Day Seventy

We're almost home!

Julia and I are leaving today for Almaty, Kazakhstan, destination: The Hyatt Hotel Almaty. Temps in the 80°'s. Coffee bar in the lobby. Julia Marian Miller by my side from sun up to sun down! And in less than one week, we will be home, and the new journey, our life as a family, will truly begin. My love to you ALL, but especially to Bruce and Austin who will have kept the home fires burning for 77 days! I can see you at the finish line...

Day Sixty-Eight

There's a little bit of dying with each significant departure and, truth be told, I'm not very good at it. If habits are established in childhood, then I'm impaired from the get-go. From my father, I inherited "transitional ambivalence" or the inability to gage when to leave or to move from one activity to another in a timely and meaningful fashion. From Dad, I learned to be late in arriving and late in departing and to feel badly about it on both ends. My mother, on the other hand is "the Abrupt Departer." To avoid the emotional complexity of leaving, she just disappears. Not a bad strategy but a bit preemptive and tending to leave those behind holding the proverbial "bag" of after-thoughts, of cautionary reminders or an intentional embrace. Left dangling like a participle. Like when the water shuts off and you have toothpaste in your mouth.

So, somewhere between not wanting to have to leave and wishing to simply disappear, I am bumbling toward my "near-death-like" departure with trepidation and despair. I am a walking zombie, preoccupied with leaving and with wanting to "do it right." To be in-the-moment. Authentic. But quite honestly, I'd like to avoid the pain. I just don't know how to graciously leave people, forever, while side-stepping the sadness. Especially friends who have selflessly cared for Bruce and me and others who quite literally saved our daughter's life. Then gave her to us. In good condition! It's been said that each good-bye builds the foundation for successive departures. All the more reason to do it well. Egad, I hate this part! I'll deal with it tomorrow...

On a completely different note, I'd say that "Victory Day" was a smashing success and although the skies remained ominous, it neither rained nor snowed. The entire city took to the streets, marching toward the Tomb of The Unknown Soldier in Victory Park, carrying carnations in denominations of two. Music bellowed from strategically placed megaphones and throngs of nationalists pushed their way to the base of the monolith, offering words of gratitude and tossing their flowers upon the pyre. Darryl, Marcy, Peter and I wandered in amazement at the enormity of the festivities. And though folks were picnicking on kabobs, beer and "army slop" in small congregations throughout the park, we could not, for the life of ourselves, figure our how to get food! So we left. The celebration spilled out of the Park onto main street toward the walking mall where more tents are erected, flags are flying, meat is grilling, beer is flowing and it looks like these Kazaks really know how to party! I mean commemorate. Predictably, I have returned to the hotel for a nap and a cup of coffee! And a blog update. So here goes...

Love to my dear family and all of my very loyal friends~ TTFN! Carrie

Day Sixty-Four

Did I say that the tile mosaics on the sides of random buildings are absolutely amazing? The first photo is just one example of a mosaic that I discovered while taking a short cut through an inner-city neighborhood while heading "home" from the Gros. Later that same day, I was again strolling somewhere for something and I happened upon the "Repetition Day" celebration in the center of town. From what I observed, hundreds of highschool students were engaged in mini marathons of varying distances. The major roads in Kostanai were cordoned off and the races all ended at the promanade or walking mall across from "Central Park." Hence, picture number two with the marching band at the finish line where shortly thereafter, awards were presented to students and their respective schools.

And the third picture, lest we forget, is the reason that I'm still here!

This weekend I have begun preparations for leaving Kazakhstan as I am scheduled to take Julia from the Delfin Baby Home on Friday, less than one week from today. We fly together to Almaty where we will stay at the International Hyatt Hotel until our final departure on Friday, May 18th. Bruce and I decided that it is best for Julia and I to leave Kostanai two days early (for the weekend) in order for us to adjust to one another and our surroundings before our scheduled meetings with the American Embassy on Monday and Tuesday.

Interestingly, our Almaty visit coinsides with the 63rd session of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP)! This means that the highest decision making body in all of Central Asia will be meeting for the first time and that more than 400 Central Asian delegates AND President Nursaltan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan will be competing with me for a table and a cab! But seriously, this is momentous and I am excited to be in Almaty at that time. Let me know if this event makes headlines or attracts media attention in the US. I am sure that Almaty will be hopping!

Sunday, May 6th, is Karen Swope's 48th birthday (Happy Birthday Karen!) and Wendesday, May 9th is "Victory Day" or "Defender of the Motherland Day," the 62nd Anniversary (1945) of the victory in "the Great Patriotic War" or Victory for Europe ("VE") Day. I shall gather with the allied forces in "Victory Park" and place flowers at the base of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier's Memorial. Then everyone drinks beer and eats kabobs. Or so I'm told. Much more to come in the days ahead... Love from us, for now, from Kostanai~ Carrie and Julia

Day Sixty-Three

Our days in Kostanai, Kazakhstan have been full of surprises! A first cookie. A walk in the park. Napping in the stroller with a dalmatian. Life in Bloomfield, New Jersey has been busy too but it's late in Central Asia so half of us are going to bed! We promise to "blog" more tomorrow. Happy weekend and much, much love~ Carrie and Julia, Bruce and Austin

Day Fifty-Nine

Julia and her two front teeth have left the Infirmary and are safely returned to Baby Room No. One. Clap! Clap! Clap!

