Happy Alexander

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Alarm clock goes off at 7:00am, so that I am ready by 8:30am to go with Ira to the passport office. We hope that they are open. Ira found out that there is police holiday, like our memorial day, (Ukrainians have many special holidays) and the passport works with the police dept. We also need Alexander to take a picture at the passport office. Our faithful driver picks us up at 8:30am, we then go and pick up Alexander, then to the passport office. And of course they are closed. Ira asked what do you propose to do. I say I don’t know, she says we could go back to the apartment until 1:00pm, at this time is Alexander’s lunch time. So we go back to apartment and surprise Jacob and Mother. Alex is very excited. Jacob shows him games on the computer, Alex plays with the PSP, we give him another dinosaur egg and have him try on his new shoes. The shoes fit. Yea! We also show him his new coat and clothes. Ira is trying to think what she can do to help get the documents finished. She says she would like to try to see if the Registration office is open, which I say of course, go and please try. She and Alex leave a little after 11:00am. She is going to drop Alex off at the boarding school and then see if the Registration office is open. After they leave Jacob and I go to the market and I also want to find something for Mother’s cough. I write down in Russian cough drops and cough syrup on a card. I show this to the pharmacy person and she gives me a couple of things, there isn’t any English on the packages but I hope it helps Mother. Ira came back later that afternoon to say that the Registration office is closed. Another translator that Ira works with has a mother here in Kherson. This lady has been sick and Ira wanted to go visit her and her grandbaby. Ira ended up spending the night. I sure she had a better bed to sleep on than the one here in our apartment. We have been without radiator heat all day and you can tell a difference with using just one electric heater in one room, but we are managing all right.

Sunday, December 21

We have snow on the ground and it seems to be heavier than the last snow. It still is not very much. We were able to listen to John Weaver’s sermon on Thanksgiving this morning for our worship service. Ira arrived back around noon and we mention that we have been informed by our travel agent that we need to pick a date. We had originally picked December 22nd because the airline required that we pick a return date. We knew that it would have to be changed, so Ira says it will take a week to get the Ukrainian passport, and the best guess for travel would be January 3rd. We will see what unfolds tomorrow and hopefully have good news. Ira books an apartment in Kiev, because of the holidays many people are traveling to Kiev. She books it for December 24. We are also concerned about getting train tickets. They have been also in short supply. Ira and I decide to go to the train station to see if they have tickets for December 23rd. We take a trolley bus to the train station and we are fortunate that they have 5 tickets available. We need go the market to buy some more chocolates and coffee to give to the various officials that Ira will talk to tomorrow. Ira eats supper with us but the lady she spent the night with really wants her to come back. So, sweet Ira goes to visit her again