Trip 2 to visit girls

So, we straightened out the "competition" over Oksana - sorta. The host mom is not interested in adopting Oksana, but the agency(s) involved in that hosting program are still spreading rumors about a Ukrainian family wanting to adopt Oksana...which is funny since the orphanage director confirmed that Oksana was not even legally released for adoption, nor was she registered. Which means that not only can we not adopt her, but neither can a Ukrainian family. Plus, according to the new State Department of Adoptions, only 10% of adoptions each year are to Ukrainian families (90% are international families)and of that 10%, 80% request a child under the age of 1 (which are not available to international families at all). So, Oksana has 0% chance of being adopted by a Ukrainian family, even when she finally is registered - which we are working on still. My friend, George, who works with Life2Orphans, tracked down Oksana's mom's last known address (given to him by the orphanage director) and she has not lived there for 3 years and no one knows where she is - ie she abandoned Oksana. So, the director is working with the local police department to file a sort of missing persons/abandonment report, which they will then use in court to have the judge terminate her parents rights. Once this happens, the director can file the adoption registration papers with the district level. After one month there, it goes to the region/oblast, and then one month later it goes to the national SDA database....then we have to wait one more year to adopt her...unless they change the laws, which is likely according to rumors. They are saying it will be reduced to a 6 month wait, not one year and maybe even no wait for kids over 5 yrs old. Since I last updated this the SDA also announced its grand opening and new policies about new dossiers - they are going to process the backlog of registered dossiers this fall, and then they will accept new dossiers in January 2007. Since we are not registered yet, we have to wait until January - which means some of our papers will expire and will need to be redone this fall and retranslated and resent. But so far the SDA seems to be keeping its primose - registered families are getting their appointment letters for September. They are also apparently favoring families who have "identified" or "known" children - ie through hosting programs, previous adoptions etc - we fall into this category! :) so hopefully this will bode well when they start accepting new dossiers too - there is rumor they will start accepting new dossiers for older known children starting in November...But in the mean time, we decided to go visit the girls in Ukraine - now we have plenty of time to save up money for the adoption, so we might as well spend some of what we have saved to visit and reassure them we are coming to get them...eventually. So, we leave this next weekend for Ukraine. Things started out bumpy in the planning, but thanks to good ol' George, things are now wonderful. He really came through for us and offered to go with us as a translator, made apartment arrangements, travel etc. AND he saved us tons of money. My only fear at this point is the whole plane ride to and from Ukraine. Not because of the "terrorist threat" - I guess it is related in a round about way though - I'm affraid of making our connections and losing our luggage. The main part of the flight I am worried about it the flight from Atlanta to JFK. We aren't flying into JFK - we are flying into Newark NJ and somehow we are transfering to JFK. We also have a short layover in NC - only 35 minutes! I like having more time between flights, but since its a domestic connection, it should be ok. I hope. We aren't bringing a whole lot of luggage and I'm even considering FedExing some of my "gifts" to George so we don't have to put them in our luggage. At least we arent driving to NY like we had originally planned. Talk about JetLag.

Competition?

