March 11

Here is some video of Sasha and Pam playing that gummy thingy game.

Oh, we have picked some names now.

Alexander (Sasha) Paul Langewisch

Jonathan (You Make Me Giggle) Valera Langewisch

Here are some transportation observations that also make us giggle:

Question: How many people can you fit on a marshrutka (a small bus)?

Answer: One more.

Question: Suppose you are driving erratically in rural Ukraine and the police pull you over. Why can’t they ask you to walk down the road a bit in a straight line?

Answer: There are too many potholes.

Question: When should you NEVER eat chocolate?

Answer: After you have used it on an overnight train for an air freshener.

Here's a video of me playing a giggling game with Valera.

Here are a few details about the process, as it has applied to us. Note first: We chatted for 3-4 hours with a woman named Alison from Germany whose adoption story has been FAR more difficult than ours, so please do not attempt to generalize based on what I write (which is only half-truth anyway). In both Kramatorsk and Mariupol we met with attorneys who have excessive staffs of young secretaries whose only jobs are to fetch photocopies or lock and unlock doors. After some very long conversations about how last year's new adoption regulations might be interpreted, the attorney in Mariupol drafted a letter saying we had visited these children and we want to adopt them anyway and we understand the implications of adoption and we are not crazy and so on.

This attorney, fortunately, was good enough to share his approach with the attorney in Kramatorsk, so it will look like we're all on the same page, even though I'm always a page behind. Add the usual certifications and scribblings and stamps and pretty paper presented in plastic sleeves, and the packet was ready to go to the SDA office in Kyiv to be registered.

I needed to go to Kyiv anyway, to initiate paperwork with the U.S. Consulate saying we wish to adopt these children who had these old names and lived at these old addresses and now would have these new names. Furthermore, after the court date, I will be heading back to Concordia, which so graciously let me leave for 2 weeks of school in the middle of the semester. As you can see from the picture, we have just switched from teaching 18-year-olds to teaching 8-year-olds. Anyway, I have to get back to Nebraska, so I needed to give Pam power of attorney to finish the process.

So, to expedite getting the packet of pretty paper to Kyiv and to take care of my consular business, I bought myself a couple of train tickets. I did this Sunday evening for a Tuesday evening trip. I think it's a good thing I didn't wait any longer, as I was only able to get a 3rd class, upper berth ticket. This means there are no doors and the beds are shorter. That wasn't too bad, as the trip was only 12 hours.

I arrived at the consulate at 8:30 am, and was dismayed to see there was a line outside the building with maybe 100 people in it. I asked a couple of people if there was only one line for all purposes, and a Ukrainian woman said that because I was an American citizen (my glasses must give me away), I could go right to the front of the line. Is that embarrassing or what. After all night in 3rd class, the ugly American cuts in line.

I heard some interesting stories while in the waiting area. One American woman was there with her Ukrainian husband of 5 years. He had been deported, and she had exhausted all her resources trying to sort out why. She was clearly frustrated. After some checking, it was not easy for the U.S. Consulate employee to inform her that her husband had entered the U.S. illegally through Canada. She did not know this when she married him. Boy was she mad at him then.

I gave the packet to Dennis, a friend of Masha's who submitted it, and we hope it will be ready Friday. Then Dennis will fax the approval back to Kramatorsk. We have a court appointment at noon on Friday. The judge is okay with a faxed version, but initial reports are that the persecutor (oops, prosecutor), who represents the state, is not. In that case we will have to wait until Monday.

I bought some boy toys and picked up Pam's ratty old pants from the tailor and visited my cooperating professor at Kyiv Polytechnic University and then traveled 2nd class back to Kramatorsk. One of my cabin mates was a very sharp Ukrainian marketing professional for a German machining company. We chatted for several hours about important stuff like ... world peace. I had a chocolate bar with me, just in case, but I didn't need it.

Court is a big deal. If there's any schlip up, this could change everything. So please pray for this--we know you have been, as we have indeed been blessed at every step.

March 8 1/2

Blah blah blah.

And this has been Andy Langevichky reporting live from the Sea of Azov. And now, back to your irregularly scheduled blog . . .

March 7

After having visited Valera for a couple of days (making snegforts and snegoviks) while assorted papers were being pushed, we have come to feel pretty comfortable with our role. So we decided to leave Kramatorsk for Mariupol (leaving Masha behind to enjoy her birthday and her family). We took the Moscow-Mariupol fast train. That means it gets up to 30 km/hr. Pam says that still makes for a rather airy breeze on your derriere when it’s time to tinkle. Stas and Natasha took us to the station, and made sure we got on the right wagon. We could read most of the ticket, but the Ukrainian word for city is almost the same as the Russian word for seat, so Stas enjoyed dramatizing the difference to help resolve our confusion.

