Sunday, March 20, 2011

Our first Sunday in Kyiv.  Cloudy and colder today (30's).  Igor called and sounded really sick.  Said he wouldn't be goin' to orphanage which meant, we didn't have a ride.  So, I thought let's have a family adventure.  We'll take the Metro (subway) & menuschcas (Sp?...little yellow buses). to get to the orphanage. I asked Igor for instruction.  He wanted to show us the first time but I was determined to go today. He gave me instructions. At the end of our call, he said he'd get Sergei to pick us up at the Metro stop near the orphanage.  That works! 

With limited Russian & a couple kind souls we were headed in the right direction and counted the # of stops (everything is in Cyrillic spelling...not pheonetic like Google translator...go figure  =)'  30 minutes/7 stops later on a "screammin'" (fast & loud) train, wella...we're there! It was great to see Sasha.  It'd been 2 days.  Kids we're havin' a special tutor time while we as family (4 of us) went downstairs.  There was knitting, Didj and sports...yes, I'm still working on my knitting.  The boys wanted to wrestle...but not on a wood floor so we played futbol...boys against Poppi. 

We met a delightful woman Anna. She was a cook and housekeeper.  Full of life and laughter.  She really enjoyed our company as we did hers.  We were given tea and we gave her (American) cookies, snacks.  Lucas was really excited to be at the orphanage and especially wanted to give out the large suitcase of gifts  and candy ( as recommended we bring by our agency)to the children. Jeanne said it best that this was the best time to do it with just us and the children on a quiet Sunday (vs. a work day w/ all staff nearby).  When the tutor time was over, the children came downstairs...Lucas opened the suitcase and WOW! was the first expression we heard with big smiles and wide-open eyes. Lucas is so generous. Jeanne and I mainly assisted while he handed out gifts making sure everyone got the right kinds and amounts.  Glow sticks, bubbles, silly bands, barrets, jump ropes, coloring books, hot wheels, cool stickers and candy.  The candy was devoured and it was fascinating to watch the trading and negotiating.  One younger boy ended up with about a 20 glow sticks around his wrists and forearms after trading cars and silly bands.

The children all played with their toys and some sat very close to us pointing to words in a coloring book, or to colors of their toys or counting of them always in English...a way they wanted to further bond with us as well as show how well they're learning.  It touched our hearts. 

Anna then called the children into the kitchen for their afternoon snack...wonderful bread and jelly with chai.  We all sat at the 2 tables together family style.  The children kept giving us a piece of their candy or more bread or chai. Afterwards, two of the smallest girls and one boy refused to let us carry our backpacks and suitcase upstairs...they did.  Another way of saying "thank you." We are humbled and give all glory to the Lord.
It was time to go. Fours hours had past with more than half of them spent as a family. It was a great Sunday and we thank the Lord for ordering our steps in such a wonderful way.