The night before we went home I thought I would go down to
the gift shop in the hotel and see if I could get some small souvenirs to bring back for the other kids.
The shop in the lobby was small and filled with many beautiful things.
The prices didn't seem overly expensive. As a matter of fact most of them seemed down right reasonable.
I chose several nesting dolls, 2 crystal key chains and a crystal
with a beautiful ballerina that had been lazered into the center.
I took the things to the counter where the well-dressed lady asked
if wanted the total in rubles or euros.
Well, rubles I suppose, I mean after all...that's what they were
marked in wasn't it?
The total came to over 4200 rubles.
OH NO.... hang on a second.... 4200? That's, um, let's see. I was
desperately trying to do the math in my head but seemed to have lost all ability to think.
It turned out the prices were marked in Euros and Rubles were marked
in tiny little print up in the corner of the price tag. Who bothers to read the fine print? The items I thought were $5
each were actually closer to $30.
I stuttered and stammered and basically stood there with a dopey
look on my face. The lady behind the counter raised her eyebrow and asked if I was OK. I too embarrassed to say I couldn't
read a price tag, so I simply handed over my credit card, said Thank You and slunk upstairs. My little shopping expedition
to get "a few small things for the kids" had totally backfired into a $150+ purchase.
You can bet the kids weren't getting their hands on those $50 nesting
dolls.
The next morning at 4 AM our driver arrived to pick us up in a dark
Mercedes sedan and whisked us to the airport through the dark and quiet streets where we discovered it was still closed.
Yes, that's right, the entire airport was closed. It opened at 5
AM and before we knew it we were on board and heading home.
We stopped in Frankfurt where they confiscated my nail clippers
from my carry on (I've taken those through countless security checks but apparently Germany is much more strict). They also
mentioned at every check point that our last name (Zucker) means Sugar in German. By the time the 6th person pointed
it out, it had lost its novelty. Everyone seemed to think it was quite humorous.
Our next stop was Detroit before we got our last plane home.
We went through customs there and then had some time to get some
food and relax for about an hour. I took Jeffrey to the food court while Jeff made some phone calls now that our cel phones
worked again.
I came back with some sandwiches, cookies and drinks and sat down.
Jeff was looking out the window quietly.
Hi, I said.
Hi, he said.
So did you get in touch with everyone?
Yes.
Is everything OK?
He turned to look at me with a tear in his eye.
He's gone.
I knew immediately that he meant his father had passed away. We
had been keeping in contact with his mom and uncle via e-mail during the time we were gone and we knew his father did not
have long.
I'm sorry was all I could manage to say.
I looked around us. 100's of people milling around, some trying
to get seats, some talking and laughing. Completely unaware of what we were feeling. I couldn't bring myself to let go
and cry.
Jeff looked at me and I looked at him and we hugged and tried
to shut out the world for just a moment.
They called us for boarding and we got swept up in the mass of people
and before we knew it we were taking off on our last plane ride home.
That weekend we had to unpack from one trip and immediately pack
to go to Las Vegas for the funeral.
I was jet lagged and cranky but by the time we got home again 5
days later we had re-adjusted to our own time zone.
Thus began 2 months of waiting. 2 months of worrying. 2 months of
checking my emails daily hoping for some news. Any news.
All I got for the most part were emails telling me I needed another
piece of paperwork. Emails telling me no news yet.
And one problem after another. Jeff's passport was expiring.
We didn't want to have to redo his passport because our coordinator told us if we redid it, then it would have a different
number and the Russian government would be upset and it might cause too many paperwork snafus. Russian adoption is one big
snafu from start to finish so we didn't need to add any new ones. But we were worried we couldn't secure a visa because
of the rules of how much time you need left on your passport.
In the end, after much sweating and worrying we were granted
a visa. I don't know how, but Thank You Russian Connections Travel Agency and who ever you knew that got it approved.
We had a court date set for April 12th Tuesday morning and purchased
plane tickets accordingly only to have it changed 2 days before to the following Friday, April 15th.
We changed our plane tickets at great cost, simply because it would
have cost more to stay in the hotel for those extra days. Monday before we were set to leave on Tuesday night I got an email
telling me the judge wanted 2 more pieces of paperwork. I spent the better part of the day scrambling to get the paperwork
I needed, getting them notarized and taking them to the county to have them certified.
We were downtown getting them apostilled on the way to the airport
on Tuesday. Talk about cutting it close.
As we sat on the plane taking off I simply could not believe that
we were on our way. I spent quite a bit of the plane ride worried that I had forgotten something.
Thankfully that turned out not to the case.
