Orphanage Day ~ Day 12

We didn’t do much this morning. There really isn’t a lot to go and see that is walking distance from where we are that we haven’t already done. We are trying to save money and it feels like walking out of our apartment is just money spent! It makes staying in and doing puzzles, or reading, or watching movies much more appealing. I have a feeling that a lot of our mornings will be this way!
We were picked up by our driver with the Cooks to take us to the orphanage in the afternoon. It is so nice to have the option of sharing cars to share the cost. Plus we get to visit with them. The driver we had today was very fast! It really feels like being on a roller coaster when you are riding in the back of those cars. They really have very different driving rules. They are all very assertive drivers. I would have a big problem driving here. I have to remember not to watch out of the windows. It’s pretty terrifying.

Someone ran to get Vika when we arrived and she took us upstairs to the common room again. She just sat there and didn’t really seem like she wanted to talk or to do much of anything. She seemed excited when we came at least! I forgot Uno, (thank heavens) so we had to find a new game to play. That turned out to be great. We taught her a few card games and when those got boring she taught us her favorite Russian card games. It was a lot of fun. We learned a game called ‘fool’ and then a different version to start ‘fool’ was called ‘9’s’. She also taught us a game called ‘swine’. She thought it was very funny after we had started to play that a rule she had forgotten to mention at the beginning was that the looser has to ‘oink’ like a pig one time for each card they are holding in their hands when the game ends. She didn’t enforce that rule thank goodness as I was the looser of that game! It was a fun afternoon. She likes playing games and that is great. She’ll fit right in at our house!

We asked her questions and she would answer us, but it felt more like interviewing her than visiting. I asked her to take me to her room so that I could take a picture of her with her bed and she thought I had lost my mind. She thought that was such a weird thing to want. She was so embarrassed and annoyed that I actually made her do it.

I told her that I really want to at least take her picture with all of her friends while we have a chance. She just kept saying that she doesn’t like pictures. Finally I think she understood when I told her that someday she may want to see her friends again when she is in America and having pictures of them may be the only way. She was more cooperative for at least one picture. We’ll work on it.

Tomorrow we are attending a birthday party for Nikita (Taylor). That should be a lot of fun. We are leaving the orphanage again if we get permission in time. That should be a lot of fun. When we came home we went to the restaurant we have eaten at every day since arriving here. Spencer was so mad we had to go there… The problem is that it is good and it is very cheap! Plus, it’s the closest place to us and they have an English menu. It’s the obvious choice! We went shopping in the mall and found a game store. We bought 4 Russian board games for 82, gryvnia. The conversion is about 8 times U.S. dollars. Divide all gryvnia purchases by 8! Super cheap. The American games are much more expensive than we could buy them at home. That’s why we’ll wait on those. The quality of the Russian games we bought is bad, but they’ll work for our next visits. Something to do is very important especially when you have a daughter you are trying to entertain for hours and hours that has no opinion of what to do! We’re getting smarter though, planning ahead and coming with options!
The grocery store in the mall was a great find. There is so much more there than we had anticipated having available after grocery shopping in Kyiv! For those who are coming later though, the things I wish I had in our apartment for ‘quick fix meals’ are mac’n cheese, rice-a-roni, spaghetti sauce mixes, pancake mix, or things that are boxed dinners to make in a hurry with minimal ingredients to buy. They would really help me out when it comes to thinking of what to make for dinner especially when we have had sandwiches every day.
This experience is definitely life changing. I am trying to soak it all up and praying for everything to burn into my memory to keep forever. It is very stressful and very anxiety filled, but such an amazing time. We don’t have the unreasonable expectation that this sweet 16 year old girl will immediately cling to us and love us like the parents she’s never known, but we will take things one day at a time and we know that that will come. Getting her home will be the best thing for all of us. We want to enjoy our time here and let her have time to say goodbye to her brother and friends, but getting home as fast as we can is the goal! I’m hoping our next post will have big news of a court date!