Integracion is done - Goodbye to Neiva

Today at 5 PM we had our integracion meeting, where we meet with the social worker to determine if we are integrating well as a family. It becomes a somewhat tense affair, not because they make it a high-pressure investigation or anything, it's just because it feels like there is so much on the line. If they think things are not proceeding well, they can stop the adoption or prolong the integration period. There is also the chance that the child can say they do not want to be adopted.

The social worker met with us as a family, Sorany, and Olga Elena (our attorney). She asked us how we were doing and what we were up to, how the family was bonding, if there were any concerns, etc. They also tried to talk with Yamile but she became very timid and quiet, not responding much, even in Spanish. She clung close to me (which I didn't mind at all). We were given opportunities to ask questions and then we were done. They said they were satisfied and congratulated us. We thanked them for taking such good care of Yamile over the past few years (which almost made me cry as I said it - I already have such a strong love for her). And that was that! It was over and done in about 45 minutes.

So ... tomorrow morning we leave the hotel at 6:15 AM for our 7:30 AM flight to Bogota. We should be in Bogota by 8:30 AM. While we are there we will wait for sentencia, where a judge in Neiva will process the adoption and I will have to return to sign the paperwork. That will pretty much finalize everything for the Colombian side of the adoption process. Sentencia could be done in as quick as a couple days, but we've been told not to expect anything this week. It could also take up to a couple weeks - we're hopeful it's somewhere in between.

We are all excited to leave for Bogota in the morning (Yamile included)! Please pray that we will have patience for the Lord's timing in the whole process. It has moved very quickly and smoothly so far - we just want to be faithful to wait on Him. Pray for safe travels and that we will frutifully occupy our time while we await sentencia. "Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to the Father."

Neiva is not New York

You know the song "New York, New York" where Frank Sinatra talks about wanting to wake up in the city that never sleeps? Well, he's definitely not talking about Neiva. Sunday is the day when the whole city seems to sleep, at least in our neck of the woods. We went out for a walk yesterday and there was virtually no traffic - vehicular, pedestrian, or otherwise. We planned to eat dinner at our favorite Mexican restaurant, Tijuana, last night and it wasn't even open, nor were any of the other open-air restaurants in our neighborhood. We ended up eating in the cafeteria upstairs at the local hipermercado.

We decided, however, to take a morning stroll to the river called Rio Magdelena, where there is a park that follows along the river. It's probably 6-8 blocks from our hotel and Sorany met us at 9 AM to lead the way. (Sorany has been a great guide, making herself available at our beck and call, when she's not teaching English at her own English Institute.) As we approached the river, we noticed they had shut down one half of the street, opening it up to pedestrians and bicycles. It reminded me of Nava (in Spain), where the pasttime on Sundays was to walk up and down the main street of the town and stop and talk to your friends and neighbors.

Sorany took us to a "restaurant" that overlooks the river. This restaurant was a large area that looked more like a campground, with bridges leading past the cooking areas. Chickens, roosters, birds, wild cats, and even a goat wandered around. The eating area was a very large, open space with wood planks for flooring and thatching for a roof. There were no walls--it was all entirely open. The trees surrounding us were really amazing. The restaurant was not open for business yet but we were allowed to enter and watch them prepare the meal for the day. You can see by the pictures that we were up above the food prep areas, looking down at the workers. The ovens and stoves were heated with wood; there was a humungous pot of something brewing; rather than cover their food with foil or saran wrap, they used palm leaves; a woman was placing food into a large clay oven, there were mounds of produce everywhere. Yamile loved taking pictures of all the food. Everything was quite different from what we'd see in America.

The river itself was a swift-moving churn of brown water (and there was quite a bit of trash washed up along the shore). As we meandered down the sidewalk, we passed some people who were selling fresh fish, although I would be a bit leary to try any of it. They also had quite a few shops along the way that reminded me a bit of booths at flea markets, 95% of them were empty. Sorany explained that, during holidays, all of these shops would be open to cater to the folks who travel to Neiva for holidays. We were able to find a couple vendors selling their wares and bought a few souvenirs from Neiva.

Eventually, we came to some playground equipment, and Yamile immediately wanted to go play. She had to accept a "no" from Daddy at first while we found a little bit better place to play. She wasn't all that thrilled with my answer but didn't throw a fit or anything - she just got quiet. That was soon resolved when we came to some more playground equipment where she could swing and play on the teeter-totter. (Unfortunately, Daddy's 45-year-old, surgically repaired knee couldn't tolerate the deep squats for too long on the teeter-totter.)

