The Beginning of the Long and Winding Road

Our apartment in Kazakhstan was a two bedroom on the ninth floor of the tall yellow apartments at the entrance to the old city right on the Ishim River. Those that have been there will know exactly where that is. It is within walking distance to the internet shops and the RAM grocery. The apartment was clean, but dusty as absolutely everything is dusty all the time. There is nothing completely ever clean because of the dust. The water trucks would come around the city around 7 AM or so and water all the plants and then water the streets down to help keep the dirt in the roads. BTW, the workers are always cleaning the streets, sidewalks, caring for the flowers and trees, and picking up trash. A lesson we should learn in some of our own cities.  

The apartment had no sheets or pillows on the boxspring. If you read through posts, you will notice I have mentioned "boxspring" twice now. Seriously, the "beds" were tuff and not really a mattress at all. Our coordinator (who could not speak English) eventually came back with a sheet set and towels. The phone did not really work. If you ever so slightly moved or breathed while on it, you'd lose the call. The ringer didn't work either so if the tv was on or were in another room, you couldn't hear it buzz. Once Eric was back home with Allyson, I missed many a call from my family. They would literally try for hours to get a call through. I was in tears when I found out. I missed them so much!

We headed to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for our interview and to show them our pictures of our home and family. It was fast and not a lot was even said. A few questions about what we knew about Kazakhstan, did we know who their president was, things like that. The next day we were off to the orphanage. I remember being kind of mesmerized by the city of Astana at the time. It has changed significantly since our time there. However, in 2004, it had a big city bustle on some streets and a small town feel on others. I loved seeing the kids jumping in and swimming near the small dam across town, the Communist style block apartment buildings, and the babushkas carrying their vegetables home to cook. 

The orphanage was on the outskirts of town off a dirt road. If it rained, we couldn't always get into the baby home entrance due to the mud. On one of our visits, a man offered to take us across the muddy road in his car. We were standing about 500 yards from the baby home, but the mud seemed knee deep to me (being a girl of short stature and all). We did make it over that day, but I thought for sure Eric would be pushing that guy's Lada out of the mud! The home sat next to a small three story apartment building that always had young teens hanging around outside. I saw a teenager or two with Down's Syndrome there as well. I wonder if that building is still there and wonder if those children had parents. Were they the children that had aged out of the system? 

We drove in through the gates that first day and I was literally a nervous wreck. Where was my boy? Was he watching from a window? What would we see once we entered the baby home? As we got out of the car, the four and five year old children were outside playing and came over to the curb to see who was visiting. I heard these children calling  out, "MAMA! PAPA!" trying to get our attention. I looked at Eric and he looked at me. I remember saying, "There is no way that I can do this". How can you leave with only one. The children want parents so so badly. They want you to see them, to pay attention to them. They flash their smiles, show off their abilities on the slide or swing, flirt a bit ~ all in hopes that you will choose them.