Unlike last time, I was able to snap some video and picture of the orphanage grounds. I think the cold weather made the cranky guard care a little less about what we were doing. Even with the ability to snap photos, there wasn't much to take.
Here's a picture of the orphanage. We have seen less of the orphanage than we did at Jason's in Vidnoe, but this one seems bigger in terms of size, number of workers, and number of children.
This is the sign by the front door.
This is the view from the front door, looking to the right. We can definitely see that it has snowed since the first visit. You can see a playground and to the far right, an apartment building. This shot reminded me of some we took during our first visit to Vidnoe.
And this is the view to the left. Anton's swank ride is beyond the gates and out of view.
Once we got inside, we found we were not the only couples visiting children. A Russian woman was visiting a boy who was two years old. There were two couples from France. One was adopting a boy a month older than Jason Alexei and the other a boy who was about a month younger than Grace.Grace was sleeping when we arrived, so they needed a little time to wake her and dress her. There is no common playroom at this orphanage so the French couples, the Russian, us, and our translators were all in the hallway. It made for quite a scene.
To further complicate the situation, Russian TV was visiting the orphanage. They were producing a segment on Russian adoption and were interviewing Victor, the head doctor of the facility. They began to set up in the hallway just when you know who was brought to us.
Grace was walked out wearing a nice red dress. She looked like she was getting ready for Christmas. Her gross motor is certainly better than Jason Alexei's at the same age, being able to walk on her own.
Once she was handed to Wendy, well, the crying began. Oh my. We may have a Russian opera singer on our hands. Grace was not happy to leave her caregiver. She can really stick out her bottom lip when she is about to bust open a good cry.
The looks on the French couples were priceless. The total look of "what are you doing to this poor girl??" was pretty obvious. However, she was scared and deserved to let the world know. I would scream, too. The fact she cried like that is a very good thing, in a counterintuitive way. It is better to see a reaction, even negative, than no reaction.
Of course who is down the hallway during this murderous screaming session? Russian TV. I could just see them come over to film the "rich ugly Americans" who had come to steal this scared girl away from her country. Fortunately, that did not happen.
Instead our translator Tatiana stepped in and sang a Russian lullaby that calmed Grace down. At that point, a caregiver came to dress her for a roadtrip. Yup! We got to take Grace on a roadtrip to get her passport photo taken. The French couple's translator added some sage wisdom with a comment, "She will be difficult to photograph." Sister, do we know children who won't photograph well for the passport photo. Jason Alexei wrote the book on that.
Grace screamed more when she got changed, she screamed more when she was given back to Wendy, she screamed more when we walked outside, she screamed more when we got in the car...Getting the idea here?
Fortunately, we got her calmed down enough to visit the photograph shop. Or was it a flower shop? Or was it a toilet shop? Or was it a photograph shop? I needed to take a picture of the shop to really convey what it looked like. It was quite a hodgepodge of stuff.
Amazingly, the photographer took four quick pictures and all four turned out great. Any of them would work for a passport photo. The one we picked is actually a decent picture.
With that we were sent back to the car to wait for the photos to be printed. It was at this point that we got to spend some time with just the three of us and Anton, who respected our privacy and didn't say much. He does speak English, which is a first for a driver on our Russian trips.
Grace began to lighten up a little bit, but still wasn't happy. It might have had something to do with the fact she looked like the Michelin man with all her clothes and snowsuit.
Once we got back, the TV crew was gone, the French couples were gone, and the Russian lady was the only one left in the hallway.
Grace screamed a little more when we took off the snowsuit. She had a sweater that the neck was too small for her head, so putting that on and taking it off were hard and she didn't like that.
Once it was just the three of us, we got her calmed down. The hallway of the orphanage is lined with plants and in the middle is a bird cage. Grace loved the bird. After a rough start we really had a good visit. She loved whacking at the leaves of a palm tree and playing with a balloon left behind by one of the French couples. The French couples eventually walked by and by then could tell we were not the child abusers we initially appeared to be. One of the women even said, "The same thing happened to us when we met our son." Thanks, now you tell us.
Here's the birdcage and bird who helped entertain our daughter. We never got his name Ptetsi is the Russian word for bird. He, she, or it needs a better name than that.
After a couple hours it was time for Grace's nap. Wendy and I felt vindicated when Grace screamed when the caregiver came. I think we had managed to win her over in those couple hours. We will see her soon and then no one will take her from us.
Tomorrow we have court sometime between 2:00 and 4:00. Tatiana has made much more of a big deal about pictures than Violetta did. It was beginning to annoy me. Yes, we have pictures. Yes, I will have them at court tomorrow. Etc, etc.
One controversial subject, in my opinion, came up today. Tatitana made a big deal about the number of visits we have had with Grace. The fact we only got two in on our first trip was frowned upon. Well it was Sonya and the others who told us to leave early. It seems that they want us to "embellish" the number of visits. We are testifying in court tomorrow, people!
The Russian system continually attempts to complicate the process for international couples. I think this issue of the number of visits may be the next thing that will be done to decrease the numbers of international adoptions in Russia. There has been a large increase in the number of Russian families who are adopting. Due to their proximity to the children, they are able to visit with the children numerous times. The soon to be father of the boy we saw in the hallway today had already visited the child ten times. By contrast, we will have only seen Grace three times.
Now Tatiana is wanting us to fudge the number of times we have visited. I suspect that is because in comparison to the Russian families, we just are not getting many visits in with the children.
Am I making a mountain of a molehill? I hope so, but it would not suprise me to hear in the next year that the number of visits required by international adoptees will be increased to make the number of visits more in line with the Russian families. That would certainly knock people like Wendy and I out of the ball game.
Once we were done, we rode back to the apartment. This strange yellow-orange blob in the sky was quite a surprise. The Russian sun is not invisible, but is certainly scarce this time of year.
After a short visit to the office, we drove back to the apartment. The bridge over the Moscow river by the Russian White House and the Hotel Ukraina was looking ready for Christmas. I wasn't able to get a good picture of the New Year's Trees at the end of the bridge but here is one that was closer to our apartment.
The day ended with the two of us settling down to a simple dinner in the apartment. To our horror, there was no hot water in the apartment! I made a call to our local apartment manager. Within 45 minutes there was a knock on the door. A man came in, quickly set the pilot, and that was that. There are no matches in the apartment so we had no way of setting it even if I had bothered to look for it (which I did not). I am impressed with the level of service we get from Peace Travel, or is GoToRussia.com?, or is it Intel Service? Whoever is ultimately behind the scenes is doing a good job. I guess that is what the Russians thought yesterday during the elections?
That is all for today. I'll post tomorrow whenever we get back from court. I think we will go out and celebrate somewhere afterward. Maybe in honor of our past Russian glories, we will visit the Georgian Restaurant on "pretty stinky street" and ask for Bok-top to wait on us...That is an inside joke from last year.
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