Happy Thanksgiving Day to everyone! I hope everyone is eating lots of turkey and dressing for us. As you can see above we have pictures of Valiry, the 3 1/2 year old boy, at the orphanage in Kharkiv. We left this morning at 3:00 am and after 6 hours and 4 million bumps, we arrived in Kharkiv (please don't ask Rob about the bathroom on the way unless you like hearing about small concrete buildings with holes in the middle of the floor). We promise you that Kharkiv is not the tourist center of Ukraine - the city is very dirty. Nothing is easy - we first had to go see the Inspector (regional social worker) to get permission to go to the orphanage.
Once at the orphanage (which felt like we were going through a war zone to get there), we spent time with the director finding out about Valiry's mother and his medical history. As you can see, he is a cute, adorable little boy - he is on the small side especially since we can't help but compare him to Zachary. When we first met, he ran up to Rob pointing to the people and things he recognized in the room. We very quickly noticed how intelligent he was. We gave him an Elmo telephone toy and he was so excited. We spent about 30 minutes with him before they had to take him away for lunch and a nap. When we went back about 4:30 this afternoon, his caretake said that he would not put the Elmo telephone down and actually fell asleep with it.
We are still tentative about the genetic diagnosis on him and have an appointment to meet with the genetic doctor that diagnosed Valiry on Monday. We are also trying to get information back to the doctor in the states to see what she says. Although Valiry looks like a very healthy, intelligent boy, we just want to make sure that there are no major issues that could tremendously affect our family.
We also included a picture of Luda, our translator. She has been a great help in trying to figure out the adoption process here in the Ukraine.
We will probably not have much to post before Monday but will send more pictures since we will be visiting Valiry through the weekend.
Rob and Lisa
2 comments:
Good luck. Valiry is very cute. Looks vibrant, alert and happy. Kahrkiv sounds a lot like Swansea. Your trip there sounds like our trip to the first Outback bowl on that bus, except I'm sure the concrete building was bigger than the stall on the bus. Additionally, I'm sure Corona bottles were not rolling around on the floor under your feet. Take care guys. See you soon.
Craig and Cindy
You know - before you had Zach and I told the two of you that you should travel ... well, I had something a little different in mind. You are so brave - even in the midst of all the uncertainly surrounding this.
I'm giving you all my support from SC ... until Sat. at 7pm. Then it switches to the Gamecocks!!
Lynn Shirley
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