We finally decided to return to our hotel and walked back along the park. When we arrived at the park's main square we heard music and someone calling out instructions into a microphone. There was a large group of people who appeared from a distance to be doing some sort of dance. When we got closer we realized this was an aerobics class where anyone could join in at any time. We chose not to join and just watched. These people seemed to be having a blast working out in the 95-degree heat. (Something tells me Chatta would jump right in and join the party!) The music made us want to dance.

We finished the walk back "home" and took a dip in the pool and ate a lunch of tortillas and beans on the patio of our room. Ahhh ... delicioso!

Ahhh...Colombian Food!

What an amazing lunch we had yesterday. We found out that our hotel restaurant serves a traditional Colombian main meal at lunch time, so we opted to give it a try. We then found out why they serve it at lunch and not dinner. There's no way a person could even sleep at night if they had that much food for dinner. You need the whole day to digest it! It was so delicious, and so very different. The meal is called Sanisocho de Gallina. It began with a chicken broth type of soup called "Caldo", then quickly moved on to the main dish. This consisted of a chicken leg & thigh sauteed in oil seasoned with onion, cilantro, tomato, salt and pepper (you all know how much I love oil!), boiled potato (papa), fried banana (platano), 1/8 of a cob of corn (maiz), yucca (I have no idea), and yama (squash). On the side was a plate of rice (arroz) with an enormous chunk of avocado (aquacate). The avocados here are enormous! (See the photo of me holding one I've cut open? I ate off of it for about 3 or 4 days.) Along with all this, we were served a drink called "Cholupa", which is made from a tiny fruit that grows in the region of Huila, where Neiva is. It was delicious. We were determined to eat the entire meal, since this was our opportunity to experience this amazing traditional Colombian food. We managed to consume most of it, but I think we rolled out of the restaurant. The meal was served at 12:30, and I don't recall feeling remotely hungry for most of the remaining day.

We have learned that Colombians like their food very bland. Surprisingly, there are very few seasonings in most of the traditional dishes we have been served. Meats, starches, and sweetened fruit juices are common. It's been a challege to find ways to eat high fiber types of foods, but our best way to do that has been to consume lots of fruits. We go to the "Hipermercado" every day to pick out our fruit. It breaks up our day, which can tend to drag as we don't have much to do. One of the more interesting fruits here is called "pitahaya". It reminds me of kiwi in its texture, but it is softer and even sweeter. It is also nearly a clear, whitish color on the inside, and full of tiny black seeds. Quite tasty.

Late in the afternoon, after swimming, we took the girls out to ice cream. Yamile likes strawberry flavor....I like chocolate! Annalisa, Geof and Rebecca got something that I can't remember, but it tasted like butterscotch. (Yes...I ate ice cream Jessica!)

The Streets of Neiva

The white building with bars directly in front is the entrance to Hotel Pacande, where we are staying.

Most stores here open out directly onto the street, you can't really go "inside" because the sidewalk puts you nearly at the cashier's counter. You basically shop from the sidewalk. There are taxis, motorcycles and bicycles everywhere.

God's Faithfulness

"If you give yourself to the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then your light will rise in darkness and your gloom will become like midday. And the Lord will continually guide you, and satisfy your desire in scorched places, and give strength to your bones; and you will be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters do not fail." Isaiah 58:10-11.

This verse has been an encouragment and an exhortation to me as we have prepared to travel to Colombia, and also as we are now here. As many of you may know, I have certain physical limitations which make travel fairly challenging. Over this past year, I have had to consider what it would cost me personally to make this trip. As I have spent time considering, I have prayed often and sought to trust the Lord, knowing how absolutely faithful He is. Many a day I have felt angst, and many a day I have given it over to the Lord. So when I found this verse in the book of Isaiah I was greatly encouraged as God spoke to me again about His trustworthiness and goodness.

I just want to share with you all that God has indeed continually guided us, satisfied our desires, and given strength to our (MY!) bones. There are numerous reasons that I should be struggling a lot more (physically) than I actually am. I really didn't expect to be doing so well, but the Lord has seen fit to grant me relief and I am grateful. I know that your prayers on our behalf are being heard--"The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous and His ears are open to their cry." Ps 34. So thank you all for your prayers and encouragement. And never forget that "the hope of the righteous is GLADNESS!!!"Pro 10:28.

My love to you all.

Lazy(?) Day

Today was our first full day, practically, without a translator. She didn't join us until 5:30p.m. or so. The morning was somewhat of a lazy day. Yamile continued to read her children's bible voraciously and she has discovered the "joys" of an i-Pod, as she was able to watch a bit of a movie on Lenna's ipod and listen to music.

