Surprise! (again!!!)
16 hours ago
February 06, 2010
Waiting for I800
So at this point, we don't know when our second trip to Bulgaria will be. The average is 3-5 months, which would put our trip between March and May. We will probably be on the longer end of that, since we didn't get our I800 sent until a month after we got back (I guess I just spaced it on that one, forgetting we had more paperwork to do). Our I800 was delivered almost 2 weeks ago, so we're hoping to hear something on that in the next couple weeks. From there, we wait for court to set our dates. We'll have to bring new Doctor's Letters (already have them in hand) and Police Clearance Letters (which will be easy, just need to get a couple hours off from work to go downtown).
January 24, 2010
Trip Report
After some delay, I'm finally getting around to posting about our first trip to Bulgaria.
TRAVEL NOTICE
We received our official travel dates from our agency on Thanksgiving Day, with our trip being December 13-20. We made our own travel arrangements, booking flights on United Airlines & Austrian Airlines and four nights at the Sheraton in Sofia. The rest of the nights were booked by our adoption contacts at a hotel a few miles from the town our son's orphanage is located.
FLIGHTS TO SOFIA
We flew United Airlines from Phoenix to Washington D.C., Austrian Airlines from D.C. to Vienna and on to Sofia. The leg room on the IAD-VIE flight was pretty bad, made worse that every seat on the plane was occupied. Our plane (Boeing 767) did have a personal T.V. in every seatback, making the flight a little more manageable. We were fed dinner shortly after takeoff and breakfast a short time before landing. The food was okay, and the drinks were complimentary. At the Vienna airport, we did have to go through a security checkpoint as we moved between gates. The airport had free wireless internet access. We were on a small jet from VIE-SOF, and the flight was only about 1/3 full.
ARRIVAL IN SOFIA
We arrived in Bulgaria on Sunday. Sofia's airport is small, but very clean & modern. We were met outside baggage claim by our driver, Evo. There was another family arriving in Sofia about an hour after us, so we waited for their flight to arrive. Dayna & I took the opportunity to sit and have coffee. Once the other family arrived, we drove to their apartment before being dropped off at the Sheraton. We checked into our room for the night. We are Starwood Gold Members, so we were upgraded to a large room and provided access to the Club Lounge which had complimentary drinks, snacks and continental breakfast.
ORPHANAGE VISITATION
We left for our son's orphanage on Monday morning. We were met at the hotel by Rosi from Vesta. She acted as our guide/coordinator/translator for our trip. The drive was a little over an hour long, and we went straight to our son's orphanage. On arrival at the orphange, we met with the orphanage director in her office. She asked us a number of questions, and went over our son's medical history (which we had already received prior to asking for the referral). After a short conversation, the nanny brought our soon into the office to meet us. Understandably, he was pretty tentative around us and clung to his Nanny the whole first visit. We learned that Tomi had been accepted into the local church, something that is apparently unusual for one of the children in the orphanage.
The first visit was short, as it was soon nap time. We were taken by taxi (our mode of transportation the entire time we were visiting the orphanage) to the hotel. The hotel was nice, but nothing too luxurious. I'd say it would be about a three-star hotel in the States. The hotel had free wireless internet and a nice restaurant that probably never had more than 10 patrons at a time eating. The only real complaint that I could make about the hotel was the location. It was a couple miles from town at the top of a small and winding road, which coupled with the weather (snow & cold) made it impractical to walk anywhere.
Our schedule while in the village was the same each day (Monday through Thursday). We would leave for the orphanage around 9:30am and visit with our son for about 2 1/2-3 hours. We would then have a few hours to ourselves for lunch, relaxation, etc. before heading back to the orphanage in the afternoon for another 2 1/2-3 hour visit. The only day we didn't visit twice was Thursday, when we left for Sofia after the morning visit.
Our son warmed up to us quite a bit as each visit occurred. By the second day, he was willing to let us both cuddle and kiss him. He started to act out by the third day, throwing some pretty major temper tantrums. I think this was due to a number of factors, including his getting an unusual amount of attention, being away from the other children (with strangers, no less) and being cooped up in a small room for 5-6 hours a day (he had apparently just gotten over a cold, so we weren't able to take him outside to play). The last visit was difficult. Not only were we saying goodbye to our son for 3-5 months, but his Nanny was with us when we left. This meant our son was clinging to her and didn't want to be held by Mommy or Daddy. We understood, but are hopeful that the Nanny isn't there when we pick him up in the Spring. The transition will be difficult enough for him without having to experience being pulled from the person he's grown most attached to in the orphanage.
