Wow, it's been over a week since we arrived home. We weren't able to post for a couple of days around our court date on Feb 25th because the internet at the hotel wasn't working. Here's the rest of the journey to catch you up to date.
We went to court on Monday, February 25th, and all went well. Our petition to adopt Yulia was granted. After court, there is a 15 day waiting period before she can legally leave the Baby Home. That date will be Feb 11th. We have chosen to have her escorted to the US versus a return trip back to Kazakhstan for a week. So, that said, we are hoping she will be home in Alabama with us before the 21st, Good Friday. Suzanne plans to fly to Washington, DC at some point to get Yulia and return home.
Flight to Almaty:
Now for the rest of the travel story.... We left Petropavlovsk on Wed morning, the 27th, flying to Almaty, the former capital on the opposite southern border of Kazakhstan, over 900 miles away.
It had snowed on Tuesday and the winds blew the night before we left creating drifts on the roads. Oleg's car was fully loaded with luggage, Svetlana, Suzanne, Nikolia, and me. He would get a running start heading into some of the drifts where the snow was real deep and chosing his spot so we would almost go airborne when hitting them! There was a couple of times I wasn't sure we'd make it to the airport. The winds had to be blowing at 50-60 mph! After getting our tickets and checking the luggage, we waited in the terminal for the flight time. The airport terminal was NOT heated!! After an hour or so, we had to walk outside about 75 yds or so to the plane, a YAK-40, whatever that is! The wind was blowing so hard, you had to turn your face away from the wind, plus just behind the plane there was a V-shaped drift about 10 inches deep created by the winds as it whipped around the plane. We sat in the cold plane on the runway motionless for an hour and a half! They never even started the engines. (It wasn't a jet!) The little plane shook from the wind and looking out the window, the visibililty outside was down to maybe 100 yds from the 'white-out' conditions created by the winds. I saw the fuel truck go by once, pulling another truck with a plow behind it. I guess they were plowing the runway and one of the trucks had broken down!! Are you nervous yet? I just kept telling myself these pilots fly in this stuff all the time! Sure enough, we did take off and make it to Almaty around 1 to 2pm that afternoon.
Visit to the U.S. Embassy: We went directly to the Embassy in Almaty to do some paperwork to enable an escort to take Yulia to the United States in a few weeks. They had also questioned our I-797 form. The embassy had not received the updated copy showing our fingerprints had been updated. Hopefully, it will all be taken care of in advance to Yulia's arrival in a few weeks at the embassy.
The Grand Eurasia Hotel: Peeeee UUUU!
Since our flight out of Almaty to begin our trip home didn't leave until 2:45am, we checked into a hotel across the street from the embassy, The Grand Eurasia Hotel. So from 5pm until 12 midnight, we had a place to nap, shower, and get a bite of supper before the 30+ hours trip home. Try 29,000 Tenge for 7 hours!! That's like $ 246 USD!! Ouch! The lobby was very nice and modern. A bellman took our bags up to the room for us. The room was nice by western standards with a king-size bed. They called it a French bed? Huh? Whatever it was, when I sat on it, I almost broke my tailbone!! I swear this bed was nothing more than a plywood box with a quilt on top of it!! I tried to take a nap. NOT!! Showers and a fresh change of clothes were in the plans for sure. Weeellllll, that bathroom
stunk to high heaven! Peeewww! Suzanne braved the shower first. It leaked all over the floor. Then, the shower head fell off the hook at the top and hit her in the head!! They hook thing was broken!! I wonder what a Kazakh personal injury lawyer would cost!! Ha!
But wait! There's more! You gotta read this!!
It was my turn for a shower now and Suzanne and Nikolai were leaving the room for something. I was about to start the water when I heard the key in the lock and them coming back. We had some trouble with the key earlier and it sounding like it wasn't opening, so with nothing more that a tee shirt and my underwear on, I opened the bathroom door which was by the main entrance to open it for them. As I opened the bathroom door, I was met by a young Kazak maid with a roll of toilet paper in her hand. She was opening the bathroom door at the same time I was and we met literally face to face! I don't know which one of us was more shocked!! It's comical now. Well, my jaw dropped, she shrieked and shoved the toilet paper into my chest, looked down to check "the" package, threw her hands over her mouth and ran past Suzanne and Nikolai down the hall laughing and jabbering in Kazak or Russian!! Suzanne and Nikolai were just standing there laughing too and all I could do is shout, "What the hell is going on?" After my injury or insult had subsided, we all laughed. Turns out Suzanne was trying to tell the maid that we were out of toilet paper. Eager to please, the young lady upon realizing what Suzanne was talking about, ran down the hall with the toilet paper and key in her hand with Suzanne and Nikolai running after her trying to stop her!! I can imagine her surprise when she saw me standing there! I'm just thankful I had some clothes on!! She might have died from laughter if that was the case!!
The power's out now!! (Later that evening at the Grand Eurasia....)
After an underwelming evening at the Grand Eurasia, I'm laying on the 'French' bed trying to catch a nap and Suzanne was packing something. The TV was on with something in English (BBC World). Suddenly the power went out!! Lights, TV, everthing!! It was real dark. At first we thought Nikolai had turned out the lights, since he was standing by the entrance door and near light switch. Suzanne said, "Nikolai, turn on the lights, please." No response.... silence.
