"Because it's Ukraine..."

This is quickly going to become our mantra here in Ukraine.

We just returned from our SDA appointment. They were a bit late and didn't see us until after 11:30.

The Ukraine social worker brought out Natasha's file and we read through it with Nadia (our interpreter). There was nothing new in the file that we didn't already know. There was only one thing that popped up as a concern and that was that Natasha's older sister is not yet 18. More on that later.

While reading through Natasha's file, the social worker went to find Pasha's file. She returned and said that she could not find it. After multiple trips to the computer and out of the office to the "place where all adoption files are kept" (don't you envision this huge room with file cabinets lining the walls to the ceiling?), she returned with his file. It turns out that the birth date we had for him was off by a year. He was born in November 1997, not 1996! So, instead of turning 13 in November, he will only be turning 12. This is great since Benjamin can truly be his "older" brother now. :)

However, when our SDA social worker returned from getting Pasha's file, a lengthy discussion ensued regarding Natasha's older siblings. Her brother is not a problem, since he is 20+ years old. As I said above, the older sister is still 17 and will turn 18 at the end of October of this year. The social worker made calls to the internat (orphanage) to confirm a few things and found out that Natasha's sister is actually still living at there. Here's where the problem lies. They will not separate siblings and since the older sister is still there, we cannot get a referal for just Natasha. Ugh. "Because it's Ukraine..."

After discussing with Nadia (our translator) and Oleg (our facilitator), the current plan is to get a referral for Natasha and her sister and then a separate referral for Pasha. We know that Natasha's sister does not want to be adopted, so we will have to get her to sign off on that when we get to the Kherson region. We want some assurances that there will be no "glitches" preventing this from happening when we get to Kherson, and will hopefully have more info on that later today. But, we're also keeping in mind that "things happen because it's Ukraine..."

Also, while we are approved for three children in our dossier, we came to the SDA only looking for referrals for two non-sibling children. It turns out that the SDA does not typically give multiple referals for non-siblings during a single appointment. They sometimes "bend the rules" (as was going to be the case in our situation), and provide two referrals for non-siblings during a single SDA appointment, but when the issue with Natasha and her older sister came up today, we were told we would have to get another SDA appointment to get the referral for Pasha. (Why? Because it's Ukraine, of course... :)

BTW, the good news is that Pasha is registered and has an adult (aged-out) sibling. So getting the referral should not be a problem.

The bad news is that we have to first get the referrals for Natasha and her sister and then have a second SDA appointment to get the referral for Pasha. So, it looks like we will be in Kiev for at least another 2 or 3 days.

The SDA is discussing our situation this afternoon and will hopefully expedite the referral for Natasha and her sister and the next SDA appointment to get the referral for Pasha. We are supposed to hear from Nadia and Oleg sometime this afternoon between 4 and 6 PM. We'll blog an update then.

If you would, please pray specifically for the following:

1. That the SDA would allow us to get the referral for Natasha and her sister tomorrow.
2. That the SDA would allow us to have the second SDA appointment tomorrow or Friday.
3. That the SDA would provide the referral for Pasha on the same day as the appointment so we don't have to stay in Kiev over the weekend.
4. That there would be no issues with the Kherson district courts for separating Natasha from her older sibling.
5. That Michele gets a good night's sleep tonight (she slept very poorly last night).

We will give more info as we have it.

Thanks,

Bruce