Trip 2 Memories, Cont'd

One other nice thing about this trip was meeting other adopting families, and even a couple who was there for his work (in mining). That also made such a difference in our experience. We had people to eat dinner with, joke with, and compare stories. One of the couples was Julie and Tim, adopting a 4 yr old boy and a 2 yr old girl, and they had the same court date we did. The night before court, Jim and I confessed how worried we were about court after our translator, Lena, told us again that the judge would not understand our desire to have more than 2 children (she told us "In Russia, we have maybe 2, but mostly just 1 child."). We were really concerned at that point that we would get this far and get rejected in Court. The next morning during the long van ride to court, Tim handed us his notebook in which he had written a Bible verse:

Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 "Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. For if either of them falls, the one will lift up his companion. But woe to the one who falls when there is not another to lift him up. Furthermore, if two lie down together they keep warm, but how can one be warm alone? And if one can overpower him who is alone, two can resist him. A cord of three strands is not quickly torn apart."

Tim told us he had been thinking about our fears about trying to explain why we want three, and he woke up at 4am with the memory of this bible verse. So he looked it up and wrote it down for us. We were both so touched by this. We couldn't believe that Tim was thinking about our issue before his big day at court to adopt two himself! I know getting up at 4am could also have been related to the time zone changes, but still, it gave me some goose bumps to think that it popped into his head like that. And it did help give us confidence in what we believe to be true - that when it comes to our children, two was even better than one, and three will be even better than two. And I think going through life as siblings, having three will make them stronger in so many ways. I always loved being part of a family with four children myself. (I did try to explain to Lena that I was the third child myself, but she didn't seem too impressed.)

I am also thankful to Tammy, the wife of the man working at the mine. She was so personable and brave. Every day she walked the streets of Novokuznetsk by herself, mapping out restaurants and markets and points of interest, finding which restaurants had English menus or English speaking people and which had free Wi-Fi. Keep in mind that she can't read or speak Russian, so most of the signs mean nothing, meaning she actually had to go into many buildings in order to find out what they were. She even rode a bus by herself to check things out (I think I might rather have died first). She ended up giving her fabulous travel guide to an adoptive family to use and pass on to others. We never, ever would have found the restaurants with English menus without her. Our translators could have helped, I'm sure, but no one really goes out of their way to map out options for you on these trips, and the agency provides absolutely no information on restaurants or points of interest. The pictures above show the Beerhouse (OK, we could have read that sign, but we never would have walked far enough to find it) where I was able to use the Wi-Fi to update our blog and send emails, and the Liverpool which had an English theme and we had a nice steak dinner. God bless Tammy the intrepid traveler!!