THE ORPHANAGE
The orphanage was about what we expected. It was in fair condition, obviously in need of quite a bit of cosmetic work. We weren't able to see much of the orphanage, but the children seem to be well cared for. We learned that this orphanage has a "Grandmothers Program", where local women come for a few hours a day to spend time with the children. We were told that that the orphanage can always use diapers, clothes (particularly for the younger children) and plastic toys (specifically plastic so the toys can be disinfected). The orphanage director was very nice and seemed genuinely happy that we were there to adopt our son. She did ask us to "present" ourselves, which caught us off guard for a moment. Basically, she wanted to know our occupations, if we have other children, how long we've been together, what religion we practice, etc.
The town that our son's orphanage is located is a very small town. There is a factory nearby where a lot of the people work. The streets and buildings were in pretty bad condition in a lot of cases. The streets were full of potholes. That made for some nauseous moments in the car, as our taxi driver would swerve all over the road to avoid the potholes. We ate most of our meals in the hotel, but did have one lunch and one dinner in town. The food was excellent everywhere we went, in particular the shopska salad.
SOFIA
We really enjoyed our time in Sofia. We stayed in a hotel on Vitosha Blvd, so we were probably in the most modern/nicest part of town. There were plenty of restaurants, coffee shops and stores within walking distance. Don't expect bargains when shopping on Vitosha Blvd, but I'm sure if we managed to get away from the touristy areas we'd find better deals. If you're looking for comfort food in the form of pizza, we can highly recommend Pizza Troll. There are 3 locations, including one on Vitosha right next to the Hotel Les Fleurs. The local beers are Zagorka and Kamenitsa. Both are fine, both are cheap. I really enjoyed Staropramen Dark, which is a beer from the Czech Republic.
We felt safe the entire time we were in Sofia. Of course, we weren't out very late and we stayed to the main retail district. Be aware that smoking is very popular in Bulgaria (or anywhere outside North America for that matter). Even if a restaurant offers a non-smoking section, it's probably just a few tables located next to the smoking section. Since we were in Sofia in December, we didn't have a chance to sit outside and have coffee, drinks, food. We look forward to going back on our second trip when the weather is warmer.
IN-COUNTRY STAFF
The staff from Vesta was excellent. Evo and Rosi were both very nice and helpful. Rosi was basically our translator, guide, social worker and friend for four solid days. She volunteered her company for every meal we ate in the village. We did eat on our own for half our meals, feeling comfortable being able to communicate with the restaurant staff. Most of the staff knew at least some English, and we were always able to get a menu with English translation. At no time did we feel overwhelmed by the language or cultural barrier.
FLIGHTS HOME
We were scheduled to leave Sofia on Sunday morning around 8:30am, getting back to Phoenix around 8:30pm that night. We were again scheduled to fly Austrian Airlines. However, when we got to Sofia Airport at 6:30am, we found out that our Vienna to Washington D.C. flight had been cancelled due to bad weather (this was at the height of the brutal snowstorm hitting the eastern U.S.). We worked with a very helpful man from the airline to rebook on alternate flights. With it being the week of Christmas, it took him about an hour and a half to find us 2 seats back to the U.S. (at one point we didn't have anything to get us home until Tuesday). The bad news was that we weren't going to get back home until Monday morning. The good news was that we were upgraded to Business Class for flights from Sofia-Warsaw and Warsaw-Chicago. This meant we were actually able to stretch our legs and get some sleep (well, Dayna didn't get much sleep). Unfortunately, our WAW-ORD flight was about 4 1/2 hours delayed. So instead of getting into Chicago around 8pm Sunday night (giving us enough time to get a room at the O'Hare Hilton Hotel to get some sleep), we didn't arrive until well after midnight. By the time we cleared customs, it was almost 1:30am and we had a 5:10am flight to PHX. No point in getting a room for that layover, so we sat in the O'Hare Airport all night. Fortunately, the last flight was on time and we arrived home to our waiting family at around 8am (only about 12 hours late). We had enough time to basically say "Hi" to my parents before I had to drop them off in their terminal because they had a 9:30am flight back to Michigan.