When the staff came to clean our room, we took a short walk to the pool patio, where we played a game of Skip-Bo. This was a new game for Yamile (and Lenna) - while Yamile did not show much interest, she was very patient and willing to learn (and patronize us). Since one of our favorite family past-times is playing games, we hope Yamile will learn to enjoy them as well.

We ate lunch on the patio outside our room - cold pizza from the night before. This time, we bought a jar of pasta sauce and were able to dip our pizza while we ate it. It was nice to have the tomato flavor, although I opted to eat most of it without the sauce. That was Yamile's preference as well.

The language issue continues to be a little bit of a challenge, although Annalisa said Yamile tried a bit more English while at the pool this afternoon. She is now proficient with such important phrases as "cannon ball", "piggy back", "monkey", and "my turn". I'm sure cannon ball and piggy back will be heavily utilized while we continue to use the pool. And ... I'm sure they will prove useful in everyday American life, too. We are very encouraged that she is willing to try and speak a new language, especially with virtual strangers.

Today she spent at least three hours in the pool. Rebecca and Annalisa took her out there and they were having a raucous good time by the time Lenna and I arrived. After a little while, she also made friends with a couple of little Colombian girls who were playing in the pool. She was able to work her way into their games and it was neat to see her play and talk with them. I am sure that she deals with some loneliness because she cannot fully communicate with us. But she had no trouble carrying on conversations with Marguerita and Maria Jose.

Yamile enjoys being carried around by me, to the extent that I've called her my little monkey ("mi mono pequeno"). She wraps her arms around my neck, wraps her legs around my waist, kisses my face over and over, and just holds on. It now appears we have a little bit of a ritual when we go out of the hotel. She reaches for my neck so that I can carry her out the door. Once on the sidewalk, she's ready to get down and immediately reaches for Lenna's hand, and we walk down the street with she and Lenna side by side, hand in hand.

I don't think we've mentioned that Yamile had a bit of a cold when we received her. She's had a runny nose and has been coughing quite a bit as well. We're not able to attack the thing with great nutrition, like we usually would, so it's been a bit frustrating that way. And we think today she may have overdone it with all the activity in the pool. She fell asleep just before dinner and while at dinner we could tell that she was kind of out of it. Eventually, we found out she had a pretty bad headache and just didn't feel well. She didn't eat any dinner, which is quite unusual for her. I carried her the whole way back to the hotel (about two blocks) and we tucked her in to bed. We hope she will be feeling better in the morning and that she will get over this cold pretty soon.

For the third night we ate at the Mexican restaurant called Tijuana. As Lenna mentioned, most of the restaurants here are in the open air, and this one is no different. The thing that makes this one a bit stranger than others is that cars drive right through the middle of it. It turns out this restaurant is located in the "driveway" of a new car dealership. So, you see new cars being driven into and out of the building. They just move the tables aside to make room for the cars. The picture to the right shows a car being pulled in.

Well, I think we'll be turning in for the evening. We continue to covet your prayers. Praise God that we were able to change our return flights to Bogota without any additional charge - we were thinking that would cost us about $500. Martha, who is our adoption coordinator here in Colombia, was able to work that out for us. Pray that Yamile recovers quickly from her cold. And pray for wisdom for us as we try to communicate our love to Yamile when words are not able to carry the message. We love you all and look forward to being home again.

Lenna's Turn

Buenos dias amigos,

It's Friday morning and we have finished breakfast, consisting of scrambled eggs "con tomates y cebollas" - with tomatoes and onions. Everywhere we eat, it is customary to be served some kind of fresh fruit juice. It is thicker than the juice we are used to in the states, and it does have sugar added, but it sure is delicioso! The hotel we are at in Neiva only includes breakfast for us, so we have to go out for lunch and dinner. We are having a great time trying out different places to eat, which are very different from what we are used to. There's no air conditioning and many of them are outside. But the food is great. Believe it or not, there is a Mexican restaurant (Colombian food is quite different from Mexican food) about a block away and they serve amazing food. We have been there for at least two meals so far. Last night we went out for pizza because we wanted to know how they eat it here in Neiva. Well, it was quite good, but they do not use any tomato sauce on it. What they did have on it was fresh cheese. Apparently, there is a cheese factory right here in Neiva. Mmmmm....!

Okay, enough about food. We are constantly amazed at the politeness of the people here. They love to serve and it shows. The hotel we are at (Hotel Pacande) is often used by adoptive families and the staff clearly enjoy playing a part in the adoptions taking place. When Yamile arrived, they congratulated her and talked to her about her new family, giving her special attention. It was very dear. There is another family here with an adorable little Colombian boy who is 27 months old. They are Italian, so we sort of use Spanish mixed with their Italian to try to communicate. Muy interesante! (Very interesting!)