I didn't realize that adoption was a race or competition. Let me back up and give you all the background. Oksana was brought to the US for a winter hosting program. Fine right? Normally, yes. The group that brought her here though was an unethical, treacherous group called Adopt a Miracle. They photo list children, which is illegal according to Ukrainian law. They often promise host families that they can guarentee the adoption of their host child, require them to sign a contract and a hefty up front deposit. I have heard two different stories - one is that the host mom did not want to pursue the adoption of Oksana. Great - good for us. The other story, which admittidly is cominng from AAM, is that the host mom IS trying to adopt Oksana....I also have one or two people (not host mom herself) saying that Oksana wants to be adopted by host mom....This is what I tell myself over and over so that I don't go mad:1. Host mom is reportedly an unmarried woman - Ukraine will put her dossier at the bottom of the stack when considering who will adopt a child. So, this gives Andrew and I am advantage.2. We have had ongoing and continuous contact with Oksana for over a year. This woman only spent 3 weeks hosting Oksana. Sure she had more "face" time with Oksana, but we have had more contact with Oksana and provided her more support in the long term. 3. AAM has admitted that the majority of their families DO NOT end up adopting the child they hosted - they are happy with the kid they adopt, but it is usually not the host kid. 4. AAM is notorious for having their adoptions fall through all together. They are a dishonest agency. With the reform of the Department of Adoptions in Ukraine, I doubt that any "connections" they had under the old, corrupt regime will no longer be there. They are also famous for lying to their clients, messing up paperwork etc. We have a good social worker and facilitator - this is an advantage for us.5. As far as I know, we have far more charity hours logged and many more "contacts" in Ukraine than host mom does. This will probably benefit us.Even with all this in our favor, I still am freaked out. I CAN NOT lose my daughter!!!! I think what is making this worse is that since the DA is not yet open, we can't have our facilitator (and our other contacts) check on Oksana's file, nor can they speak to the DA on our behalf and plead our case. I am sure once it opens and we have our represenatives talk to them, it will be a done deal in our favor. But it is still an unknown at this point, and could go horribly wrong. It just REALLY SUCKS that with 100,000 kids in orphanages there, this woman has to try and "compete" with us for one child!!! Pick someone else damnit!!! This one is ours!! One woman is saying she visited Oksana in April and Oksana asked about host mom and said she was waiting for host mom to adopt her....Oksana is 6, almost 7....she could very well be confused and be thinking of me, her sponsor Mom. Sponsor...host....very similar. Plus, we are both from America. Olesya at BFC says that Oksana asks about me by name every single time they visit Pryluky. Oksana always runs right up to Lesya as soon as she is in the door to ask about me. I asked Oksana about her hosting trip in January...she said she didn't like the lady she visited and she wanted ME to adopt her, not that lady. WTF am I supposed to believe?!?!On top of all this stress, there is still the fact that Americans have restrictions on them for adoptions there - Oksana does not meet the criteria of the restrictions - this rule has been bent in many cases, but who knows what the new DA will do. Will they remove the restrictions all together, will they amend them? Also, Oksana's orphanage director is now saying she isn't registered for adoption at all - in fact her mother still has parental rights to her. Oksana has two siblings that live with mom....I can believe that a mom and siblings exist, but what I can't believe is that she would have given up and abandoned Oksana and not had her rights terminated. Oksana has been in the orphanage system for a long time. Plenty of time to get her registered. I just want to scream!

