RELAXING DAY!!

We don’t have a lot going on today. We can’t see Jacob today. Andrew is gone. We are moving this afternoon to a different apartment where we can wash clothes. Hopefully we will be able to move one more time while we are here so we can get an apartment with 2 bedrooms so Andrew can stay with us. We have to pay for his travel and accommodations. It helps if he stays with us. Since we don’t have a lot going on today I thought I would try to post some information that would to helpful to those families traveling here to adopt.

I having been reading blogs for 2 years and learned a lot and talking with people. I know each region is probably different but some things don’t change. First, if you want bottled water that isn’t carbonated ask for water no gas (which is the one with the light blue cap, not dark blue). I read they don’t have toilet paper here. They do in hotels and the apartments. They don’t in the squat pots, which is nothing more than a hole in the floor. The term squat pot came from Laurie which has been to Africa and that is what they are called there. The port-a-potties don’t have TP either and you have to pay to use them. They are about 10 cents. Also you have to pay to use some of the squat pots. I would suggest bringing the little travel packs of Kleenex.

We were told to bring water and crackers, which is a good idea. Thanks, Donna. We brought a little too much though. I would bring 2-4 bottles. You can buy it in Kyiv.

The supermarket that we went to in Kyiv had pretty much everything we have at home. We brought coffee, sugar, creamer, etc. Their coffee is stronger and they sugar isn’t as sweet though.

The apartments in Kyiv run about $80 per night. TGIFriday’s and McDonald’s are about the same price.

I need to clarify about the taxis I mention earlier. The price per trip isn’t bad. The expensive part is the amount of time we are using them. We aren’t close to the orphanage, or the Inspector, or McDonald’s (which James has to have). We spent 7.5 hrs with our taxi driver one day. Then yesterday we went over 400 km. We have negotiated a price of 35 cents per km.

The Internet Cafes are cheap. It’s about 20 cent per hour here in Simferopol. I don’t know the price in Kyiv. We used wireless and it didn’t cost us anything.

Skype.com is wonderful. I can’t say enough about it. It is 4 cents to connect and 2 cents per minute to call home. It helps tremendously with the homesickness. It’s easy to download and to connect. Thanks, Clark and Jenny for telling us about it. If you don’t bring a laptop I did notice that the computers at the Internet Café have Skype on them. You would probably just have to setup an account.

If you don’t know the blog website are free to use. I do know that blogcity.com is not user friendly. The one we are using, which is blogspot.com is user friendly. I don’t know about any of the others.

We have a DVD player in our apartment, which will play the movie but it doesn’t have audio. Andrew, our translator explained there is a difference in the configuration of the audio of US vs. Europe. We did bring some to play in our laptop but we haven’t had time to watch any. If you bring any I would suggest just a few. The luggage gets pretty heavy moving as much as we have, especially with all the stairs.

I hope I haven’t overwhelmed you with information. If anyone has any questions that I have thought to address send them to me in the comments. I will answer anything I can.

Joann – We mentioned looking at pictures on your blog on March 31, 2005. I must have overlooked the address. Can you please send it to me?

Signing off for now.

James, Teresa, & Jacob