So much has happened! There were 12 families adopting from Cambodia October who had visas denied for their children due to accusations of facilitators trafficking, buying and stealing baby girls to help "meet the demand" of Americans wanting to adopt baby girls. Last wed. December 19, the TV show 20/20 aired a segment about it. Thursday and Friday, all politicians with any power at all were hammered with phone calls, e-mails, and faxes', trying to get the INS to give these children visa's to come home. On Friday, Dec 21, President Bush Issued Humanitarian Visa's with conditions. Shortly after that, the INS announced that effective immediately, with the exception of those 12, and the 40 appointments that were already scheduled for January, ALL Cambodian adoptions are to be suspended until who knows when!
We have spoken with Kimberly, our AWAA coordinator, and she has recommended we try the Kalmykiya program. We really don't want to go to Russia, and the Ukraine is out because we can't be away from home for 3+ weeks. Kalmykiya is a part of Russia, but we would only have to go for 2 weeks. So, our next step is to look into Kalmykiya.
We learned the other day that Russia passed a law that requires all adoptive parents to travel twice for their adoptions. The first trip lasts 4-6 days. The purpose is to meet your child, start bonding with him/her, and to apply to the Ministry of Education and the court for adoption. The second trip is 4-8 weeks later and lasts 7-14+ days, when you go to court for the adoption hearing.
AWAA will be sending our information packet so we can complete out dossier. Our home study goes to INS this coming week. I really don't like the idea of going to Russia to choose a child. I feel like I am picking out a puppy, not my daughter. But that's the way Russia does it now. Our home study goes to INS this coming week.
Kimberly also informed me that since we are going to be going to Kalmykiya, we would be assigned a new family coordinator.
We have been assigned a new coordinator. His name is Kevin, and he seems to be very knowledgeable about Russian adoption. It was very upsetting to have to stop working with Kimberly as she has been working with us for the past 9 months.
Last week, we received our Russia information packet and we sent our contract back right away (we were told that because we were changing programs, our original contract is no longer valid), and our home study was sent to INS. I also got e-mail from Eric asking for a family photo because they are beginning to match referrals. Hopefully, we will get our referral soon. We should have our I-171H in 3-4 weeks. I know that the timing is in Gods hands, but I still hope it doesn't take too long. We are hoping to travel to Russia on our first trip toward the end of June so the boys can stay with their father while we are gone.
We came home from shopping tonight to find a call on the answering machine from Kevin at AWAA asking us to call him back as soon as we got home. I was very nervous calling him, afraid something had happened, and we would not be going to Russia. But I called anyway. He has a little girl for us. Her name is Marina, and she is 2 yrs 8 months old, has brown eyes, dark hair and sounds absolutely perfect. But she is from Voronezh, not Kalmykiya. The problem is, he wants us to be able to travel next month. I don't think we can travel next month because our I-171H will not be back by then.
I called Mom to tell her about the phone call with Kevin. She loves Marina's name. She kept saying it over and over. I feel like she is ours, but the timing is all wrong.
Kevin and I have been discussing Marina all weekend. We will be turning down the referral because the timing is all wrong. Kevin needs to finish school so he can graduate in the spring. We can't be ready to go to Russia in a month.
I called Kevin at AWAA today and let him know we will not be accepting Marina's referral. It was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. Kevin was very nice, and asked us to take a few more days to think about it.
Today I went to the town clerks office to see about getting my documents notarized. She photocopied our passports and notarized the copies. She could not notarize our Marriage Certificate; so she had to give us 3 new copies that had to be notarized. She could not notarize her own signature, so she has to wait and try to find another notary who can notarize them, and will have to mail them back to us later. I also went to the police station with our letter to request our police clearance letters.
I also called the Strafford County & Cheshire County Superior Courts to try to get our divorce decrees notarized. After a lot of discussion on the phone, they finally agreed to notarize mine. Cheshire county however, said, "we just don't do that" when I told them I needed Kevin's divorce decrees notarized. So, I called Kevin at AWAA and told him the situation. He and I both called the NH Secretary of State's Office, who ended up having to call the Cheshire County Superior Court, and told them that they had to notarize the documents for us.
I called the Cheshire County Superior Court today. They are going to notarize Kevin's divorce decree for us, although they more than let me know they didn't want to. I also called Kevin and told him we would not be able to adopt Marina.
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