10/10/04-Half Day and some exploring...

From Bill:

Today was Sunday, which means we only make one visit to the Orphanage. We went over in the morning at the usual time. MJ went to get Jack and I went to get Grace. When I got to her room, no kids were there. They said they were all asleep. I went around the back and peeked in the room. There was Grace with her big brown eyes wide open. Our eyes met and I knew she would want up. I let the caregiver know she was up and she got her out of bed. I found out there is still a bug going through the room, so they checked her temp and it was fine. They were ready to feed her, so I took her out to the big room to meet up with Mom and Jack. We just hung and looked at books until ten minutes later when I took her back to the room for Breakfast. I mentioned last time about the feeding process here, so I won’t go into details, but let me say I’m getting pretty good. At least they didn’t have to change her cloths after we were done. The doctor checked her out and said she did have some redness in her throat, but her temp and chest were fine. So out to the room we went.

In the big room, Grace hung out with Mom for most of the morning. As I said before, we’re trying to get her to sit-up more. Well, today, she sat on her own for most of the time with very little fuss. She played with her rattle, looked at books with Mom and imitated Mom doing the traditional “la-la-la-la” sound with her tongue.

Jack and I spent the morning together. Actually, I should say it was my turn to follow Jack around the room. He went on his typical explorations. He saw a little plastic half ball that he just had to get and didn’t let anyone or anything get in his way. Got a little tangled under a chair, but persisted and got his object. Then we went over to the Lego box and dumped it on the floor. Jack tasted every piece, of course. Eventually, Grace decided to take a crawl and joined us. We hung the rest of the morning.

On answer to a question we’ve received – Jack’s hair appears to be blonde. In pictures it will sometimes looks like it is red, but I think it is blonde. We will see as we get more nutrients in this kid.

MJ took Jack back to the room where he settled back in. I took Grace into her room. She cried when I put her back in the big crib in the room, which, of course, tugged at my heart. I tore myself away and left. I missed not getting to see them in the afternoon.

Check out the pictures in the morning

In the afternoon, MJ wanted to rest a little, so I went exploring. Lisa and Steve, who were here 3 years ago, mentioned a lake and a park and I wanted to find it in case we want to take the kids there later. So, I grabbed the camera and took a walk.

One of my biggest frustrations here is the language. There is just no way to communicate. I feel like a typical ugly American, but every attempt to learn even rudimentary words have failed. When you are walking around, it gets more frustrating. When we are at the orphanage, we have Lena as our translator to help with any conversations, but outside, we have no one. So, as I walk around and see monuments or buildings, being the big history geek (as MJ calls me), I want to know the story behind the item or what the building is and there is no one to ask. You will see that in the pictures I took.

Kazakhstan is really a country in transition, still trying to find its identity. You can see the burgeoning retail market all around us. There are markets and malls everywhere. We are right next to a new three story Mall where they are still installing the escalators. The stores are all sizes, from full enclosed rooms to a corner divided by curtains. They sell everything, though I find the most striking being the electronics stores. There are tons of them. You can also buy a cell phone every 10 feet it seems.

As I walked around, I saw a lot of new building and construction. But there are also parts that are very run down. After finding the Lenin statue, which was obviously not torn down like it was done in other former Soviet and Eastern Bloc countries; I walked through a couple parks. I was struck by the run-down condition of the parks. They just didn’t seem to be taken care of. The grass was growing long and many places looked like they had not been painted for some time.

I eventually did find the lake and park that Lisa and Steve mentioned and it was also striking. The park was actually an amusement park with full function rides. (After it snowed earlier this week, the weather was nice, so there were families out and about.) The rides were rusted and the paint coming off. The grass was also brown and very long. There were a lot of booths that were no longer in use. As someone else said, it looked like a nice place “in its day”, but I’m not sure when its day was. I was a little saddened by what I saw, but I want to be careful. As I said at the start, I really don’t know the story behind all this, so I don’t know if this is something this is one its way back up or on its way out. I try not to judge, but it is hard not to when you bring your American eyes to a completely different place and have no narration to explain what you are seeing.

Check out the pictures from my explorations.