LIFE with LEXIE

The first picture of course is Miss Lexie in her adorable purple hat. Next is our driver, ReNot. He said he played "American Football" and I believe him. He's been great and understands just enough English to get some of my jokes. After that is the famous Flora holding Lexie yesterday. She's quit a character. Then since I've been talking about bathrooms all day I thought I should include a picture of our "hot" water in the tub. You can't tell since the flash washed the color out but it's more a grayish color than brown. The darker the color the warmer it is so this is luke warm. Oh the joys of communal water. I found out the reason the whole town was without water when we first arrived is because according to ReNot they have a factory that produces hot water not even one boiler for the whole building. So if the family across town is showering or flushing their toilet then you're out of luck - kidding. Beats me but that's how it works here. What a great way for the government to control it's people.

Then comes the Director's Private bathroom and I'm going to let the pictures speak for themselves and the last is our friendly mall bathroom ladies. I forgot in this picture there is the younger lady helping out our favorite older one. Why it would take two women to hand out stacks of TP I can't imagine but they where both there the whole time we were. It's 1:15am so I've gotta hit the hay. More tomorrow.

Yeee haaa - it looks like court will be on Tue or Wed. Of course we don't have a set date or time but Flora has been assured that the judge will see us one of those two days. So I guess that's as firm as it gets around here. She came in during our morning visit to tell us that and to start prepping us for court. She wanted to make sure we are planning our speeches and what to say and more importantly what not to say. I had heard about most of the questions we'd be asked but I didn't know that they didn't want us to say what our religion was or that I would be baptizing Alexis. She said we must tell the court that I will teach Alexis about both my religion and how to be a Muslim. Then Lexie can choose what she wants to be when she is 18. Interesting. Flora also said that Alexis will have a dual citizenship for life not just until she is 18 as I was told. The court is really concerned that if I get married that I would somehow not want her any more. I told Flora we're a package deal now and if someone I'm interested in doesn't want Lexie then I don't want him. I'm going to be working on my speech and hopefully we can get through this next week without too many problems. I don't expect it to be without issues but I'm sure we can get through them.

Back to Lexie. When I went to pick her up today she had already been feed. I'm told that on the weekends they don't have as much help so the nurses have to prepare the kids food as well as care for them so they just make the mush and then mix it in with their formula and feed it to them in the bottle. That's why the holes in the nipples are so huge so that this mush mix can go through it. This makes it easier on the staff since they don't have to feed a dozen 12 months old individually with a spoon. They can just hold up 2 bottles for two babies and get them feed quicker. Anyway they were all back in there cribs by 10am when I got there. As soon as Lexie heard me she started crying until I picked her up and she gave me a big hug and slobbered all over me. Ain't life grand. Then they started gesturing to me and I figured out she needed to be changed. So I laid her down on a tall homemade changing table and I opened her diaper and she has a surprise for me (no Andrew I did not take a picture for your dung wall but maybe next time.) I've changed her almost every day and she's never had a poop just potty so I was actually glad to see that everything was working normally. Now I am leading up to the interesting part of the story - not that Lexie's poops aren't fascinating to everyone. The nurse just took off the diaper picked her up under the shoulders and by the feet (so her butt is hanging out) went over to the sink and turned on the water (and no they don't have hot or even warm water here) and put her little dirty butt right in the sink under the running water. Then she just grabbed a bar of soap and washed her off right there in the sink. No wipes, not antiseptic wash - just plop her in the sink, rinse her off and hand her back to me to dry off and diaper up. I guess it works because Lexie hasn't had any kind of a diaper rash even though they only get one diaper per child per day. I just don't see how that works and I'm going to ask more questions of her favorite nurse on Monday. Talk about making supplies stretch. WOW. They also haven't tried to potty train these kids as I've heard that so many other baby houses do at around 6 months. Now Rosa's daughter, who is three, they sit them on the potties as soon as they finish any meal and also they bring a pot (I mean a literal pot not a cute little potty chair) to her usually once a visit for her to just drop her drawers and sit on it whereever she happens to be. Outside on the "playground" or in the visitor's room it doesn't matter. Here comes the pot, just sit down and do your business. I'll have to ask Rosa if they bring potty paper with them as well or if they just drip dry. Sorry about all this potty talk but it's fascinating how differently they do things.

