Early Birthday Celebration for Victoria

(L to R: Dave, Kathie, Vika, Erin, Gary, Beverly, Nicky, Elliott, & Oles the facilitator)



We spent Friday climbing stairs at the hotel as the power was out from 8-4. Evidently this was a city shut down for some reason. We even spied a generator running outside a local shop so they were prepared. Being on the 11th floor of the hotel has given us a wonderful view of the Sea of Azov and of a lighthouse on a hill beside which sits the orphanage. On Friday, by the 2nd trip up the stairs, we might have considered trading the view. It did give us some exercise after all the great food we are eating and thankful for the small dark elevator when it’s working.

Our taxi driver, Vova has been wonderful and at his suggestion we are now sending the 4 children in the taxi each way instead of paying round trip. Elliot who turns 16 tomorrow is very responsible and they all seem to have the skills to get around town on their own. Actually, we have told Erin what we need and she either translates when Vova picks us up or she calls him for us. She has also helped us shop and order our meals.

We were invited to lunch with the director of the orphanage on Saturday and enjoyed a wonderful meal. Afterward she gave us a tour of the classrooms and shared with us areas she would like to get help improving. We saw the rooms were very clean and orderly yet sparse in their content. There is an Internet room that one prior family who adopted has kept running although due to some boys getting in without permission and using all the minutes up for the month, the Internet is only used under supervision. Other concerns were broken windows, a leaky roof and mold in the auditorium, lack of chalkboards that were usable and of course the toilets. (Holes in the ground with footmarks on which to stand) We also discussed things that could be done to help with the English class such as sending games to help teach facts about the US and English as well as other teaching aides. We promised to get the word to others and to see what we could each do to help. The donation that we gave with the help of our friends will be used to improve the medical area. They will take a storage area and open it up into the medical area and use it to give the children treatments that build up their immunities.

Today we celebrated Victoria’s 13th birthday early (December 16th). We surprised her with a cake and gifts at the café during our afternoon meal. Later the children were treated to a movie with Oles. We think it was an American movie, which most are. It will be funny for them to hear the real actor’s voices when they come to the states instead of the dubbed Russian ones.

Victor returns tomorrow after an all night bus ride from Kiev. We will be meeting at 7:30 am and then off and running to get the birth certificate and passport completed and on our way to Kiev if everything goes well by Wednesday. We have an appointment with the American Embassy on Thursday so the schedule might make it hard for us to blog. Gary also noticed today that all his emails where gone off the Cox server. Might be that someone at home opened up his Outlook and downloaded it by mistake or something is going on with the Cox system. Who knows? So once again, if you sent an email recently (03-05 Nov) and didn’t get a response from him please send it again. Thanks.

We covet your continued prayers through the days that follow and we once again give thanks for the Lords protection and care through this remarkable experience. (Erin has faith. Her suitcase has been packed for the last two days!)