Day 6 – What a great day!

We arrived in Donetsk at about 7:20 this morning. Our driver was there to meet us as usual; they are very good about that here! We then headed towards our destination town. This area was hit very hard by an unusual snow storm earlier this year. Something like 4+ feet of snow in one storm. I was keeping up with happenings in the area and it was all over the news. Roads completely shut down. People snowed in for days. If I recall, one of the previous families was trying to get here about that time. One part of the road is still only one lane!  It has been above freezing on and off here for a week plus and even with the melt, the snow drifts on the side of the road are still 15+ feet high. Unbelievable!

Landscape and trees are very similar to home. And there are lots of small villages and fields.

It was very obvious when we had reached our destination city. This particular city is very industrial, steel and shipping as it’s on the Azov Sea. As I looked out the window on my side of the car, all you could see were steel mills as far as your eyes could go across the horizon. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such massive plants/equipment, and so many. Not even in Philadelphia...

It’s now about 9:40 a.m. Our first stop was the local inspector’s office as we needed to take our referral from the SDA from yesterday and obtain the local inspector’s referral before we could go to the orphanage. Based on what were told for process, we were expecting to go in, meet with the inspector and answer a few questions. Our coordinator went inside to see if she could get the local referral without us. And low and behold, out she came with it! Another non-event! Loving it so far! The local inspector’s office, somewhere through that front door:

Off we went to the orphanage. We were told that we would not be able to see V until later in the day as he was in school. We understood that we would meet with the orphanage director, doctor and psychologist to obtain the background information in V’s local file. And then the local inspector would come to the orphanage and speak with V and then with us. If all went well, then she would write up basically a recommendation for adoption.  There is another term for it but I have lost it...that lack of sleep thing.

The psychologist was unavailable but we were able to meet with the director and the doctor as planned. We received detailed information about V, how he came to be in the orphanage, what his medical situation is, etc. For now, I am going to keep those details within the family. This is all part of his journey and I want to respect his privacy. I don’t know yet how open he is to talking about his past. And I don’t know what he lived through as seen from his eyes. Hard to know when he doesn’t speak English and I don’t speak Russian! But we’ll get there, together, as a family, all four of us. The way God planned.

After our meeting with the director and doctor, we walked out of the office into the hallway and there was our V turning the corner to go upstairs! I gave a quick wave and he stopped dead in his tracks. He came running back down as we went into another room across the hallway. A few minutes later he came bounding in! Turns out they only had a few hours of school today so he was there. Hugs all around! We were so happy to see him and vice versa. He asked quite a few questions about Alex and then about his best friend who was adopted late last year and living in California. The orphanage director told us that V said he felt a very strong bond with Alex, V talked about him all the time and is very excited to have him as a brother. That was obvious in our discussion with V. He was also very excited when I told him we knew where his best friend is. He asked if he could call his friend as soon as he gets home. Very cute! After much more chatting (thanks to our fabulous coordinator!), we left V with the understanding that we would be returning later that afternoon to talk with the local assistant inspector and we would see him then.

We grabbed the first meal of the day then (about 1:30) at this great Greek place across the street from our new flat (more on the new flat tomorrow I think).

We returned to the orphanage as planned. V asked for a banana so we grabbed 4 bananas and a puzzle I had brought with us. We completed the puzzle and then since it was one of those “I Spy” puzzles, we looked for the items it told us to find in the picture. Still can’t find the number 5. ???  The assistant inspector was there as scheduled and she asked V if he liked us. He said he liked us very much and that he felt loved. He said he wanted to be adopted by us, he wanted us to be a family. We found out in our discussion this morning that this little guy has had some tough decisions in the last 30 days or so, unbeknownst to us until today of course. He told the director that he has dreamed of a real family. And he told the assistant inspector that we’re that family! Tears all around!

She spoke to us next and to be honest, I don’t have a clue what she asked...I just know it wasn’t very long. Another non-event!

Based on the conversations, the local assistant inspector is recommending the adoption. Our coordinator is running copies of documentation right now and the orphanage is preparing their documentation. We will go to the notary tomorrow at 9 and then our coordinator will meet with the (non-assistant this time) inspector for the written recommendation. If I understand the process correctly (help me previous families!), all of this will go back to Kiev to the SDA. If all is in order, we will be granted permission for a court date. Court will be held here in this town, not Kiev. There is a 5 day wait from granting of permission and the court date...BUMMER! Let’s get this show on the road and get this boy home! But, this is within our allotted time so this is nothing to be concerned about.

All in all, things are progressing very fast via the series of non-events and we got to spend a lot of quality time with V. What a great day!

One last item to note. Go figure. No matter where we are in the world, my lovely husband can ALWAYS find hunting and fishing ‘stuff’. Please note the picture below. OXOTA and whatever other letters are behind the tree are, yes you guessed it. Hunting! And the letters (sorry, I don’t have the right keyboard for their letters...) on the other side are, yup you guessed it again. Fishing! The red letters in the middle are the name of the shop. The pictures on the right are of a wild boar and a very large fish.  Guess where we’re going tomorrow if we have some down time...go figure...