Okay, I have to add one more potty story and them I'm done with the trash talk for a while. A couple of days ago we were waiting for our driver at the baby house at the end of our day and I had to go to the potty but I really didn't want to use theirs. To say that it is unsanitary is being very kind but I just couldn't wait anymore, so I told Zina I'd be back. She said wait that I could use the director's private bathroom since it was closer and the director was still here and it wasn't locked. Cool, this has to be better then the public one. So off I go past the director's office to use her private bath. That is the two pictures you see of the blue/green bathroom. Boy was that a surprise. I was speechless. I have to say I really admire her even more for putting the children first with all her improvements and not fixing this little issue first. Or maybe she doesn't see this as a problem even though we've been in better public bathrooms in the mall that are MUCH nicer and certainly cleaner.

So I lied. I have to tell a final bathroom story and then I won't bring it up again (for at least a week unless a really good incident happens.) Mom and I where going to the Internet Cafe on the 3rd floor of this mall near the Baby House every day at lunch for a week or so until we got the Internet to work at the apt. Anyway, in Kazakhstan as far as I can tell, you can't go to the bathroom for free in public. It cost 20 tenge (about 15 cents). So everyday Mom would take her 20 tenge to the old lady who sits outside the bathrooms at her little table with small stacks of toilet paper on it. You pay your tenge and get a stack of TP which is about 6 pieces. Only this is the local TP which is extremely rough to say the least. We carry our own but of course you don't want to offend these sweet old ladies so you take your stack, do your business and leave with at Spa-sea-ba (thank you in Russian) and off you go. So on Mom's 3rd or 4th day for some reason she didn't pay attention and went into the men's room. How she went in, did her business and didn't notice the two men in there I don't know. But she managed it and caused quit a scene when she came out to wash her hands. The lady came in to get her since I think the man at the sink was yelling "woman in sacred manly pee pee room" or something to that effect. Mom told me she didn't really notice anything until this guy started yelling. Okay we've got to have a talk with Mom really soon about what the little "man" symbol on the door means. The next day as we are coming up the stairs in the mall and the bathroom is right at the top of the stairs. Well before we hit the last step the bathroom lady is laughing hysterically and slapping her leg and pointing to the men's room and then at Mom. Somehow Mom didn't think it was funny but I thought it was hilarious. Every time we come there now she laughs and points. It's nice to know that we can entertain the locals with so little effort.

I'm done with the potty stories I promise. FYI some of the pictures I posted earlier were the wrong ones. The one with the round shower was of the bathroom in Almaty not Aktau (sorry I couldn't tell what I was down loading but I clearly had bathrooms on the brain all day) another is of Rosa and her 3 year 3 month old daughter Ellena. She's a little shy but very sweet. Another is our neighbor hanging her laundry. I never realized how stiff clothes that are washed and then left to dry on a rack where. Everyone here either hangs them outside where the wind loosens them up or they iron everything. Thank goodness for poly-blends so I haven't had to do too much ironing but Mom likes to iron (crazy woman) so she's taken care of Lexie and my clothes. Thanks Mom!! Now I know why they don't change clothes very often. Zina & Flora maybe have 4 or 5 outfits with them and that's it. So anyone coming here that wants to pack light and only bring a few things I can honestly say no one here would even notice. I can't remember if I included a picture of the ceilings or not but they are way cool. All the buildings are concrete and so are all the walls including the ceilings. To add lights they have lowered the ceilings and put in little canned lights and created these really cool coved ceilings. It's a really creative way to add lights in these small spaces and make it attractive at the same time.

We went to our first restaurant in Aktau for lunch today which was an experience but I've really got to end for now but I'll try to tell you about it tomorrow. See there's always something exciting going on around here so you'll just have to tune in tomorrow for an update.

I just have a minute but here are pictures of our apartment in Aktau as requested. As you can see it's nicer that in Almaty and is much cleaner. You'll notice the living room with the lovely blue sofa & chairs, then our little dining room, the bedroom with our twin beds and the kitchen complete with the dryer (AKA - they drying rack in front of the fridge) the bath room with the clothes washer in it. Then I think I have a view from the bedroom of the parking lot with the bus in it and the front of our building with Mom standing in front of it. My favorite pictures is our neighbors chatting out front. Aren't they fabulous? I've gotta run as they are coming to pick us up but more later.

