Day 18

Beauties and the Beast

Bilinnis (crepes) for breakfast.

Found out we are not at the mercy of the whim of the cook but could actually request pancakes, eggs, oatmeal, or breadcrumb concoction.

Getting Nastia’s cold. Throat feels ‘fuzzy.’ Glad I brought drugs and tissues.

After breakfast, we wanted to pay for several nights of hotel stay. Let’s take that new visa out for a test drive. The clerk swiped the card. Several times. Canceled transaction several times. Called someone. Ran the card once for each day. It took a good bit of time but our persistence paid off. You must be firm with these young cards.

Off to the notary! Olga told us yesterday that this notary needed to be convinced to take our case. She didn’t want to mess with the extra paperwork international adoptions require. At times I noticed she looked unsure of what she was doing. That done, we took a cab back to the hotel. Olga needed to stop at the girls’ school, Tanya’s trade school, then somewhere else. We could just veg at the hotel.

We had lunch and I napped. Then we attempted doing some laundry in the little sink in the bathroom. We decided that we’ll have to send out to have pants and shirts done, too big for our ‘washer.’ The bungees, clothes pins and universal sink stopper are finally getting a workout. I washed a few things in the sink and then handed them to Rolan to rinse in the shower. It’s kind of hard to get all the soap out. We’ll see.

Went up to get the girls at 2 but it’s an awkward time. Everyone is moving around. Nastia was still messing around at school and Sasha was in line for snack time. Kids turn and look and say, “Good morning,” even if its afternoon, or “Hello.” It must be nice to finally use the English you are learning in class.

Whisked our girls away. The sun is out. It’s not so cold. We will meet Tanya at the inevitable pizza place and then catch a cab for the hair dresser. I had my ever tasty Greek salad. The girls had desserts. Chomping at the bit, we left early.

I’m sure we are experiencing the girl’s first professional cut.
There was one hairdresser on duty. Tanya was first. The hair cutter took half an hour. She gave Tanya quite the jazzy do. Then Sasha, who just wanted a little cleaning up of the bangs and ends. By then Anya had arrived. Curls were requested. At first I thought Sasha wanted a perm. No, no, just a curling iron. Oh, sure! Then my turn. The beautician was very gentle with my fine hair. She took her time to do a good job. She blow dried it somewhat straight. A funny contrast to Sasha’s head of curls. I started to worry about the price. All of us took the hairdresser 2 hours but it only cost a total of $20! “I’m moving to Ukraine!” I told Anya.

Olga called. She was on her way back to Kiev. She wanted to let us know, the judge set a date. Wednesday the 11th at 2pm! Finally. Ro was bummed. He wanted Monday. After the court date there is a 10 day waiting period to allow long lost relatives one final opportunity to step forward and claim their young relatives. Because our court date is on Wednesday, we add an additional day or two because the end of the 10 day wait falls on a weekend. It delays the process a little bit but it isn’t a disaster. The waiting continues with a concrete goal.

Very cold this evening.

Hotel had power outages in the morning. Work is being done on the entrance, which is in the back, for tourist season. Rustic wood handrails. Due to the weather, the front tiled brick area is a sheet of ice. There must not be lawsuits for this kind of thing. Yet.

We saw another devastatingly cute little girl at the orphanage. Maybe 6 years old. Exactly the kind of child that got us into this story.