Well, that's about it. I probably left out a lot of important details that people are wondering about. Please feel free to let us know if you have any questions that I can answer. Obviously, we have to leave our the specific information about our son, the orphanage, etc. Any other questions, we're happy to answer. We'll post more as we prepare for and make our second trip to bring our son home.
TRAVEL NOTICE
We received our official travel dates from our agency on Thanksgiving Day, with our trip being December 13-20. We made our own travel arrangements, booking flights on United Airlines & Austrian Airlines and four nights at the Sheraton in Sofia. The rest of the nights were booked by our adoption contacts at a hotel a few miles from the town our son's orphanage is located.
FLIGHTS TO SOFIA
We flew United Airlines from Phoenix to Washington D.C., Austrian Airlines from D.C. to Vienna and on to Sofia. The leg room on the IAD-VIE flight was pretty bad, made worse that every seat on the plane was occupied. Our plane (Boeing 767) did have a personal T.V. in every seatback, making the flight a little more manageable. We were fed dinner shortly after takeoff and breakfast a short time before landing. The food was okay, and the drinks were complimentary. At the Vienna airport, we did have to go through a security checkpoint as we moved between gates. The airport had free wireless internet access. We were on a small jet from VIE-SOF, and the flight was only about 1/3 full.
ARRIVAL IN SOFIA
We arrived in Bulgaria on Sunday. Sofia's airport is small, but very clean & modern. We were met outside baggage claim by our driver, Evo. There was another family arriving in Sofia about an hour after us, so we waited for their flight to arrive. Dayna & I took the opportunity to sit and have coffee. Once the other family arrived, we drove to their apartment before being dropped off at the Sheraton. We checked into our room for the night. We are Starwood Gold Members, so we were upgraded to a large room and provided access to the Club Lounge which had complimentary drinks, snacks and continental breakfast.
ORPHANAGE VISITATION
We left for our son's orphanage on Monday morning. We were met at the hotel by Rosi from Vesta. She acted as our guide/coordinator/translator for our trip. The drive was a little over an hour long, and we went straight to our son's orphanage. On arrival at the orphange, we met with the orphanage director in her office. She asked us a number of questions, and went over our son's medical history (which we had already received prior to asking for the referral). After a short conversation, the nanny brought our soon into the office to meet us. Understandably, he was pretty tentative around us and clung to his Nanny the whole first visit. We learned that Tomi had been accepted into the local church, something that is apparently unusual for one of the children in the orphanage.
The first visit was short, as it was soon nap time. We were taken by taxi (our mode of transportation the entire time we were visiting the orphanage) to the hotel. The hotel was nice, but nothing too luxurious. I'd say it would be about a three-star hotel in the States. The hotel had free wireless internet and a nice restaurant that probably never had more than 10 patrons at a time eating. The only real complaint that I could make about the hotel was the location. It was a couple miles from town at the top of a small and winding road, which coupled with the weather (snow & cold) made it impractical to walk anywhere.
Our schedule while in the village was the same each day (Monday through Thursday). We would leave for the orphanage around 9:30am and visit with our son for about 2 1/2-3 hours. We would then have a few hours to ourselves for lunch, relaxation, etc. before heading back to the orphanage in the afternoon for another 2 1/2-3 hour visit. The only day we didn't visit twice was Thursday, when we left for Sofia after the morning visit.
Our son warmed up to us quite a bit as each visit occurred. By the second day, he was willing to let us both cuddle and kiss him. He started to act out by the third day, throwing some pretty major temper tantrums. I think this was due to a number of factors, including his getting an unusual amount of attention, being away from the other children (with strangers, no less) and being cooped up in a small room for 5-6 hours a day (he had apparently just gotten over a cold, so we weren't able to take him outside to play). The last visit was difficult. Not only were we saying goodbye to our son for 3-5 months, but his Nanny was with us when we left. This meant our son was clinging to her and didn't want to be held by Mommy or Daddy. We understood, but are hopeful that the Nanny isn't there when we pick him up in the Spring. The transition will be difficult enough for him without having to experience being pulled from the person he's grown most attached to in the orphanage.