Dossier Completed

So, we finally got all the paperwork together for the dossier. This includes:1.the homestudy2.state police clearance3.INS approval4.letters of employment for us both5.specific medical forms for each of us from our doctors6.letter of obligation (to reigster our kid with the Ukrainian embassy and file reports)7.petition to adopt/request to be registered as adoptive parents in ukraine (this also lists the info on the girls we are requesting8.power of attorney for our translator to act on our behalf in ukraineThe power of attorney was the last thing we were working on - we needed our translator's passport number, date of birth, address etc. and it took him awhile to get that to us as he was "in the field" helping another family. So, now I am waiting for Dani to fax the dossier to us, so I can scan it into pdf and then I will email it to our translator to check for errors. Once he gives us the ok, Dani will get the apostilles from the US government (verifies the notary stamps - basically an extra layer of legalization). Sasha, our translator, will start translating the dossier into Ukrainian and we will mail him the completed, stamped hard copy of the dossier in english - I think we send the original directly to the Ukrainian government and then he submits the ukrainian translation to them.The ukrainian government then has 10 or 20 days to register the dossier and assign us a number. They send us a letter with our registration number and a range of dates for an appointment. We have Sasha contact them and schedule the specific date for the appointment. Normally you want the earliest date possible and the first appointment of the morning, but in our case, we are hoping to adopt Oksana first and her "file" doesn't become available until August sometime, so we won't be able to "get" her until then, so our appointment will be in August hopefully. My friend Dima is talking to Oksana's orphanage director tomorrow about us adopting Oksana - hopefully she will be helpful and supporitive of us adopting her. I met Lidia while I was there in January, so she should remember me. I have also since January, arranged for her kids to get DVD players and movies, and I paid for a oven thermometer for their kitchen. Hopefully she will agree to write a letter of recommendation to the Ukrainian government and send us a copy for our dossier. We'd also like it if she told us the exact date Oksana becomes available and/or if she would reserve Oksana for us in the event that we can't get there on the exact date. An agency can't do this according to Ukrainian law, but the orphanage can, so there is no law being broke by doing this. My friend Gayle is back in Ukraine right now, completing the adoption of her second Ukrainian son, and she is planning on visiting Marina's orphanage in Kirovograd on Saturday. Her first Ukie son is from Marina's class/groupa, and she is trying to adopt another one of the kids from that class. While she is there she takes photos for me of Marina, and will deliver some gifts I sent for her. The hardest thing about getting gifts to Marina is that I don't have anyone I can trust to deliver the packages to her and no consistent way to verify if she gets the gifts. Oksana gets her gifts through the Big Family Adopt an Angel program that my friend Dima owns/runs. Since it is an organized charity trip, I get verification of my package arriving and photos of Oksana opening her gifts. Since Gayle is delivering my gifts to Marina this time, I will probably get photos of Marina getting her gifts. Gayle said she will also talk to Marina about the previous packages I sent, and about this illusive sister her caretakers say she has. As for the money - by adopting Oksana first, it will cut back on our costs - Marina's region has some unusual legal fees that they require that are not required anywhere else in Ukraine, so that was going to add $2000 on to the usual costs. Also, Marina's orphanage is 4 hours outside of Kyiv, while Oksana's is only 1.5 hours away. This affects travel expenses. Andrew has gotten an offer for some side work - scoring sleep studies for a local sleep medicine lab. It will pay $35 per study he scores, and he can do one report in about an hour - so he says he wants to try and do about 25 studies per week (3 per week night, and 5 each weekend day). All this will be untaxed (we pay taxes on it at the end of the year) so it will bring in an estimated $3500 per month towards to adoption....so if all goes well this will pay for it all. I am a pessimist, so I am still holding on to our other options - my wonderful aunt and uncle who agree to give us a 2K loan, our social worker, Dani, who agreed to give us a loan, and Andrew could probably get some money from the doctors he works for. We also plan on having a "money shower" - instead of bringing baby gifts, people donate $20 or so. A girl I work with also wants to collect money from people in the office. Every little bit will help. I want to have 10K in our pocket (literally) when we go - well, maybe 6K since we will need 1K for airline tickets to get there, and we can wire the 3K for our translator's salary ahead of time. So, the baby shower. I'm hoping to have it Memorial Day weekend. I've got the invites already. Just need to send them out and then start planning the party.

INS Approval!

So, we got our INS approval - YAYYY!!! This means our American-side of the prep/approval process is complete. All we have now is to finish up our dossier, have it sent to the Ukrainian government, have it translated into Ukrainian, have the translated version sent to the UA govt, and then wait.....Right now the UA government is switching control of the adoption center from one ministry to another. Rumors say that this new center and staff will be a BIG improvement - hopefully less corrupt, more accomodating, and the new minister has pledged to double the number of adoptions processed. Our big concern is the money. We need to pay for: our plane tickets there and back, our hotel while there for 3-4 weeks, food/spending money, 3K for the translator's services, $1800-2K for the required lawyer in K-grad, orphanage donation of approx $500 which is pretty much required, US Embassy visa fee of $400 per child....plus, we will not be working those 3-4 weeks, thus no paychecks except for what vacation and sick leave we can use up. Both of us are also looking into working out some sort of teleworking agreement with our work so we can get paid for some of our time while we are there. We won't be "busy" everyday - alot of the time spent there is waiting....waiting for signatures, waiting for paperwork, waiting for a court date etc. AND while we are out of the country, our bills still need to be paid. We are going to try and work out something with our apartment complex so we don't have to pay rent the month we are gone. One of the things we were counting on as far as money fell through - our tax return. Normally we have gotten $1500 back - but due to a series of circumstances, this year we OWE $150. So, now I am considering taking on a second job ugh. I've learned in my life that you can't count on other people to help you out - you can only depend on yourself. We have a few people - family and friends - who have said they will help and loan us money. We CAN save alot of it ourselves, but it would take time and time is not something you always have control over in an international adoption - they invite you when they have an opening! not when you have enough money necessarily LOL. Plus, every month our little girl sits in that orphanage is a month she could have been in a loving home with us.