The hotel we are staying in here in Neiva is quite comfortable. We have a suite with a queen sized bed, another "small" queen sleeper couch, and a twin bed. There is an outside patio with table and chairs. The bathroom is enormous, with both a spa-style tub with jets (big enough to swim in!) and a shower with lots of interesting gadgets. We can adjust the water to come out from about four different directions, and we can add steam if we feel like using it for a sauna. The water can come out from directly overhead- like a rainshower; it can come out of a regular shower nozzle; it can come out on your entire torso, so you can use it for a back massage; or it comes out in something we aren't quite sure what it is, but you can remove it from the wall and put it at your feet. There is a built in remote in this amazing shower that we haven't even completely figured out, but we know we can use it to light up the shower stall, or even pipe in music. So...not to worry. We're all keeping very clean!! :)

Before we traveled, I managed to get ahold of a couple of bilingual children's books and a Children's Spanish picture Bible. I am so wishing we had brought a whole pile of books, as we have discovered that Yamile is a lot like her big sister, Rebecca. She absolutely loves to read, and she is good at it. She picked up her children's Bible and started at the beginning. I think she is about 3/4 of the way through it already!

Again, like her big sisters, Yamile appears to be capable of handling electronics very well....at least....my ipod! She's getting familiar with the game of Tetris. And she gets a kick out of the Spanish kid's music we downloaded for her.

Much to my surprise and delight, Yamile's foster mother prepared a little photo album for us and Yamile. I could harldly believe my eyes when I discovered a photo of our daughter when she was only two!! It's the only one of her when she was little, but it is one we will treasure. It's clear to us that Yamile has been cared for and loved by the people who have been involved in her young life. We are so thankful to the Lord for this. He is so faithful!

Geof and I want you all to know we love reading your comments. Keep them coming! It helps us feel connected. Our love to you all.

Together at last

Well, yesterday was the big day!! We were reunited with Yamile and, this time, we got to take her with us!!! She is now, "provisionally", part of our family. It won't be final until our integracion meeting next Monday and until we receive the sentencia a week or two after that.

We took two taxis (there is no way to fit five people, including our translator, into one taxi here in Colombia) to the ICBF (family well-being department) offices and arrived there about 15 minutes early. While we waited in the parking lot for our attorney we saw a vehicle enter and Lenna and Rebecca were quick to note that they saw Yamile inside. We quickly scurried away to another area where we couldn't be seen, but we could watch her enter the building with her defender (basically, her case worker who has handled her case and made sure she has been cared for appropriately). I was so excited just to see her that I got goose bumps.

The ICBF building was an interesting structure, a two-story brick building that has large openings to allow the breeze to pass through. (The receptionist was seated at a desk that was, essentially, out in the open with a roof over her.) We headed upstairs and were brought into a large conference room with our attorney (Olga Elena), our translator (Sorany), an ICBF attorney, and the ICBF psychologist. The ICBF attorney explained the process to us and prepared us for the introduction.

And then ... the moment we were waiting for. Yamile came in wearing a beautiful, new, yellow dress and came over to us and we were able to give her big hugs and tell her how beautiful she was. She was introduced to her new mama and papa and hermanas (sisters) and she sat with us on our side of the table. We brought a cake for a little celebration and we all shared in it together. During the whole time, Yamile was very quiet because she was nervous (and who could blame her? - her whole life was being turned upside down). We were very thankful for the ICBF staff, who had been ensuring her care for the last four years. She and her defender shared a big hug as they said goodbye and her defender held Yamile's face in her hands as she said something to her. We signed some legal documents giving us permission to have custody of Yamile. This way, if anyone questioned us, we were to show these papers. Then we were done.

After a bit of frustration trying to find two taxis in the middle of heavy traffic, we headed back to the hotel. Sorany was still with us and was able to help us with some translation with Yamile. We gave Yamile the suitcase we'd brought for her, which included a wardrobe that we'd picked for her (so far, thankfully, everything is the right size). We went on a quick shopping trip to buy a couple pairs of shoes and some socks for her and headed out to lunch. Through it all, Yamile was still prety quiet and, truth be known, so were we. The uncertainty of it all, along with the language barrier, contributed to the silence.

We then decided it was time for a little "play therapy" and headed to the hotel pool. There, we had a blast. We found out we've adopted a fish, as Yamile immediately took to the water and was all over the place. I was able to talk with her a little bit and she talked with us more. She climbed all over us and laughed and we generally had a ball. So far, our observation is that Yamile has a very quick wit and quite a sense of humor. We love it! And her!