Again, "Nikolai, turn on the lights!" Another long pause with no response from Nikolai. "Nikolai, get over here!" Then, a response, "I didn't do it." in a faint voice. Suzanne realized the TV wasn't on either and said she thought the power was out. I muttered, "Oh no, don't tell me the power is out now. What else can go wrong in this hotel!?" I opened the curtains to get a little light in the room. Here's what happened.... There was a slot over by the door for those card type keys that are used for hotel doors nowadays. This slot had a note above it stating that the card must be inserted to activate the power for the room. I suppose it's an energy saving devise, who knows? They had stuffed a piece of cardboard into the slot to keep the power to the room on at all times without using the key. Guess WHO was curious enough to pull it out of the slot?
You guessed it.... Mr., "I didn't do it", Nikolai.
Oh yea, true to form, Nikolai fell asleep (finally) just before we had to leave the hotel and had to be carried all the way to the terminal and woke up as we were boarding the plane.
Needless to say our seven hours at the Grand Eurasia were very eventful before the long trip home. We left at 12 midnight for the airport and our flight on Lufthansa leaving at 2:45am.
Frankfurt, Germany and home sweet home:
We were on that plane from Almaty, to Astana, to Frankfurt, Germany for something like 8 or 9 hours!! It stopped in Astana and we must have sat there for well over an hour. Going west and through 5 time zones, we were chasing the night and the sun kept trying to catch us. That darn Lufthansa flight didn't have any video or movies!! It didn't matter much because it was night time and most people were asleep. We spent a few more hours with Tom and Kristen from Cape Cod at the McDonald's at the Frankfurt Airport. They boarded our plane in Astana, KZ.
Next stop, the good ol' USA!! This time our United Airlines flight had video screens in the headrest of the seats in front of each seat, so we watched 3 movies on the 7.5 hr flight to Washington -Dulles. It makes the flight seem a lot shorter!! Oh yea, another 7 time zones.... I think?
Welcome to the USA:
Everything went like clockwork so far on the trip back. So far that is.... until we got back to the good ol' USA!! There are two Customs areas for entry. One for people ending their trip in Washington and one for those transferring on to other flights in the US through the airport. Since we were transferring on to Birmingham in a couple of hours, we went through that Customs area. There was an area for our luggage to be claimed & rechecked right there in Customs, which was a tremendous convenience. Thus, we'd not have to bother with the main security lines again and just stay within the airport area for our connecting flight.
We went through Customs fine, got the baggage claim and NO BAGS!! After traveling for 24 hours straight, I was in no mood for this. Our bags were 'short checked', meaning checked only to Washington. We had to go to a different floor and through customs again and then take a shuttle to the main terminal to claim our bags there. Problem was, we had to take all our bags and recheck them in the main terminal and had a little over an hour until our final leg for Birmingham was to leave. We had to take a shuttle from Customs to the baggage claim area and waited for close to 15 minutes because there weren't enough people on it and they were waiting on the next incoming flight! We walk out of baggage claim and the United baggage re-check and ticketing desk is literally on the opposite end of Washington Dulles Airport!! I ran with a push cart from one end of the terminal to the other. It looked like a mile long, but was probably only a half a mile. Poor Nikolai and Suzanne were trying to catch up with me and we were all huffing and puffing when we go there. There were a couple of dozen lines and all of them were packed!! We got our bags checked with 45 minutes to go until our plane left. Ah, we might make it! NOT! We walked around the corner to go through security. There were four lines and we couldn't even see where they went or the familiar check points with metal detectors. I walked ahead while Suzanne and Nikolai waited in line. I walked... and walked. Then I saw where we were going. There were four or five more lines coming in from the opposite end also!! Each end met in the middle of the terminal to enter and must have been more than 100 ft long each!! Remember folks, this is WASHINGTON, DC!! The nations capital. Talk about security. I just knew at that point, we'd be spending the night in Washington and not get home. We made it through security with 15 minutes to go. We might just make it! There's a chance!! Home, sweet, home at last! I can hear Lynrd Skynrd playing, 'Sweet Home, Alabama'!! Dang, we have to take one of those shuttle things to Terminal A. It takes for-ev-errrrr! We get to Terminal A.... 5 minutes to flight departure! I take off to hold the plane doing my best O.J. Simpson impression in an airport. No, I didn't have a white Bronco! That's for all you old folks that remember Simpson's commericals for AVIS. I made it!!! I made it!!! Two minutes to spare!! "Hold the plane", I yelled!! "What flight are you on, sir?", the lady taking tickets asked. "Birmingham." "This flight is boarding for Charleston", she said. My mouth hung in shock. Where is MY plane? It's late and now scheduled for an hour later!! To make an already long story longer, we waited another 3 hours for take off to Birmingham and arrived so late in Birmingham that when Suzanne's mother, Norma and brother, Keith came to pick us up our flight wasn't even on the Birmingham Airport 'arrivals' board!! Finally, after somewhere around 33 hours, we're home!! It's 9:30 pm on Thursday night, 2/28. Ahhhh, I love my bed.....