Passport in hand, INS application complete

So, alot has happened since my last post. Andrew's passport arrived in the mail the weekend we were moving from one apartment in our complex to another. We celebrated by treating ourselves to a steak dinner at Longhorn. We sent in our INS I-600A application. Dani sent along our completed homestudy, and we went for our fingerprints this past Friday. The fingerprinting center is seperate from the INS office I went to previousely. This was a little DMV-like office - sets of chairs in groups, but what the different groups are for you have no clue because there are no signs. The officer who checks you paperwork just tells you where to stand - you still have no clue how he's deciding where people go. Our appointment was for 9am, but we got there at 8 and got printed at 830am. They have one little form for you to fill out, then you check in with the fingerprinting clerk, and one of the fingerprinting people comes and gets you. They do the prints, a supervisor(?) comes and verifies their work and asks you some questions, and off you go. I'm going to call Officer Sandino sometime this week to "make sure" she got everything....hehe. Hopefully she will expedite our application since Marina is considered "sick." Once we get our approval letter, we can get our dossier finished up. I can't get ahold of Dani to find out where she is in that process. We sent her the remaining documents, but I never got confirmation from her that she got them ok. She then needs to get all the documents notarized and apostilled. After that....we have no clue who is going to be our translator/facilitator in country, so we don't know who will translate our dossier into Ukrainian. We can't get registered as adoptive parents until the dossier is translated and submitted to the NAC in Kyiv. We are probably going to submit it to the NAC afer the changeover in their leadership on May 1. So, our two big problems right now - money and facilitation team - but these are tied together....the amount of money we are going to need is directly related to who we chose to use for translation...the prices vary SO much. I just can't decide....you can't decide based purely on price - what if that person has no connections with NAC and can't get your documents submitted? You are out of luck at that point. I think it boils down to trust - if you trust someone, you probably trust them not to rip you off, and you trust them to make sure you get your kid.

