INS Office and Upcoming trip

Four updates to make. Drew's passport - We found out for certain that both Florida and Georgia CSE had his passport on the denial list. Our Georgia case-worker is a sweet lady and sent the email to the state level to have the denial removed while I was on the phone. So, one state down, one to go. Drew talked to our contact in Tallahassee and she said that she CAN remove it, but she wants to give Escambia county the chance to "makes things right" first. Escambia FINALLY returned our many phone calls and letters (after Tallahassee reprimanded them LOL) and they would not talk to me, only to Drew and he was busy taking care of patients at work. So, we have to get an official power of attorney faxed to them ( I thought marriage gave you automatic power of attorney in alot of cases, but I guess not). They probably still won't be helpful, so we will likely have to have Tallahassee remove the denial, but I'm glad to know that she can if it comes down to it. So, one cirsis in the process if being diverted. INS office - I went in to the regional INS office here in Atlanta to ask a question about our form. I HAD called the 800 number, but they said that fee-waivers were decided at the local level and I would need to schedule an appointment to ask my local officers. I was told I had to do this through their online system - InfoPass. Infopass was BROKEN for over a week. Finally got an appointment and went down there at 8:30 in the morning. I had a heck of a time finding parking as the office is in downtown Atlanta, and then no one knew which building the INS was in and it was NOT marked. Finally get into the right building and the security dudes were overly-thorough - I mean, I've worked at CDC for over 5 years and been to a dozen airports since 9-11 and I've never had any security checkpoint be this obnoxious. I get through security and go to the "check-in" counter. They confirm my appointment give me some papers and tell me to go to such-and-such room down the hall. I enter what looks like a DMV waiting lobby. They have 10 windows/counters to help people - only 6 people are in these windows, and only one person is actually helping people!!!! My "number" is A-39. I walk in and they are on A-17. After 90 minutes they are only on A-24!!! Why did I make an appointment if I was going to be sitting here for three hours waiting for someone to speak to me? So, I pick up my things and go out to the check-in counter to ask about the hold-up...needless to say, my righteous indignation got a hold of me and I kinda bitched them out....they got the supervisor who made all sorts of excuses as to why only one person was doing any work....they then called the orphan supervisor to come talk to me....she was about 25 and decided to talk down to me - something I do not tolerate - but I bit my tongue as this was the girl who would be reviewing our application. So, I got no real answer to my question and was getting ready to leave and head to work...but parking was uber-expensive and I need to take out more cash. The desk clerk said there was an ATM right in the next room. I went to use it and it wouldn't dispense the money to me....I went to the desk and told them the ATM wasn't working. They tell me I have to wait in the line in that room to have that specific desk clerk "unlock" the ATM so it will dispense money....What the F*!@#?My upcoming trip to Ukraine!! - I got my paper ticket in the mail the other day for my trip to Kiev. I have had a lot of luck using the AAA travel agents so I used them again this time. I'm flying over night to Paris and then will arrive in Kiev in the early afternoon on a Thursday. My friend Lucy is picking me up at the airport, and Olesya is arranging an apartment. Hopefully I will be able to help the Big Family staff do the final shopping for the Pryluky trip and then go out to dinner with all of them. Friday is the Pryluky trip where I will finally get to meet my little angel, O. I've been sponsoring her for 6 months now, since Vira aged out of Pryluky and was moved to an internat not sponsored by Big Family. We had hoped to adopt either one of these girls, but we have no info on Vira, and there is conflicting info on O - supposedly a Spanish couple paid a large bribe to have O "held" for them. There is also an unethical/illegal hosting group that has promised O to an American couple. So, hopefully O will find a family, but we thought it best to move as far away from that mess as possible. We found M through a friend who had received a referral to her but could not accept it due to the girl's medical conditions (she didn't have good medical insurance). Saturday, Lucy and I are going to visit M in Kirovograd. I am SOOOO excited to meet my future-daughter!! I have tons of clothes and gifts for her and her classmates, and some friends who have adopted from M's orphanage have given me money and pictures to give to the director. I will probably go to the local market and buy meat and fruit for the kiddos - hopefully this will make a good impression on the director and she will favor our adopting of M. Finances - pretty bleak. We've been denied for every single adoption loan and don't qualify for any of the grants - our credit is too bad, but we also make too much money *sigh* can't win. We are considering filing bankruptcy to fix the credit - our credit is bad because we both lost our jobs a few years ago and then we had an extended under-employement/unemployement followed by a costly custody battle over Drew's oldest son. Now that we both have good, stable jobs and the custody battle is over, we are finding it impossible to dig ourselves out of this hole. All the new credit we have is positive and we are able to make all our payments, its just the older stuff we can't catch up on due to all the penalties. Credit counseling services don't really work but to reduce your interest rates, and they don't allow you to take on any new credit while you are in their "program." So bankruptcy seems the best - it will allow us to recover from this past debt rather quickly and will allow us to rebuilt the credit so that we can buy a home in the next two years.