April 30

Today when we got to Umit, we were told that they couldn’t find the key to the room we usually bonded with Alina in. We headed off to the Music room with the Robey’s… until we were told that there was a music teacher who had lessons in there today. So we all ended up outside. It’s a good thing that it was a beautiful day again today.

Alina was fairly quiet for most of the time today. She was more lively for a little bit, and she definitely likes to bounce up and down. It’s good because she needs to strengthen her legs. She also said a few syllables today: mama, baba, and tsss. She said mama a bunch of times. Of course, I would get the camera out to record it and she’d stop. As soon as I would stop recording, she would say it again. It’s like she knew I was recording and didn’t want there to be any evidence.

We found out more news today about our trip. May 1st is a national holiday, something about the celebration of nationalities in Kazakhstan. So the next three days are one big holiday celebration. While this is interesting, it also means that the baby house is closed and we can’t visit again until Monday. In addition, we also found out that the first Monday we were here, or the day we met Alina, doesn’t really count for bonding, so we’re one day further behind than we had originally thought. So as it is right now, we need to bond with her from Monday-Thursday next week to complete our 14 days. Then we need to go to Guardianship Council, which only meets on Monday. We’ve been told that we will do that on the 11th, which means we won’t fly back until the 13th.

The news hit me a bit hard today. I kind of expected that we would have to wait until the 13th anyway, but was holding out some hope that we could be done on the 4th and travel back on the 6th. The good news is that we get to spend more time with Alina. The bad news is that it pushes everything back a week, including our court date which is still TBD. It also means a week more of expenses here, which is a bit frustrating. In the grand scheme of things, a week really isn’t that big of a deal I suppose, so we’ll just have to deal with it. I guess this is another one of those times when you need to listen to the agency when they say that you need to be flexible and patient.

After the baby house we went to Aral again for lunch. It’s nice and cheap, and the food is pretty good. It was a beautiful day to sit outside and people watch. I had the manty for the first time. They are a lot like Chinese pot-stickers or gyoza; dumplings filled with some sort of meat mixture. We took a picture of them to put into the food blog, whenever I get around to writing it. :-)

We went for a stroll around the block after lunch, and came across a street of stores the next street over from the hotel (the street parallel to Tole Bi, in front of the hotel). There we found a bakery, more food stores (called Central Grocery), a few cafes, and more money changing places. We stopped for a few items and some ice cream and then wandered back to the hotel.

We’re hoping that the weather is nice tomorrow so we can head out and watch the celebration.