(Maureen's Post)
Hard to believe, but our time to return to Kazakhstan has come! It's been a long road. What made it tougher this time around is that we had certain expectations based on what the process was like for James, and this time turned out very different. But we are glad and very humbled and grateful that we are given the opportunity to return to Kazakhstan to bring home another baby boy and grow our family.
As for the preparations, we are ready - or at least as ready as we'll ever be! The original plan of a packing "dress rehearsal" a few days before travel did not happen as I had hoped (yes, that's the planner in me), but at least we're done now (as I type this it's 10PM), and we won't be up until 3AM packing with Sean having to make a quick run to WalMart near midnight to find another piece of luggage since we far exceeded the weight limit for our bags (like last time).
We managed to fit most of our stuff for the next 5+ weeks into 2 suitcases and 2 rolling duffle bags to check-in. We managed to get each checked bag to weigh only 44 pounds each, which is right at the cutoff weight for the in-country flights on Air Astana in Kazakhstan and well below Lufthansa's long-haul flight weight cutoff of 50 lbs. However, Lufthansa only allows one free checked bag per ticketed passenger, so it will be interesting to see if/how much we get charged for the 4th bag. Sean, James, and I each have a rolling backpack to take on the plane We're also taking along an umbrella stroller for James which we will check-in at the gate. Since we're travelling during the summer this time, we'll have more opportunity to do some walking around Karaganda on our own. We figured it would be good to have the stroller on-hand in case James gets tired.
Another thing we decided to do before this trip is get James a Continental OnePass account like us. It is possible to get one for minor children. We figured since Lufthansa partners frequent flyer miles with Continental, why not get James set up, too? So, now James will be racking up the frequent flyer miles right along with us.
So, the first leg of our trip has us landing in Frankfurt, Germany on Friday morning. The first flight will be just shy of 10 hours. Yes - that is a long time to be sitting on a plane. We then have a 4 1/2 hr. layover in Frankfurt before boarding our flight to Almaty, Kazakhstan. 4 1/2 hours sounds like a long time, but I distinctly remember that last time we barely made our flight for the second leg of our journey due to flight delays. Our second leg has us taking a shorter, 6 1/2 hour flight into Almaty, Kazakhstan with us landing just a tad past midnight on early Saturday morning. Then we will probably be taken to a hotel to get a little bit of rest before heading to the sisters office later on Saturday morning to go over our plan for our stay in Kazakhstan. By the way, for those who do not know who "the sisters" are, they are three women who are sisters and facilitate our agency's adoptions while in Kazakhstan.
I'm really hoping we also get to travel to Karaganda on Saturday so we can meet the baby on Sunday morning, but it all depends on the flights from Almaty to Karaganda available on that day, as well as if a Ministry of Education representative will be available to meet with us. So, just as before, we must "go with the flow," or, as another adoptive family put it, "be a leaf in the stream."
Just to let you know - we may not be able to post for a couple of days. Please do not panic if you don't see us post to the website right away once we're in Kazakhstan. Even though we're leaving tomorrow we may not be settled in an apartment in Karaganda until sometime this weekend, much less have internet set up. However, we will still be blogging off-line so that once we are able to establish an internet connection we can post for all the days missing until then.
Well, this is it! A big thank you to all our family and friends for all the support and words of encouragement along the way. Special thanks for the house-sitters, dog-sitters, etc. who are helping make this trip possible for us. We are truly grateful for your generosity!
So, paka-paka (bye-bye) for now, and we'll catch up with you on the other side of the world!