The cabin attendant heard us say two words, then immediately grinned and spouted out “San Francisco, Chicago, New York.” He moved out a lady who would have been sharing our cabin into another so we could have a compartment to ourselves. Then he brought mugs of chai and sat down and chatted with us. He hopes someday to have his mug taken in the White House :D.

Officers from the Department of Motherland Security checked our passports. They looked as us and laughed. By comparison, in Germany, they radio in selected passport numbers to some central dispatcher, where I’m sure I’m on the suspiciously dweeby-looking database. There is a lot of room for database work in Ukraine. 5 ½ hours later, we had putzed through all the little ivkas in the region, and arrived in Mariupol, a smoggy port city of about 1,000,000. Pitifully, we were only slightly better at our Russian vocabulary. I think my brain has been smogged over.

We thought the visiting time at the orphanage might be only 2-4 (we don't know the weekend schedule yet), and the train arrived at 3:00 (right on time), so we took a taxi directly to the orphanage and hauled our luggage up to the door. We got some funny looks from the kids. “Gosh, they’re making you move in? I hope there’s enough gruel for all of us.”

The kids at the orphanage know the routine. When parental types show up, whichever child is nearest the entryway runs to get the child you are looking to visit. Sometimes you don’t even have to say the name—word gets around. After the right Sasha came, we asked for a room to play in. An Italian couple, from bella Napoli, was already there playing with a blonde 10-year-old who spoke English pretty well. They were trying to teach her Italiansky.

In some orphanages they are quite strict, and have someone monitor you while you are playing, which seems reasonable but can be awkward. We have not had that experience. In fact, we just kept playing until 6:00 when we figured it was his dinner time. Then Sasha turned out the lights, we went back downstairs, he got the key from the security lady, went back upstairs in the dark, locked up, then returned the key. Electricity is not to be wasted here.

I showed Sasha the video of Valera and his classmates preparing for the March 8th International Women’s Day Program. Valera is in the green shirt and yellow men-in-tights costume below. If you haven’t heard of this important international holiday, perhaps it’s because the U.S.S.R. made it up, and U.S. textbooks only have one line for Ukraine: the bridebasket of the world. Still, since all women get flowers, even beginning at age 3, Pam suggested that I write a very poignant paragraph extolling its virtues.



Anyway, Sasha was very interested in the video of his brother, whom he hasn't seen in some time. The program had poetry, dancing, and contests. And a witch (a teacher, of course), who gave out gifts. Sasha rooted for Valera in every little race, such as a race to decorate a divchinka (girl) or a teacher with a basket full of jewelry or flowers, and he recognized several other children from Kramatorsk.



Here's some leftover footage of his Janga-playing skills from our first visit:



Today I taught Sasha basic camcorder functions, and he enjoyed learning this. We taped handage and footage. We taped inside and outside—terms which we had practiced that morning but had already forgotten :<. Then we played a gummy animal game—close your eyes, get fed a gummy thingy, then guess what color(s) it was. Here’s where we learned that Sasha already knows colors and some animals in English. After that he asked to play with the computer. We mostly played with SketchUp and a little MS Word. I’ll start teaching him Excel tomorrow. Sasha also knows the English numbers at least up to 10, and the Roman alphabet, and can type his name Саша in English. We are overwhelmed.

March 6

Oy! Some complications are now sorted out. That doesn't mean there may not be more, but we should not keep you out of the loop any longer. Check out the video and pics below:

This is Valeriy. His nickname is Valera. When he walked into the office to meet us, he grinned from ear to ear, stuck out his hand, and said, "Здравствуйте!" He is 6. Valera is a bundle of smiles and energy. His report describes him as tender, friendly, social, not aggressive, healthy, active, likes jokes, and athletic. You can trust this report.

In the video, the context is this: It was outside playtime from 10:30 - noon. The caretakers led us to a section of the play area where we could be more by ourselves. I think he went down this slide a hundred times. He should not have gone down at all, because the slide was rusty. I'm sure the laundry crew wishes that we will eat bad mushrooms tonight.


In the first picture, he is giving this truck through us to his sibling. In the second picture, we had been playing together for about an hour, where he had not stopped smiling and showing us all the fun he could have in a special playroom, when I showed him our videocamera. More curious than any cat, he was determined to figure out the function of every button. So we know he can be calm. :)

This is Alexander. His nickname is Sasha. Kjersten, you can call him Littler Sasha. Yes, Adrienne, two boys. I know, you told us your stipulations. Look at it this way. I doubt they will want to borrow your clothes. He is 8. Sasha's report describes him as smart, doing well, healthy, bright, and enjoys playing with Legos. Before being transferred to an orphanage in Mariupol for somewhat older children, he lived in Kramatorsk with Valera, his brother. He likes drawing and reading and dancing. His teachers at Kramatorsk remember him well. They said his main desire was to learn, and that he wants to be an architect. (Insert smile here!) Though the boys primarily speak Russian, Sasha began to read the "Twelve Dancing Princesses" to us in Ukrainian and didn't want to stop.

