Tuesday - the continuation of Hurry up and WAIT!

Tuesday was another fun day in Ukraine! We had to get up at 12:45am to let our translator into the apartment - she had just gotten off of the train. We left the apartment at 7:45am to hurry and get some unknown piece of paper to take to the city where "O" was born. We got in a car driven by Yana's friend, Tolic. We start off by going to another mystery building - adding the ever present "rush fee" in a plain white folded piece of paper, and then we sit and WAIT! Apparently - the fee we paid does not include them opening early! haha! So we wait an hour - then go back, pick up some necessary paper and then proceed to the city where "O" was born. The drive was interesting... it reminded me of the Snoqualmie Valley, before all the development of course, there were HUGE plowed fields and orchards the whole way. The drive took about an hour and a half. We got to the city and then went to the office of unknown name - apparently some Civil records office. Paid for the "rush" - which instead of a few hours was supposed to be 15-20 minutes for a birth certificate! Well, apparently the typewriter (no that is not a typo!) broke and they needed someone to fix it. UGH. So - after the hurry and wait we got back in the car... Tolic was a little irked that it took a few hours instead of minutes... so he drive back to Zap. at Mach 3. Seemed like one near-death experience after another! I swear people here have no sense of "personal space" when they drive!
We got back to the city and then had to haul butt to get things notarized, and the passport application turned in so that we could have the passport for "O" by 5pm. Things had a way of working out - and we got the passport, had a quick dinner, since we had not eaten since 9am, and then hauled off to the orphange to pick up "O"!
We got to the orphanage at 6:15pm... we had to be on our train at 7:15pm - so the clock was ticking! We had "O" dressed and swept out of there before she could even have an idea of what was going on! Of course the caretakers stopped us to remind us of the donation they wanted us to make to her groupa... like we had time to pick up an electronic scale! haha! So, John threw a US $50 at her - which totally made her happy! And we hurried to the train station!
Lucky for us, the train was late! We got on the train at 7:30pm... Yana got called to head to another region to help another family - so she sent us back to Kyiv all by ourselves!
The train went pretty well.... O had to sleep with me on the bunk. Needless to say, she only screamed at the top of her lungs for about 45 minutes before she feel asleep!
What a day! But, she is officially ours! What a relief! One step closer to home!