Fish Treats

Monday, 21 May

(good day, busy day, long entry!)

Up at 8:30 and after a chemically-induced full night’s sleep, we woke to no hot water. We have now learned to shower when you can…a “Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em” lesson in opportunity management. Mark had decided after a hot and dirty day at Extreme Park that he’d wait until morning to shower. He made good use of the “personal wipes” that we brought!

About 10:15, we got a call from Sveta telling us to be downstairs in ten minutes so we could go to the courthouse to meet with the local social worker to gain the local government’s approval to file for our adoption. Once we arrived, we were sat on a row of chairs that appeared to have been ripped from a crumbling movie theatre and set down in the hallway of another very old building. Not being attached to anything, they had a tendency to tilt a bit if all of us were leaning back or forward!

We were able to speak briefly with the director of social work in the hallway, but we learned that we also needed to speak with the assistant to the mayor. So we waited in the hallway for a good 20 minutes for her to be available, and then spent about 3 minutes in her office answering questions and smiling a lot.

After we finished this interview, we learned that several of the other workers in the office wanted to meet the parents that were adopting Masha. Over the years, they had gotten to know her because of some special court proceedings on her behalf, and they all seemed very happy to meet us. One woman’s eyes were filled with tears. We thanked them for everything they had done on Masha’s behalf, and then we were on the move again.

Sveta dropped us at the Internet café for a quick check of email, and then gave us a little time while she did more paperwork to walk around town before meeting back up to go to the orphanage.

At the Internet café, the morning was challenging. As is becoming our habit, we got two computers for 30 minutes…all for the whopping sum of $1. They sat us next to each other; I got the computer where the flash drive didn’t work, and Mark couldn’t log into any web-based email systems. As a result, we are now THREE days behind on the blog!!!!

After the Internet Café, we walked around town with Fred and Lisa. We visited a few shops and walked through the hidden mall…it really looks like a modern office building, but it was a five-story Mecca of the Ukrainian shopping scene. We noticed that the European clothes and other items were very reasonably priced, but the American items (particularly the sports stuff like warm-up suits and running shoes) were really expensive.

On the top floor of the mall, we found a shop that sold DVDs of American movies with Russian dubs and subtitles, and picked up a couple for Masha. We also found a toy store where we bought a Velcro catch set for the beach and Lisa and Fred bought a whistling Frisbee (guess I have to say goodbye to my “last Frisbee in Ukraine” story). Then we headed back downstairs and discovered the bookstore in the basement. They also sold movies and CDs, so we picked up a couple more movies and then headed back to meet our drivers.

By this time, we were all so hungry we could have gnawed our own arms off…the original plan was to pick the girls up at about 1:00 and get some lunch. We didn’t get to the orphanage until 2:30, and then we played Frisbee in the parking lot for another half hour while Sveta tended to some business inside the orphanage. Around 3:00, we ran out to Papa Karlos for a quick lunch with the girls since we were due back at the courthouse for a 4:00 appointment.

At the cafeteria, Masha chose a piece of cake to split with Papa, and also asked for a bag of these odd-looking dried fish things…they looked like cat treats. But they looked harmless enough, so sure. At least it wasn’t a candy bar, right?? WRONG! Being the kind child that Masha is, she offered these things to each of us at the table. Sveta started into a story about how she loves them, but her husband banishes her to another room after she’s eaten then until she’s brushed her teeth three times and eaten 5 mints. Mark sniffed one, made a face and gave it back to Masha. Lisa and Fred wouldn’t even look at them. . So what do I do? I accept one and make an attempt to EAT it. Note to self: when no other adult at the table is willing to eat something, do not eat it or at least smell it first!! When we got back to the orphanage, Masha tried to give one of these things to a stray cat. The cat walked up to it, sniffed it, and walked away. Even the cat wouldn’t eat it!!!!

After dropping the girls off and meeting briefly with the orphanage doctor, we went to the courthouse to file the application for a court date; on the way in, we realized that this is the time we need to provide the name that we are requesting to be given to Masha on her adoption paperwork….in other words, if we wanted to change her name or give her an American middle name, now’s the time! We had been spending a lot of time with name books evaluating options and narrowing our choices down to a short list that we had planned to review with Masha. Time had been short today, and we just didn’t get to that conversation.

We submitted the paperwork with her new name, and then drove back to the orphanage to talk to her about it. We printed her full name on a bright green index card so that she could keep it. We explained that Maria is a pretty common name in America, and that we kept that as her first name (note that we dropped the “y” for simplicity!). Then we explained that Americans don’t have a patronymic name (middle name as a derivative of the father’s name), so we chose an American name for her middle name: Elizabeth. So there we have it….Maria Elizabeth Niles. She approved, and when she ran to get one of her friends, we overheard them talking about her new name…it’s so cute to hear her say it!

We played Frisbee a little while longer with Masha, Khrystyna, and one of their friends, and then called it a night. We headed back to the apartment, watched another movie, and hit the sack!