In the video, Sasha is playing piano for us. This song sounded so Russian--kind of somber and heavy. The next was lighter and more fun. In the first picture he is smiling for his brother. In the second we are playing Janga. He is very careful and coordinated. After we had taken out all the possible blocks and the stack still had not fallen, we began to build up. We had it balanced on rows alternating between one and two blocks until just before we ran out of blocks.

Then we played with Google SketchUp. I can hear you chortling, but think of it. It is immediately rewarding and fun, and teaching SketchUp doesn't require a lot of complicated English-to-Russian translation. We played for an hour and a half. I think it was his first time using a computer, but he is a quick study, and soon we had him isolating subcomponents of a car, coloring them, and putting it back together. I wish I could show it to you. It looks kind of like a cross between a pizza delivery car and Concordia's pimped up admissions van.

March 5

As I write this, Kjersten and Adrienne are looking at pictures of the kids we have started paperwork on. As soon as they calm down, I'll post them for all of you. So go ahead, bug them.

Here's a picture of the orphanage where one of the children is now. Note the daggers of death. It might look a bit dreary, but it's a lot cozier once you step inside. That's typical of Ukraine.






















Meanwhile ...

We were looking for an Internet cafe in Mariupol. The first one we took a bus to was closed. So we decided to ask a taxi driver. He checked with his dispatcher, but came up empty. We asked another taxi driver. He seemed more confident, so we hopped in. He started taking us to the closed location. When we sorted that out, he started driving around, asking his other taxi buddies that he would pass. He wished he was younger--then he would know. Finally we found one. Here it is:

















Now I'm thinking about what we teach in marketing. Let's talk about brand management. I'll guess I'll have to go through detox when I get home. I probably picked up a nasty Ukrainian Trojan Horse worm bomb just taking this picture.

Speaking of marketing, here are some pictures from an English translation of a menu at a nice restaurant across the street from the orphanage pictured above.
























































This one turned my stomach, so I played it safe and ordered the ox eggs. They are what you think they are.

When we're trying to save money, which we usually are, we eat on the cheap. Here I am trying not to make a mess with my Ukrainian Chinese dinner in a box.

March 1

Sunday morning came with a surprise peak at the sun and some worship of the Son.

Breakfast with Jim and Margaret was, well, entertaining. E.g. A mission team was arriving from the States, so Margaret talked to the kitchen staff about what would and would not make a good first impression on the jet-lagged visitors. (Pause while you stop eating and make sure you have a bucket nearby.)
...

Fish


(raw)


served with


fish entrails


on the side.


Yummy.


The mission group members pushed the food around on their plates, then someone heard about Jim's cooking. Eventually the whole group was at Jim's, and for two weeks they never set foot in the dining hall again.

The 12 full-time students at DCU and their families gathered in a classroom to sing familiar worship songs in Russian ("Shout to the Lord," "As the Deer," etc.), celebrate the Lord's supper together, and be exhorted from the word. Our translator for the service was Lawrence (Wright?), who's been serving here for 11 years and is originally from CO. It was fun to learn his daughter is a freshman at UNL in Lincoln this year! I offered to deliver something small they might like to send home with us. Their Christmas gifts sent Nov. 29 arrived mid-Feb.!

In the afternoon Nurlan again helped us as he called a taxi for us and made sure the driver knew where the school was we wanted to visit. The DCU property is right next to a horse stable and one of the homes of Renat Aktmetov, a billionaire Mafia leader whom we’ve read about in the Wall Street Journal. Several people here said he blew up a hotel with his brother in it. No one can prove it, of course. Our taxi driver said he was an engineer for a company that Aktmetov demanded and got. He was still cheerful and animated in our attempts to communicate. He called his daughter at least 3 times to ask for some English word he couldn't come up with. We liked him, so we asked him to help us shop. He didn't charge us for shopping time, only for distance traveled. 1.5 hours for $11. Go figure!

Spent time correcting. I'm offering my students extra credit for coming up with names for our new kids, if they cleverly weave them into their assignments. So far we've seen:

Emilie, Emily. Emiliee
Kathleen, Cathleen, Kathlene
Espen, Champ, Boss
Владилена, Спартак, Горазд, Ипполита


Did they get extra credit?

No.

Ukrainian rules.

