Friday, November 1st and Saturday, November 2nd
We both got up early because there was so much to do. I had a great plan, or so I thought. All week long as I was thinking of things to take (and yes, I had a list going too), I would put the item on the dining room table. I had our suitcases open and would pack clothes after they were freshly laundered. As 1pm came closer and closer (our proposed time of departure from the house), things just started getting thrown in to the suitcases as we were running out of time before we had to leave. We knew our suitcases could only weigh 50#, but didn't realize that Lufthansa Airlines also puts a weight limit on your carry on luggage also, so our carry-ons were packed to the max so that we could fit everything that we wanted to take. I had ordered a new winter coat and it was supposed to arrive via UPS on Thursday, but it didn't. I didn't have enough time to worry about it, so I didn't track the package, but would occasionally check the front porch to see if it had come. We finally got out of the house around 1:30ish - no coat. I was sad, but grabbed another coat that I own (that isn't all that warm). As we were backing out of the driveway, my eye caught sight of a green bag on the front porch. Woohoo! My coat had arrived! I quickly got out and ripped open the package, tried it on and decided it fit! Thank you Lord! I know I am going to need this coat to get through the cold Ukraine winter.
We picked up our friend, Preston, who drove us to the airport. We got there super early for our flight, but we were glad that we didn't have to rush. The ticket counter and the security line hardly had any people waiting, another relief. Except that we were then informed that our carry on luggage greatly exceeded the weight limit. :( They offered to check the carry-ons for free, so that's what we did. We were also pleasantly surprised that they didn't charge us for our extra bag. Grateful again!
Our seat assignments were far from each other, but we decided that we both had pretty good seats, so we were confident that we could find someone to trade with us so we could sit together. Ha...neither one of our seatmates would trade. Oh well. The flight went well, and we were pleased with all of Lufthansa's perks and surprised that they offer free alcohol and frequently made trips up and down the aisles offering to fill your glass. (we don't drink, but I'd never seen that before!). Neither one of us slept much and so we arrived in Frankfurt, Germany extremely tired. We had a very long walk to our departing gate and waited for our next flight to Kyiv. While we were waiting I noticed a pregnant lady with a young child. This little girl was probably less than 2, and she was enjoying singing at the top of her lungs, much to the delight of everyone around her. Since I couldn't understand her, I decided that they must not be Americans. Then an American man stopped and talked to the lady and her daughter and I got little snippets of the conversation. She said that she was on her way to Kyiv to adopt a girl. My ears perked up and so when the man stopped talking to her, I made a bee-line over to where she was standing and found out she was from Texas and was there to adopt a 16 year old girl. If I remember correctly, they had hosted her in the past, but had found out recently that she decided that she didn't want to be adopted. Her SDA appointment was Monday (Nov. 4) and her plan was to fly into Kyiv on Saturday (with her young daughter) and get on an overnight train for Odessa and meet with this girl to see if she could change her mind. Wow. Talk about determination. I cannot imagine the horrible jet lag this girl was feeling and then to be pregnant on top of that and also to be traveling with a toddler? Man, I have nothing to complain about!
This flight wasn't full, so we were able to sit next to each other and we both slept quite a bit, arriving in Kyiv at 1pm. We made it through customs, got our luggage and were met by our friend, David at the door. We made the drive back to their apartment (probably about 45-60 minute drive). Our initial plan was to go to Father's House (Liliya's orphanage), in the evening, but we had never been there before and so we would have needed an escort the first time. Also, we found out that Liliya was spending the night at a friend's house, so we scrapped that idea and went with Plan B (to meet her at church on Sunday). Later on that night we facebooked with her and then she asked if we could Skype. She kept talking about how she couldn't wait to see us on Tuesday and then she mentioned that she was going to go to ICA church (which was where we were going to surprise her), it was fun to go along with everything knowing that she had no clue that we were in Kyiv already. We also received a phone call from Bogdan. He returned a call we had made earlier. He seemed very happy to talk to us. Dave, our friend, told us we couldn't go to sleep until 9pm, so that we could get over the jet lag easier. It was hard to stay awake until that time, but we slept like logs and in fact, over slept a bit making us late to leave to go see Bogdan.
No comments:
Post a Comment