Ukraine trip part 2 - Day in Kyiv and Trip to meet M

The next morning, Saturday, I was met at my apartment by BF Staff member, Sasha. He offered to show me around Kyiv for the day and take me shopping. We first went to MegaMarket - a Western-style shopping center.....kinda. It was in a two story brick factory looking building - the sign at the road was very obvious, but the enterance to the building was not....down an alley and around a corner to a small unmarked set of sliding glass doors. There was grocery store downstairs and a department type store upstairs. There was an "L" shaped area around each of these main shops that had flea-market type booths, each rented by different types of vendors; one sold nice men's dress clothing, another sold automatic weapons (eek!). This store had everything - BUT selection within a type of item was small - they had hair-dryers, but only 2 to choose from, not 10 like we are used to in the states. Since my luggage had still not turned up, I needed to replace my gifts for Marina. I think I spend about $75 USD (they took my visa debit card too!) and I got her: a insulated down coat with rabbit fur trim, a long sleeved shirt, pink heart slippers, a pink poodle stuffed toy, a Barbie doll, a Barbie coloring book, a think Disney anthology of Princess stories, and thick stockings. While we were there Sasha and I took down prices of various items, requested by the US sponsors, to update the BFC online shop. He also took me to a neat little book shop, right across the street from my apartment - I got 3 of the Harry Potter books in Ukrainian! All three cost less than $20 total. Since he doesn't have a car, we took public transport - the shuttle buses were neat and the metro was beautiful! Each cost less than a quarter to use. He took me to Independance Square and we walked around there a bit, the underground Western-style mall, and then we walked to some of the nearby cathedrals. They are so gorgeous! Light blue walls with big golden domes! We found some street vendors around one of the cathedrals and I did my souvenier shopping. "TAK!" scarves, matryoshka dolls, little hand-sewn dolls in traditional Ukrainian dress...Exhausted from all the walking, Sasha dropped me off at my apartment and I went right to sleep. The next morning I had blisters LOL :)Sunday: Dima picks me up bright and early - its still dark outside. I go to get in the jeep and there is an unexpected person with Dima! Vladimir doesn't speak a word of English and he is what most people would think of when they think of a Russian man...olive skin, black hair, very Russian looking mustache and beard, thick build etc. Dima says that Vladimir is coming along to "make sure the doors of the orphanage are open..." uhhh....okayyyyy. So he's our thug for the day? LOL Nice enough guy though - or at least he seems that way...I don't speak Russian and he doesn't speak English, but he seemed like a pleasant guy. Very diplomatic while he was negotiating our way into the orphanage and when asking for directions etc. So, after a long drive, we make it to the city of Kirovograd. Still, we have no real idea of where the specific orphanage is and this is a good sized city...we only know the name of the orphanage and the director's name. After driving around in circles for a bit, we arrive. There are little kids playing in the snow inside the safety of the orphanage fence. Dima speaks a bunch of Ukrainian, confirms this is Barvinok and Mila is the director and we are ushered inside. We go up to a classroom and they begin bringing little girls named M out to me - I guess its a common name and the teachers don't always know their last names. I'd say "no, that is not her, she is 8 years old, here is picture of her..."etc. Finally one of the teachers knew who I was talking about and send some of the kids to fetch the correct M. I'm coming down the stairs and this little girl comes running up, bundled to the ears in snow clothing....They ask "is this her?" - its hard to tell with the hat and scarf and all....so they motion for her to pull off her hat. And there she is...my angel! I think they tell her I'm here to visit her, and she smiles, takes my hand and starts to lead me to her classroom so she can take off her jacket and such. I guess I walked too slow since she and her little friends take off at a run down the hall, chattering the whole way. I catch up and she is stading in a little locker room taking off all her snow clothes. She goes into the main classroom and starts playing with a broken music box with two of her friends. She seems shy at first. Dima explains that I have gifts for her and I start pulling out the things I bought at MegaMarket. She seems so happy, but still shy. She nuzzles in the rabbit fur of her new coat, letting it tickle her nose. Soon, a crowd forms around M. Everyone is passing around her gifts and looking at them. Thankfully the locket we had bought and had our pictures put in had been safe in my carry on bag, so I gave that to her - I put it around her neck and clasped it, and then opened it for her to see the photos. I told her "Mamma and Pappa". She brightened up at this and kept showing her friends her necklace. I doubt many of the kids there have golden lockets from their parents. I just hope it doesnt get stolen. I gave her a photo album with pictures of her room, our home, our family...and a postcard book of Atlanta. All the kids seemed to like these things the most. I just sat back and watched her with her little friends. Then it was lunch time and time for us to go. M said thank you (spaseeba) and was being all shy as we went to leave. Just as we got out of her classroom into the hall, she comes running out and hugs my legs! I squat down and hug her back and kiss her cheek. She keeps saying somethingin Ukrainian over and over....I have no clue what it was, but I think she was happy. I found out her birthday had been a week before (January 21, and now she's 9), and this was probably the best birthday she had had in a long time - they don't get gifts or parties at an orphanage. We left Barvinok, and headed out of the city. We stopped for lunch and to visit with Dima's grandfather's friend, then back to Kyiv. The airport called on the drive back and said they had one of my bags. We stopped by the airport and picked it up (after much arguing with the customs clerk).Next morning Dima picked me up and dropped me at the airport. My trip home was uneventful - thank God!

