Moscow- Day 4

Today is another mostly sunny day with warmer temperatures. I slept really well last night, but Chad was up half the night (he had taken a nap earlier in the day). This morning he woke up with a backache. We ate breakfast in our apartment and then went out for a brief walk to get a few pictures and to try and loosen up his back. We picked up a few meatballs at Sbarro to add to our spaghetti for dinner tonight. We have eaten mostly in our apartment so far with only one trip to Duncan Donuts and two trips to Sbarro for a slice of pizza. Unfortunately I think once we get to Siberia our food options will be very limited as we are staying in a hotel and the amount of restaurants with English menus or English-speaking staff is limited. Maybe I should get online now and look up how to pronounce several food items. I am also trying to get more acquainted with the alphabet to help in reading store signs. There are only seven letters which are the same between Russian and English. The vowel system is a bit different too. We don't have any plans for today with the exception of getting things organized in our luggage in preparation for the flight tomorrow night. We are staying in the apartment of our driver once we return to Moscow. He has been working with adoptive families from agency for many years, and his son has visited the US with families who have stayed with them in Russia. They have agreed to store one of our pieces of luggage for us so that we don't have to pay the extra baggage fees to take three bags for only two people to Siberia. We will be there for several weeks, but for the majority of that time we won't be with the boys so we really don't need that much stuff. We do have quite a bit of donations to drop off at the orphanage as well. It will be nice to be able to get rid of the donations so that we can have room to buy a few souvenirs for the boys in Siberia. We did a little window shopping in Moscow but the prices are pretty high; we are thinking things will be more affordable while in the region. Chad said today he is ready to get to the region as it will take us one step closer to being with our boys. It has been hard for me to have life slow down so much. I keep thinking I should be doing something; and feeling guilty that I am just sitting reading a book for two hours. Then, it hits me that I better enjoy this time because in a few days I will be back to my fast-paced life!

Moscow- day 3

Last night I was up again at midnight. Chad continues to sleep well. At least I had downloaded Tina Fey's autobiography to pass the time. She is wicked funny with lots of sarcasm dripping from every page. I quickly realized as I finished her book on day three of our trip that I had not brought enough to do while we wait to pick up the boys. I didn't want to pack and carry my heavy textbooks cause we were pushing it on weight in our luggage as it was. Maybe I didn't need to bring quite so many socks.... or my hair straightener.... oh well. At 4am I got up and skyped with the girls and my parents. Callie kept saying, Mommy? I would answer yes? and she would say I love you! This happened at least five times during our fifteen minute conversation. She was a bit concerned we have to get onto a SECOND airplane to go to Siberia. When I explained we had to do that to get the boys she asked if we could just fly there, get the boys, and fly right home. I told her we really wished we could but that we had to get the papers that show the boys are official a Gipson. Samantha didn't say much during the call even when I asked her open ended questions (for my CSD students this IS the way to attempt to increase topic maintenance right?). I am hoping it wasn't because she was upset but more that she didn't have much to say. After I finished the call, I crawled back into bed and finally fell into a deep sleep until about 9am. We got up, showered, and dressed as housekeeping was coming at 10 and we were set to meet the other family we are traveling with at the US Embassy at 10:30. Chad and I sat outside of the Embassy for a while, which was an interesting site for people watching. There was a long line of Russians waiting with papers in hand. I am assuming they were waiting to be let into the Embassy to request a travel visa or something. There was a separate door that was marked "US citizens" that wasn't busy at all. We thought this was a good sign since we really didn't think waiting around in a long line with the boys would be a fun exercise. We acted as "tour guides" for the other couple as they hadn't walked in our neighborhood. We went over to the old arbat area and found much going on. People were constructing outdoor patios for the restaurants. I am not sure if part of the preparations were for the celebration on Sunday. I believe there may be a parade Sunday which will be nice to see. Our driver offered to take us on a tour tomorrow with the other family but Chad and I decided to wait until we returned with the boys as we would like for them to be able to see such important landmarks in their native country. I am excited to get pictures of them in Red Square. We found an open air market with lots of fresh produce, vegetables, and breads too. We bought a couple of potatoes for our dinner and some more fresh bread. Tonight we are cooking baked pork chops with baked potatoes to make us feel at home. Luckily the internet has been working (it wasn't the first few hours we had arrived) and there are a few channels that are English speaking; thank God for the Discovery Channel! I just got back from a little outing by myself. Mom, don't get too excited I only went a half block away. Anyhow, I wanted to go down to the bookstore we had visited earlier today. I found a decent English fiction books and bought two by an author I have enjoyed in the past. The prices weren't too bad, but definitely not Walmart! They had a book discount card program like Barnes and Noble they wanted me to join; I confidently said "nyet" while shaking my head, signed my receipt and placed my purchases in my book bag. Everywhere I go I try to not stick out as an American but Chad kinda sticks out. First off, he is taller than most Russians. Secondly, he usually wears an Iowa Hawkeyes shirt or some other tshirt with writing on it. Don't get me wrong, some younger Russians have clothing from Abercrombie and such but it isn't the same. The kid sitting next to us at Sbarro (yep, $1 slices of cheese pizza again) had a Megadeath tshirt on. Apparently death metal is popular here. Iron Maiden's huge plane was here during our first trip in Kemerovo. Overall, American popular music is significant here as we hear it coming from passing cars. There are lots of Russians who drive Toyotas and Fords. Although I haven't seen any Russian dometic cars, our driver said there are several models that are made (then he stated they don't run very well : ). So, not much going on today or tomorrow just more relaxing and reading my books. Oh, and doing some work for school as well; I don't think I will have much time once we have the boys! More tomorrow...