As you can see Alexis is as wonderful as ever. The goats are in front of the dump and as you know the camels are behind it. We had quit the day.

First we are done with the Bonding Period, whoopee!!! Not that it wasn't wonderful but we must complete it to move on to the next step - court. I had to sign my application for the court which was my request to adopt and change her name which is Moldir, hence Alexis. Zina read it to me and it was a very formally written letter verses an application like we would fill out in the states. I will get a copy of it when we leave but I don't think it will be translated back to English for me. They did have my name as Lea Ann in one sentence but they assured me that would not matter. So no LeAnn you can't have her just because of their mistake! Anyway all my other hand carry documents are here and translated so Flora can present everything to court tomorrow with the hopes that the judge will say yes we can have a court date of June 12th to accommodate the new Director of the Baby House. So fingers crossed for one more day please.

I also got all my pictures and journals ready for the court and the Ministry of Education. We've had to take a picture every day of Lexie & myself which had to be dated and then write a paragraph about what we did each day to prove that I was there every day of the required bonding period. My camera has been a day off almost everyday so I had to go to the photo shop where, with Zina's help, we had the correct dates put on each picture. We also have to sign a book every day, along with the child's caregiver, the interpreter and I believe the director. I guess some time ago there was a couple that was adopting a child and the husband had to leave or something but the wife signed his name. They eventually found out about it so now they make us do all this as proof plus we have to submit the plane ticket as proof of when we flew down here. I could even show them my empty bank account if they really want proof. Anyway, now all that is left is to stand in front of the judge and hope she is having a good day. Of course after that we still have the 15 day waiting period, then we have to wait to get the new birth certificate and Kazakh passport, then go to the American Embassy in Almaty to deal with all the American requirements including some blood work for poor miss Lexie and then get her new passport and our visas. But the court is the most important part of it all so I'll feel much better once that is over with.

Lexie was just great as usual. I got her a ball yesterday that she really likes to chew on. Poor thing is trying to break her first tooth so she chews on everything she can get her hands on and slobbers on everything else. She missed our trip to the see the camels though. That's right camels.

This morning we headed out early so we could see the camels walking across the desert but we thought we missed them at first since there were none where they normally are. But our fearless driver ReNot won't give up. He stopped a local goat herder to ask him if he knew where the camels had gotten to. He told ReNot just to head around the back of the local dump and we should find them. OKAY now why didn't we think of that first. Off we go past the Gypsy camp, you must spit on the ground as you pass them (I'm not sure why) and turn right on a dirt road that wasn't fit for a camel (that's probably why they were not on the road but off to the side) around the dump and there they were - about 100 of them. I have to say these were what I'd call wild camels since they where roaming free and only a few of them had some kind of tether around there necks but they weren't attached to anything. Zina said they know where to go when it's time to be milked and then sleep. Yes I said milked. Evidently this was a milking heard (so do you think they are all females then?) I will definitely not be trying any of the local camels milk since they were eating grass and who knows what else at the dump. Anyway, they weren't afraid of us but certainly moved on if we got too close. You'd think we were the ones that stink instead of them. No one got spat on by them and unfortunately I didn't get to ride one or see one milked. But it was fun to see them in their natural habitat (if you call the dump a natural habitat.)

That's if for today. I'll try to get as many pictures loaded as possible but I'd like to get some sleep tonight. Take care and drink some cow's milk for me please.

Today as we played outside Lexie discovered a flower as you can see. She loves being outside with all the noise and activity. Then the 3 year old group came out to play and we met a new friend. He came right up to my mom and sat on her lap. Then played with Lexie's toys but shared very nicely. Of course I want to take him home but we understand he has a 5 year old brother and they are not up for adoption right now. He has only been here for less than a year. I'll see if I can find out more. I've got to run for our second visit but it takes so long to download the pictures I wanted to get a couple on. More later I hope.

So these are the pictures from the apartment in Almaty the first two days here and that a fruit thing in Germany. The apartment actually looks better in the pictures but you get the idea.