Mother and daughter spent a delicious morning walking the grounds of the Delfin Baby Home. In the garden, on a clear, warm spring day, we talked about planting and the difference between annuals and perennials. Actually, "mother" did all of the talking while "daughter," feigning a slight interest, persisted in attempting to rip the buds off tree branches. Fortunately for the tree, Julia's own short limbs were engulfed in snow suit sleeves so damage was averted. She was notably more comfortable today and the tiny white ridges of her two lower "milk teeth" are more pronounced with each visit.

Tomorrow, May 1st, is a holiday in Kazakhstan, commerating ethnic and cultural diverstiy. As with International Women's Day (March 8th), and the traditional Kazak New Year and spring festival, Nauriz (March 22nd), the main street in Kostanai will be closed and there will be colorful displays of ethnic costumes, music, dancing and food. More yurts are also expected! Remember the yurt? These were the circular tents made of felt or animal skins affixed to collapsible frames and used by nomads in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. But you knew that.

Meanwhile, Bruce is waiting patiently for our return while working like a dog, spring cleaning the yard, preparing the baby's room, staining our back porch, answering inquiries about our Kazakhstan adventure, 'Google-ing' baby equiptment, touching base with friends and family and persistently vying for Austin's attention! Relatively speaking, life for me in Kostanai has been a vacation. I have loved the food, the beer, the people, the accommodations and the the exotic nature of this sacred place. Our babies birth land. But I'm now ready to come home already. I miss Bruce and our big kid, Austin. I miss my Mom, Reggie and all of you, our dear family and friends! Still hoping to be home by Mother's Day, I am sending my love on ahead, with gratitude and warm wishes ~ Carrie

Day Fifty-Seven

On my 57th day in Kostanai, Marcy, Darryl, Nellie (our translator/guide) and I boarded a bus which took us to another bus which brought us to a taxi station where we hired a car to drive south west to the iron ore mining capital of Kazakhstan. We ventured to "Rudney," deriving from the root word "rud," meaning ore in Russian.

Partly for the scenery, partly for the challenge of traveling in a foreign land and partly for the experience of exploring a new locale, we departed Kostanai at 1:30 PM on Saturday afternoon. Initially, we were amazed to discover that Kostanai is much larger than we had previously believed. Surrounding the downtown area, are sprawling suburbs offering a mixture of single family homes and high rise condominiums. There are no swimming pools, despite pockets of great wealth and the scorching, arid climate that prevails throughout the long, hot summer months. Once outside the city limits, for as far as the eye can see, lie endless fields of low cut grass, wheat or tilled dirt, preparing to birth to this year's vegetable harvest. Every few kilometers, in the distant pastures, thickly clothed sheep or brown cows were grazing. And as is customary for a predominant number middle income city dwellers, there are clusters of brick or wooden sheds on small parcels of farmland where people lease or own land for weekend fruit and vegetable farming.

On the outskirts of Rudney, the distant hills reveal evidence of strip mining. The mining of ore and coal, in addition to Kazakhstan's oil reserves, metallurgy and chemical production, play an important role in Kazakhstan's economy, employing 27 percent of the total labor force. Another 23 percent of the workforce is employed in agriculture with an emphasis on livestock and grain production.

Rudney is a small city or large village. It has extremely flat terraine, with wide streets, colorful metal store front facades and expansive tile wall murals displayed on many of the older, government buildings. As in Kostanai, Rudney also possesses numerous imposing, Soviet era metal statues, denoting the ore industry, military conflicts and the collective struggle of the common man. We walked for hours and hours but the sun doesn't set until after 9:00 PM so it simply felt like a v-e-r-y l-o-n-g d-a-y. Our final exploration was the new, local, three-story mall and the event center, replete with movie theater, disco, bowling alley, billiards and a Chinese restaurant. By 8:15 PM, we caught a bus for home which took us to another bus which dropped us off at the bottom of the promenade in Kostanai, one kilometer from our hotel. In a trance-like procession, we trudged the gradual incline just as the sun was setting in the west.

It was nice to get out and really nice to get back in! And we now know that we never could have done it without Nellie!

Day Fifty-Five

Julia has teeth! Upon arriving at the Baby Home this morning, Julia's caretaker showed me that her two front bottom teeth have broken through the gums! That's the good news. The bad news is that she has diarrhea, a fever and she is very uncomfortable. She cried on and off throughout my visit and it was nearly unbearable because there was nothing I could do to soothe her. She went back to the infirmary where they are monitoring her temperature and hopefully keeping her comfortable. So the first picture is of Julia, teething.

The next picture is the worst one in the series of me and the BEST one of Julia. Isn't that motherhood in a nutshell? And the last photograph is a shot from our balcony window, the scene Bruce and I and now "I" look out on everyday. It is a picture that we never want to forget. I just wish that I could include the sounds (Russian and Kazak), smells (boiled meat, open air barbecue, fresh bread, sour milk and old clothes!) and tastes (indescribable) of Kostanai!

In my ninth week in Kazakhstan, I am just now realizing that my ability to sustain positivity and a sense of adventure comes solely from the security of knowing that Bruce and Austin are taking care of our lives back home while preparing for Julia's arrival and my return with anticipation and love. This security is magnified by the love and support from our families and dear and loyal friends who are "keeping a light on" for us as well. Your love is the miracle, the muscle, the motivation and the meaning. Bruce and I both want you all to know how much we love you back!