THE ORPHANAGE
The orphanage was about what we expected. It was in fair condition, obviously in need of quite a bit of cosmetic work. We weren't able to see much of the orphanage, but the children seem to be well cared for. We learned that this orphanage has a "Grandmothers Program", where local women come for a few hours a day to spend time with the children. We were told that that the orphanage can always use diapers, clothes (particularly for the younger children) and plastic toys (specifically plastic so the toys can be disinfected). The orphanage director was very nice and seemed genuinely happy that we were there to adopt our son. She did ask us to "present" ourselves, which caught us off guard for a moment. Basically, she wanted to know our occupations, if we have other children, how long we've been together, what religion we practice, etc.
The town that our son's orphanage is located is a very small town. There is a factory nearby where a lot of the people work. The streets and buildings were in pretty bad condition in a lot of cases. The streets were full of potholes. That made for some nauseous moments in the car, as our taxi driver would swerve all over the road to avoid the potholes. We ate most of our meals in the hotel, but did have one lunch and one dinner in town. The food was excellent everywhere we went, in particular the shopska salad.
SOFIA
We really enjoyed our time in Sofia. We stayed in a hotel on Vitosha Blvd, so we were probably in the most modern/nicest part of town. There were plenty of restaurants, coffee shops and stores within walking distance. Don't expect bargains when shopping on Vitosha Blvd, but I'm sure if we managed to get away from the touristy areas we'd find better deals. If you're looking for comfort food in the form of pizza, we can highly recommend Pizza Troll. There are 3 locations, including one on Vitosha right next to the Hotel Les Fleurs. The local beers are Zagorka and Kamenitsa. Both are fine, both are cheap. I really enjoyed Staropramen Dark, which is a beer from the Czech Republic.
We felt safe the entire time we were in Sofia. Of course, we weren't out very late and we stayed to the main retail district. Be aware that smoking is very popular in Bulgaria (or anywhere outside North America for that matter). Even if a restaurant offers a non-smoking section, it's probably just a few tables located next to the smoking section. Since we were in Sofia in December, we didn't have a chance to sit outside and have coffee, drinks, food. We look forward to going back on our second trip when the weather is warmer.
IN-COUNTRY STAFF
The staff from Vesta was excellent. Evo and Rosi were both very nice and helpful. Rosi was basically our translator, guide, social worker and friend for four solid days. She volunteered her company for every meal we ate in the village. We did eat on our own for half our meals, feeling comfortable being able to communicate with the restaurant staff. Most of the staff knew at least some English, and we were always able to get a menu with English translation. At no time did we feel overwhelmed by the language or cultural barrier.
FLIGHTS HOME
We were scheduled to leave Sofia on Sunday morning around 8:30am, getting back to Phoenix around 8:30pm that night. We were again scheduled to fly Austrian Airlines. However, when we got to Sofia Airport at 6:30am, we found out that our Vienna to Washington D.C. flight had been cancelled due to bad weather (this was at the height of the brutal snowstorm hitting the eastern U.S.). We worked with a very helpful man from the airline to rebook on alternate flights. With it being the week of Christmas, it took him about an hour and a half to find us 2 seats back to the U.S. (at one point we didn't have anything to get us home until Tuesday). The bad news was that we weren't going to get back home until Monday morning. The good news was that we were upgraded to Business Class for flights from Sofia-Warsaw and Warsaw-Chicago. This meant we were actually able to stretch our legs and get some sleep (well, Dayna didn't get much sleep). Unfortunately, our WAW-ORD flight was about 4 1/2 hours delayed. So instead of getting into Chicago around 8pm Sunday night (giving us enough time to get a room at the O'Hare Hilton Hotel to get some sleep), we didn't arrive until well after midnight. By the time we cleared customs, it was almost 1:30am and we had a 5:10am flight to PHX. No point in getting a room for that layover, so we sat in the O'Hare Airport all night. Fortunately, the last flight was on time and we arrived home to our waiting family at around 8am (only about 12 hours late). We had enough time to basically say "Hi" to my parents before I had to drop them off in their terminal because they had a 9:30am flight back to Michigan.
Well, that's about it. I probably left out a lot of important details that people are wondering about. Please feel free to let us know if you have any questions that I can answer. Obviously, we have to leave our the specific information about our son, the orphanage, etc. Any other questions, we're happy to answer. We'll post more as we prepare for and make our second trip to bring our son home.
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