had closed up shop. We did however, get some amazing views of the city lit up at night. It was a really nice time for the two of us. We also found the underground mall and each got a gelati to snack on. Sergei missed out on this one! We took some photos and then went back to make dinner and eat with Sergei. Tonight went much better and we did not have an early flight, so I promised them we would try to go find some souvenirs in the morning. We got as much packed as we could and I was very ready for our trip home.
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| City lights |
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