My trip to Ukraine

So, things are finally settling down after my trip to Ukraine and I've had time to digest everything that happened....I am also now coming down with strep throat - a gift from the little orphans LOLMy adventure started on Wednesday January 25th when I arrived at the Atlanta airport in the evening. Bags were checked and I made it through security with no problems. Got some Starbucks and waited to board. The flight to Paris was long, but they had nice movies to watch and the flight was empty enough I could stretch out and sleep a bit. Arrive Paris - Thursday morning. By the time we landed and they bused us to the terminal, the flight to Kyiv had already closed! To top it off, there are no signs tellilng you where to go in Paris and there were no more flights to Kyiv that day. I was in hysterics on the floor. The French are very rude and have absolutely no concept of customer service. Thanks to two orthodox jews who were also trying to get to Kyiv, I got onto a flight to Prague, which would then connect to Kyiv that same evening. I had Andrew call Dima and let him know the change in arrival time. I get to Kyiv and they have lost both my checked bags with my gifts for the kids in them. Dima is waiting for me and takes me on a short driving tour of Kyiv and then we pick up the key to my apartment. I settle in and go to sleep, finally at my destination. Yura arrives at 7:30 am the next morning to pick me up and take me to the Big Family Chairty offices so we can get on the road to Pryluky. At the office I meet Sasha (cutie!) and we drink good strong coffee while waiting for Dima and Olesya to arrive. Once everyone was there, we all loaded into two cars, packed with parcels, and drove the two hours to Pryluky. We stopped at one of the only gasoline stations in Ukraine that has a mini-market. I get a Vanilla Coke, an Energy drink to bring back to the states for my husband (he lives on Monster energy drink), and three Ukrainian rock CDs (for my mom). I start filming the village of Pryluky, and the approach to the orphanage - I probably filmed the car seats as I was learning the buttons LOL. The playground was buried in snow and the enterance to the orphanage was unassuming - like many things in post-soviet Ukraine. The caretakers and director are there to greet us, and the boys begin bringing the parcels in to the lobby in front of the director's office. The caretakers then gather the parcels for the children in their classes and return to their classrooms. Olesya then gets permission to bring me to meet my angel, O . We go upstairs as her class has been merged with another groupa due to the lack of heat in her normal classroom. Standing at the classroom door, they call her out - up walks this TINY little girl with long black hair, pulled back in a pony tail, in a fluffy red sweater! Then she asks the most heart breaking question possible -"Are you going to be my Mamma and take me with you?" - I was almost in tears! I had Olesya tell her, "no, I wish I was your Mamma and could take you with me, but I'm not allowed to right now." On top of my luggage being lost, Big Family had mistakingly given O's December parcel to the kids at Borzna! So I had no gifts for O, except what I could scroung out of my backpack. Thankfully, I had made sure to put her necklace in there for safe-keeping! I also had a game-boy that I gave her. Olesya explained to O that the necklace symbolized my relationship with her - two hearts connected forever! O liked her gifts, and we went out with her caretaker to locate a jacket that we thought may have been from the misplaced parcel. O is a very stubborn and spirited child! Just like me...LOL. The jacket was not the one I had sent, but during the search I learned alot about O - no one is trying to adopt her, according to the caretaker. She also doesn't remember any parents and has no idea how long she has been at the Detsky dom - for as long as she could remember she said. I also gave my disposable camera to O and she loved taking pictures with it - I took the camera when she was done, and told her I would get it developed and send her copies of the pictures. I gave her tons of hugs and kisses and Olesya took tons of pictures of the two of us together. The kids then ate lunch and laid down for a nap. We all waited in the directors office, discussing the kids, and cataloguing the "all children" gifts. I then tried to video as many of the groupas as possible as they were waking up from their naps - but the camera died! I still visited many of the groupas and talked to the kids - to get impressions and stories to bring back to their sponsors. We all then said good bye, and went to the village for lunch.Olesya helped me order, and I got borscht and fried potatoes (hashbrowns). Dima also ordered Vodka. Sahsa played bartender, and Dima taught me the "proper" way to drink vodka - straight, chased by warm borscht! My eyes were watering and I almost coughed. I was tipsy the whole was back to Kyiv. Back at my apartment I watched Ukrainian news and music TV, took a bath in hot brownish/yellow water, and then went to bed. Continued in part 2.

Good News!

Andrew spoke to the CSE office in Escambia county Florida and I guess having the woman in Tallahassee put pressure on them worked!! They agreed to release his passport! They are still arguing the arrearage amount, but at least they, grudgingly, agree that it is unfair to hold his passport while the amount is disputed and unverified. Also, my friend Mary finally got her registration letter! So much has been going on with the status of adoptions in Ukraine and Mary has already been through so much grief, I was worried for her. My friend Chad is still waiting for an appointment, last I heard. All of us are trying to adopt "hard-to-place" kids, so hopefully our adoptions will go smoothly. All the rumor and news around the new ministry is positive, so hopefully we can complete our adoption by September. Sooner if we can get a grant :)

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.