A Walk With Our Buddies and the Nuclear Memorial

Anelya had just finished eating when we got to the baby house and they asked me to please take her outside again, which I was thrilled about. Much to our delight, Kalumkas was also allowed to go outside today, so we got to walk around with Tammy, Bob, Sarah, and Kalumkas, which made for a nice diversion from our usual laps around the baby house. Anelya is really loving her carrier now and plays with my face or sucks on the straps the whole time she is in it, unless I give her a pacifier.

While we were waiting for the Clark/Gilpatricks, we walked the halls and took some pictures. Aren't these hand-painted murals amazing? Anelya always wants to see what's happening so she is often trying to turn her head backwards to see where we are going, what the various noises are etc. However, in the interest of bonding and attachment, I keep her facing me. We're doing just fine ;-)

Here we are making our way around the baby house.

And stopping for pictures every 30 seconds.

Doesn't get much cuter than this...

Yesterday we bought Anelya a new flower toy at the swanky toy shop at Park City. She just loved it and played with it a lot once we finished our one hour of walking. Anelya managed to stay wide awake for the entire afternoon bonding session today, probably because of the new toy. I think I got busted letting her sleep the past couple of days because when I took her down, the caregiver asked me, "Has she slept?" "No, I replied, I kept her awake today." And she smiled and said good. Busted, Caesar!

After bonding, we went to the Semey Nuclear Memorial site, which you can see below. Up until the late 80's, the outskirts of Semey were host to the USSR's nuclear testing. They never told the people of Kazakhstan, they just did the nuclear testing and used the Kazakh people as guinea pigs to see what would happen to them. As a result, there were many children born with handicaps, deformities, etc. I am not worried about this for Anelya, in case you were wondering, but it is an important part of the history of where she is from and we wanted to learn about it.

As you can see, the monument is of a woman hovering over her baby to protect him from the mushroom cloud of nuclear smoke above. It's a very sad, but beautiful memorial. There are beautiful gardens around the park as well.

Here is a wedding tree where wedding parties come after the ceremony to tie a ribbon and make a wish for many children. Seriously, these people have like 8 stops to make before they can get to the reception. Remember the bottles at the tops of the tress 30 minutes away? Oy vay.

This is a traditional Kazakh design that we have seen in embroidered linens, on signs, and now on grass. I was kind of hoping that they would shave this into the side of Bob's head yesterday, but no such luck. That's the next post.

Here is a closeup of the monument.

And a stone map of Kazakhstan

We stopped at Bob's grocery store, which is the market right next to their apartment and bought some stuffed chicken and rice for dinner. Then we were dropped off at the hotel and did the first 8 of our 15 pages for our photo album that I will submit in court, documenting my time with Anelya. It's exciting to think that in 5 days bonding will be over and I will officially start being prepared for court. YES! I need everyone to start praying again for a smooth process and successful, uneventful day in court. I still don't know when the court date will be.

Tomorrow we will only get to see Anelya in the morning, as Olga has arranged for us to go on an "adventure", which sounds thoroughly terrifying, but fun indeed. We need something to give us a little kick in our step, so we are looking forward to this, although if I had been given a choice I would have stayed to see Anelya again. I will not be able to post until the evening, but I am sure you will all do just fine! Until then, dosvidanya!