February 27 - 28

I know that Masha is a professional, but in a weak moment, we goaded her into telling this story:

The quota for international adoptions had been met very early in 2008, before our dossier was ready to be processed. (So some of our documents got stale, like our wedding certificate. So we had to get to married again, or something like that.) Anyway, by November, some of the approved dossier slots had gone unused, so the SDA announced that they would accept a small number of additional dossiers yet in 2008. First come, first served, must be in person, on November xx. Now, think back to the cabbage patch kids craze.

Day xx came, and the SDA announced, “Never mindsky, come back tomorrow.” The facilitators (I think there are 200 or so) decided to make a list: #1 Natasha, of course, #2 Boris, #3 Olga, … Masha was #5, holding our dossier. Big Problem. A second list was started. Masha was not on this list. Big Argument. Eventually they agreed to first come, first served the next morning. So Masha and a friend sat in their car in front of the SDA office all night. They had to stay warm, of course, and by the morning they could not pass a breathalyzer test. Now we have seen Boris. He is a big guy, and ugly too. We are glad he is not our facilitator, but we are also glad he is Masha’s friend. For when the fight started and the gate was rushed, it was Boris who pulled skinny Masha through the mob. Our dossier was indeed submitted, with Masha holding it out at arm’s length with her other hand covering her mouth.

This story was shared while waiting for Olena, a regional social work director. She is an important woman, and made sure we knew it. Masha said, “Did you notice her asking for a donation?” I had not, so I asked, “Was it a subtle request?” “Oh, no, she came right out and said so.” They don’t call it a bribe. It is a bribe if the payment is to do something they are not supposed to do. It is a donation if it is their job. Masha said, “She is going to give us problems.” The social worker and the orphanage director must, by law, be present at the first meetings.

We will continue to leave out the details that you probably want to hear about. We don’t know them either. We couldn’t visit one child Friday because the social worker was busy in the a.m. with court proceedings and the director was busy in the afternoon. We couldn’t visit one child Saturday because of the law mentioned above. We couldn’t visit one child Monday because we don’t know why. We couldn’t visit Tuesday because the social worker wants us to wait some more. There is a sequence to all of this that is complicated, and we’re stuck until this process wears itself or us out.

So. On with the dribble. Friday we stayed put in Kramatorsk. Stas took us to visit one child for the second and third time. Pretty fun times. Can you picture an adorable, smiling child stepping right up and saying, “здрацвите!” While playing outside, we were given a separate section of the playground. Nevertheless, at one point five little girls stood in a row watching us play. Went down the slide a hundred times. Afterwards we learned the children are not allowed to use the slides because they are rusty and ruin their clothes. Tee hee.

We went home. They have a nice Samsung washing machine. You just need to unplug the hot water heater, plug in the washing machine, divert the water away from the house and press random keys until it starts.

In the afternoon we returned to the orphanage and played indoor games. Still has not stopped smiling. :) Enjoyed all sorts of ball games, balancing tricks, and especially figuring out the purpose of every button on our video camera. Spent more time in Pam’s lap concentrating on that camcorder than most college students spend studying for their exams.

Saturday, February 28

Masha and her daughter Lera drove us to Donetsk. Can’t say much now about our visit/non-visit there. We took a suitcase with us and connected with Jim & Margaret Parlow, volunteers at Donetsk Christian University, and we stayed there the next two nights. Margaret taught upper grades at Kiev Christian Academy when Adrienne was there, and Jim, a former army cook, used his impressive cooking skills to make friends and open doors to evangelizing everyone he met. They invited us over for fried chicken, breakfast, and stories. They should square off with Sandy Pomerenke in an outrageous tale contest.

We had spent an hour or so writing a letter, and needed it translated into Russian. Jim and Margaret tried everyone they knew (and they knew everyone), but all were unavailable. Then after dinner a missionary student from Kazakhstan who could do it showed up (maybe for Jim’s cake? Thank you, Lord!). It turns out he is a friend of Kip, a student of mine from the 1980s. We asked him if he and his wife could translate and we would pay them. They tried to refuse the payment but I said if he was going to be a missionary, he needed to learn how to accept gifts. Everyone is short on funds here, so I think this extra work was appreciated.

This campus was a former Communist Young Pioneers Camp. The main buildings are all less than 15 years old, with impressive architectural features but often ultra cheap materials. The Canadian Mennonite church initiated this project, with plans to turn it over to Ukrainian leadership. That transfer happened, but the Ukrainian leadership had no funds for upkeep. There are many signs of summer teams projects that are sadly unusable now (an extensive wooden playground with important pieces missing, a cute gazebo with a heavy tile roof that leans farther than that tower in Pisa, ...).

We appreciate your prayers!