Moscow- Day 2

Preevyet from Moscow! Today was another long day but we completed important tasks. We both slept pretty well last night and seem to have adjusted fairly well to the time change. This morning Chad was up early (I had been up in the middle of the night) and I laid in bed for a while sneaking in a little more sleep. We got up and dressed around 8am and went over to Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. We walked around a bit and found a small market at which we purchased eggs (yaitso), milk (malako), hleb (bread) and jam (jem). We were proud of ourselves that we could find the market in the first place and then accomplish what we had set out to do. The items we purchased were about $20 US dollars. Thus, groceries are expensive here too. We then came back home and I showered before our medical visit. After hanging out in our apartment for a while (and eating some Easy Mac for lunch) our driver picked us up to head back to the US Medical clinic for our 8 doctor medical visit. Traffic wasn't as bad today as yesterday (it wasn't rush hour). We picked up the other couple on our way. Our appointment was at 3pm. We didn't see the first doctor until after 4pm. Then it was five minutes with one doctor, wait twenty minutes, five minutes with another doctor, etc. I had heard that the psychologist may ask all kinds of crazy questions and that they will look very closely at your skin to see if you have cancer. We found the overall process to be long (4 1/2 hours) but not too painful. I don' think the doctors had read our medicals that had been completed by our physician here in the US. The dermatologist told me I had "nice skin". I am not sure exactly what that meant but she had reddish hair and freckles so I think she felt we had a bond of sisterhood. One of the doctors had fishnet stockings and stiletto heels with Barbie-doll like hair and features; she looked as if she was still in medical school. The last doctor we saw was the narcologist (doctor specializing in addition to narcotics/alcohol/etc.) I found it to be amusing that she smelled as if she had just crawled out of an ashtray. An addiction specialist with an addiction... hmm. The neurologist asked us where we were from, and when I replied Illinois in the United States he responded with "I am from here". Then when he asked about our occupations, he blushed a bit and apologized as he felt the quality of his English was poor (he actually did a nice job but I didn't mind feeling superior in the presence of a MD). In the end, we got the paper that showed each physician approved us as being healthy enough to adopt our little Siberian boys. And as a door prize, we got to walk out with the actual chest xrays they took. What? We only had to spend $1600 and we got our chest xrays too? Amazing! After our medical visit we stopped by at the larger supermarket with our driver and bought a few more items for the meals during the rest of this part of our stay (pork chops, peanut butter, butter, bacon, sausage, pasta noodles, marinara sauce, chips, pepper, frozen french fries and a bag of M&Ms) Total bill... $85. We came home and made breakfast for dinner as we were tired and hungry. Tomorrow night we will have fine dining on pork chops. Saturday we are meeting the other couple to walk and do more sightseeing. We are planning to visit a Russian bookstore close by as I would like to buy a traditional Russian storybook for the boys. Sunday we fly out of Moscow at 10:30 pm for an overnight flight to Kemerovo (it lands at 5am). That same day we will climb into the van for the three hour trip to the orphanage and see the boys. More to come....

In Moscow- day one

We arrived in Moscow tired, but no worse for the wear. Luckily our driver was waiting for us at the airport and we were on our way fairly quickly. We were headed directly to the American Medical Clinic to have our blood drawn to prepare for our 8 Doctor Medical visit tomorrow. Yes, I said EIGHT doctors. Once there we were joined by the family that traveled with us on our first trip. Our drive to the clinic from the airport was about an hour, but theirs had been three. YUCK. Travel is crazy here in Moscow; bumper to bumper. Unlike in Chicago or NYC during rush hour, in Moscow drivers don't signal and regularly change lanes. After having our blood drawn (which was an event in itself... ask me sometime) we had to wait for our chest x-rays. It seemed more like a mammogram to me, as I had to strip down to the waist. It will be interesting to see if we have to get completely naked tomorrow for our medicals. I actually shaved my legs just in case. We arrived to our apartment on New Arbat street at about 6pm Moscow time. We unpacked a little and then ran out to do some quick sightseeing as we tried to find a market. We plan on cooking in our apartment as much as possible to save money. I had packed some cereal and Kraft Easy Mac. We walked quite a while on New Arbat street and an adjacent side street. We found out the main thoroughfare outside our apartment used to be lined with casinos. The remnants of the decorations are still apparent. The government banned all casinos several years ago and higher end shopping took the vacant spots. There were quite a lot of people out strolling (the weather was beautiful in the upper 60s) and taking in the various vendors and street musicians. We found a Sbarro (the same one Kathy told us about) and both ate a slice of pizza (each slice was just over $1). On our walk home we found a vendor that sold water and pop and purchased them. We were disappointed we couldn't find one of the larger supermarkets we frequently saw during our drives to and from the clinic. Tomorrow we plan to venture out again in the morning to try and find a market and get a donut from Dunkin Donuts across the street. Our apartment is small but very clean and comfortable. We have an excellent view in two different directions. I am glad that the girls aren't with us and we don't have the boys yet; the windows open wide with no screens and we are on the 19th floor! I have taken several pictures during our walks and posted one of the Hard Rock Cafe. We found a Cinnabon, Subway, and McDonalds last night as well. My goal is to try and post something daily, we will see if it happens once we get the boys! Feel free to leave comments!