Friday, August 17, 2007

THREE DOWN AND TWO TO GO




After Tami and the girls spent more than 24 hours hanging out in airports and airplanes on Wednesday, I was quite happy when I heard that they had arrived home safe and sound. The first thing the girls did was check in on the cats. They missed them dearly and were excited to see them again.

While the rest of the family was traveling home, I was traveling on a train with Kostya from Kyiv to Gorlovka, Kostya's home town. Gorlovka is only two hours from Mariupol and thirty minutes from Donetsk. It made sense for me to stay in Gorlovka for a day while we waited to finalize things in Donetsk on Friday (today).

After arriving at Kostya's home yesterday morning, Olga made us a delicious breakfast, ham and cheese crepes, cheese and raisin crepes, and sour cream and raspberry jam crepes. She needs to open up a Ukrainian restaurant in So. Cal. Any investors? After breakfast, Kostya showed me around Gorlovka. He owns a comfortable apartment which is within walking distance from a grocery store, a bank, many parks, four large ponds, the city square, a bowling alley, and two large universities. It is nice place to live and raise a family. I even had a chance to chat with his 60 year old father about politics, sports, and the USSR. He too is quite a gentlemen and I was fascinated by what he had to say. I am grateful to have experienced Ukrainian hospitality first hand and in particular, the hospitality of Kostya's family. They treated me like King.

Earlier this morning, we hopped in a taxi for Donetsk, the capital of this region and the site of today's work. You see, it has now been ten days and D is our son. So, I now have the right to obtain D's birth certificate and passport. As a matter of fact, I just obtained D's new birth certificate which states his father's name, Matthew P. Armstrong, and his mother's name, Tamra J. Armstrong. Soon, we will be picking up his Ukrainian passport which is the final hurdle in the Donetsk region. After we get his passport, we will be traveling back to Mariupol and taking physical custody of D on Sunday.

It appears that we will be leaving Mariupol on Sunday afternoon by train for Kyiv. While in Kyiv, D will have to undergo a medical examination by a certified doctor and we will have paper work to complete at the American embassy. I am hoping to take D to his first soccer game on Tuesday evening to watch the Ukrainian national soccer team play against Uzbekistan. How's that for our first father/son outing? We will have quite a bit of time to play before we fly home on Thursday. I am sure it is going to interesting. I hope to see you next weekend. Thanks for checking in.

1 comment:

Suzanna said...

Amazing! Travel blessings to you...