Friday, October 21^st 2011

9 AM – Head down for our daily buffet at the motel. No I am still not trying the local food!

10 AM – Yuri and Irene pick us up to take us to the Paralegal. We have to sign several forms that are necessary to set the date for the court hearing. After a 30 minute commute we arrive with our passports in hand. We have to go through the typical checkpoint and then to the Paralegal’s office. Apparently my computer curse has followed me to Russia; the Paralegal is not able to open the attachment which contains all of our adoption documents. After trying for 1 hour the office gives up stating that the forms will have to be printed from the adoption agency then scanned in to their computer system. Our translator Irene says this will take around three hours with average traffic to accomplish this task. Rather than sitting in the back of the car through this we opted to go walk to Red Square.

     On our walk, we go past the KGB building. I was a little nervous even taking the picture. (Below)

     Next we passed several churches and historic buildings before arriving at Red Square. Saint Basils (Picture below) was built in 1561 under Ivan the Terrible. According to legend Ivan had the architect blinded so he would never be able to design anything so amazing again.

      Red Square is a huge courtyard where military parades and now rock concerts are performed in front of amazing buildings. (Picture below)

     At the other end of the square is a History museum containing around 4.5 million artifacts from Russia. (Picture Below)

     Resurrection gate (Picture Below) was passed through by Napoleon in 1812 in victory only to flee through it 1 month later in defeat.  

     Next we visit GUM which is Russia’s largest shopping mall (Picture Below) The stores were all high end retailers like Tiffany & Company. Needless to say we only window shopped!

It was then time for lunch so we stopped at McDonalds- almost tasted like at home.

     Afterwards we walked around the Kremlin walls. The Kremlin was originally built in 1147.  (Picture below) we didn’t have time to view the inside but hope to on the next trip.

We stopped for a minute at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier and watched the changing of the guard. (Picture Below)

     On the way back to the Paralegal, Christy found her American addiction, the “Fatachino” from Starbucks. (Picture Below)

3 PM – We meet Irene back at the Paralegal and proceed to sit for the next 4 hours proofing forms that have been translated for the adoption. Finally, we are able to sign all of the official forms. Irene tells us that they will be recorded Monday which allows the process to set the date for the court hearing. This process can take anywhere from 1 to 2 months.

8 PM – We are both exhausted and decide to eat granola bars for dinner. We are so ready to get home to our boys, family and friends. We look forward to sharing more details with all of you when we get home J.