Saturday, March 20 – Decide to give Janat the day off. Don’t really want to learn about Kazak culture today. Will sit in our warm apartment , watching the snow, eating our oatmeal, listening to Bethany Dillon on John’s iPhone (thank you, Tucker) and possibly venture out to join the New Year’s festivities a little later (while Gulnara works things out). Thankfully, we did get to call and wish our precious Cooper a Happy Birthday at midnight our time last night (2PM in Greenwood). God, please do this thing. You are faithful to equip those whom you call. Please give us courage and strength to endure. We will wait on You.
1:30PM Change in plans – Janat called and says that Gulnara wants to meet us st 3 PM at nearby restaurant to talk. Because this conversation did not go well and we have not had the opportunity to speak with our agency (except to let her know that we have a problem), I will wait to write any details until all of this is resolved. To summarize our meeting without sharing details – yesterday afternoon was more stressful than the 8 hours of sitting in the SUV in front of road closed for bad weather AND our evening before at the babyhouse meeting all (or many) of the Karaganda police. God give us strength to do this. I feel sick inside. I thank you that you have allowed us trials before this so that we are stronger to endure what is ahead of us now. Help us to stay the course. We still believe that you have brought us here to bring this little girl home. Make a way through all of this mess. You are able. Evening with Janat - after Gulnara left, Jonad took us to an internet café where we were finally able to send out our blog. It has been very frustrating not to be able to e-mail or talk to friends and family back home. Still learning our phone and how to do the wireless thing in a turkish café and not have to pay $5/minute on John’s cell phone. Wishing we had brought more/better movies. Watched 2 episodes of King of Queens DVD (thank you, again, Tucker) last night. Have to watch what we have sparingly since our stay has been extended by a week. Don’t know when we’ve been in a place that almost everything is out of our control – not such a bad place to be when you know the One who is