Friday Meetings, July 30, 2004

We visited the children twice today. Once in the morning (12:30-ish to 1:00-ish?), and once in the afternoon (around 5:00 – 6:00).

This time, we got to meet with all three of them together! This was so exciting! But, this first meeting seemed very short. We walked over to a bench, away from most of the other children, though some still came over for a bit. Liana loved looking at the camera again, and discovered how to flip through the pictures that we had already taken. (She seems like she’s pretty bright.)

We took out the balloons, and we found out which color they wanted. Then I asked them what I should make with them. Alexa (Zena) wasn’t sure what she wanted, so I made a dog for her. Liana wanted a bird – Ouch! I told them that it was hard, and made a somewhat feeble attempt at it. She seemed to like it anyway. Adam seemed like he wante to take it easy on me, so he asked for a dog. :o) After a little playing around, I showed Liana and Adam how to blow up the balloons for themselves. Then, I showed them how to curl up the balloon without tying it, and to let it spin in circles after letting go. Liana really liked that for about 5 or 10 minutes.

Time went way to fast, and Adam had to leave before the others. He looked dreadfully disappointed at first, but was smiling when we hugged him before he left. Then Liana had to go, and Zena followed soon after. It was a pleasant visit, and we wished we could have stayed longer, but didn’t really know what we would have done with the little that we had brought.

VISIT 2

We went out looking for them after waiting in the director’s waiting room. We found Adam (Meesha) first, and then we found Liana (Vallia). They both came running, and got big hugs. Liana was smiling a lot more than we expected, and seemed almost like a different girl. Adam showed me his deflated balloon, and I tied off the holes and reinflated the part that was still good. We also had two balloons left, and I gave them to Adam and Liana. They chased each other around for a while, and I wasn’t sure what to do, so I tried to play a little, and watch more. (This language barrier is *incredibly* frustrating.)

Aleksa (Zena) walked around the corner while we weren’t looking, and ran to Shelly for a hug. I reached for a hug after Shelly put her down, and she came. (Sometime soon, I think she will genuinely want to give me a hug, but she still seems somewhat uncomfortable with me.)

We found a little bench area with 3 walls and a roof, where we sat down and did some stuff. Liana started to show some character traits that scared us, since she grabbed the pictures we had brought, then ran off without letting anyone (even me) look at them with her. She did this with the balloon, and the beach ball that we inflated as well.

Adam is bigger and stronger, so he was able to get the ball from her (in what looked like a playful manner). They enjoyed running around the little seating building we were in, chasing each other and laughing. I joined in, catching them and putting them back down, which they didn’t seem to mind too much. Aleksa was still just sitting on Shelly’s lap.

Somewhere during this time, the rest of the kids started to flood in. They demanded things, and tried to poke around in Shelly’s purse. It was very difficult for us to pay attention to Adam and Liana. Sometime during this, Liana got very disturbed and whenever I walked toward her, she would walk away. This totally freaked us out! I ended up following her back to the place where she was playing with her friends before. The caregiver there looked at me sympathetically and tried to help, but I couldn’t tell her what was going on – because I didn’t know, and because I can’t speak Russian! (Argh!)

The caregiver tried to speak to Liana, but she wouldn’t listen. I walked toward her again, and she went into a different little seating building, supposedly to hide. I found her standing on the seat, with her back to the corner. I held my hands out for her to come down to me, and she refused. Then I just reached for her, told her that I loved her (I think I did, anyway), and hugged her (picking her up at the same time). She seemed okay after a little bit, and even accepted the hug! So, I carried her back to where Shelly was.

I’m not sure exactly how things happened, but Adam did something very similar after that, too. (Scary * 2 = extra scary!) It was much harder to deal with him. At least twice, I followed him, picked him up gently, and carried him back to the place where we were. Vika was not there at this time, and we sure could have used her. She did show up after a little while, and asked if we were ready to leave. Instead, we explained what happened, and she spent at least half an hour talking, following, and figuring out what was going on with Adam. It all boiled down to a little fight that Adam and Liana had had, as well as all the other things going on. Vika is pretty sure that they were also fighting for attention from us. During this whole time, Aleksa had Shelly’s lap locked up, and I was running after the one with the most obvious problem.

Things eventually improved, and all three ended up at a bench much farther from the other children. We had them drawing in coloring books, and Vika dominated things in a continued attempt to keep things going well. (If I haven’t said it already, Vika is an absolute God-send!)

We colored for a while, and then it was time for us to leave. Adam gave me a shy, but accepting hug, and I told him that I loved him (I know I had messed it up when I tried the other two or three times during this situation.) Aleksa let me hug her without any problems, and when I told her that I loved her (as I did with each of them), she looked me straight in the face (at very close, hugging range). Nothing much happened, but she seemed like she was analyzing me. Liana was a little more difficult, but it seemed that she just wanted more attention, not that she didn’t want to be with us. I gave her a good, long hug, as well as a couple kisses on the cheek. (Boy will my insides feel better when I know that they feel accepted by us. This in-between stuff, which will probably last for a few weeks, is really tough – particularly since we didn’t learn Russian.) In the mean-time, we will do our best to visit them in a place that is completely separate from the other children, and will try very hard to give them all the attention we can. (Did I say that I love them, yet? I sure do. They really need it, too.)