10/26/04-Our day in court...

Dear Readers,
Today was a big day on two fronts, so make sure you read both entries. Today we saw the arrival of Gma and her first day with her newest grandkids and we went to court to make this whole thing official.
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Our day in Court
Today marked the most significant day of our adventure – our day in court. After getting the kids up and acclimated with their new grandmother, we were picked up by Lena and left the children in the expert hands of Gma Jan. (Gracie is still fussy and we found that she had a fever. We later arranged to have her pediatrician make a visit, but that is later in our story.)

We were transported to the court by our usual driver Anatoly. At the court we waited outside the judge’s courtroom as another parent was adopting from the same orphanage, but through a different agency. After they were done with her, we were the first couple into the room. We had been prepped by Lena on what questions we would be asked and given a pre-written crib sheet for the final question. (During our preparation with Lena, Mary Jo told me that I would do the speaking – or so she thought.) In the courtroom, as in the Kazakhstan streets, no one smiled. The judge called court to order and asked us if we respect the court. Holding back a temptation to say I could never respect a judge in a maroon graduation gown and sunglasses, we accented to our respect of the court. At that point, Tamara our facilitator presented our application to the judge while Lena translated for us. The most striking part of the application was that Tamara made the exact statement that had been written in the aforementioned pre-written crib sheet. Damn, she stole my line. After that, Rosa, the director of the orphanage (and Bolat’s mother) gave the background on the children, the summary of which said they were eligible for adoption. Then their pediatricians gave their medical background. Then it was our turn. The judges asked the standard questions – What do you do for a living? How much to you make? Do you own your home? How will you take care of child care? Then the big question – Why are you here in court today? This is where I was ready to give my prearranged speech. “We are here to adopt Daniel and Tania. We have no biological children. We are both from large families and would like to adopt both children and raise them as siblings. We have worked with Children at Heart adoption agency and came to Karaganda and chose these children…” I was about to proceed onto the big finish about wanting to change their names to Jackson William and Elizabeth Grace and would like their birth certificates changed to have our names listed as parents when I was interrupted by the judge, who muttered something in Russian. Lena informed us that the judge wanted to hear from Mary Jo, who, as previously mentioned, had not planned to speak. A brief look of panic appeared on her face as she fought the urge to scream, “I just want to go home and see my mommy.” She recovered and mumbled “I agree with what he said.” After this, the social worker spoke and confirmed that there was no one else looking to claim the children. After this, we were all asked to leave the room.

After the other two couples went in for the same interrogation, we were all brought back into court where we told that the judge had no objections to the adoptions and congratulations on our new children. A feeling of relief came over all of us as we left the court. We all proceeded back to the orphanage for a party with the doctors. In a moment of traditionalism, all the women went with Lena to the market to buy supplies for the parties. The men went in another vehicle to the orphanage. When everyone arrived, we delivered all the goodies to the appropriate rooms for the parties that were happening. We all went to the doctors’ office to have a party with them. They proceeded to serve us all the food that we bought. I don’t know if I saw them eat much. But we sat with Rosa, Tamara, Lena and one of the doctors and exchanged numerous toasts of congratulations and thanks and talked about the process. It was a nice little party. In the afternoon, there were parties scheduled in the kids’ rooms with all their caregivers, but Mary Jo and I would not go back for the parties since we had kids back at the apartment to care for. We stopped by the rooms, brought some gifts for them and gave our thanks for taking care of our children.

After the party, we went back to the apartment with Lena and Grace’s pediatrician. She examined Grace and said it was not congestion she had, but she did have a severely red throat. She “prescribed” some medication, which we think is for her diarrhea, and said to make sure we try to feed her small amounts of food and a lot of fluids. We are not sure if she looked at all possibilities, but we were reasonably satisfied with her diagnosis and can’t complain about a doctor who makes house calls and charged $7.

After this, we settled into the afternoon. Gma, Jack and I took a walk to the local “Mall” to get some supplies we needed. Gma had her first trip to a Kazakhstan supermarket and we began to strategize on things we can eat during the coming weeks. We returned, sat with the kiddos, gave them their baths and put them to bed. We ended the day with some pasta and cheap Moldovian wine.

Here are couple pictures from the day:

All of us coming out of the courthouse


Lena, our doctors and Rosa at the party