My first impressions of Port-au-Prince leave me thinking of Africa, though.  The earthquake devastated an already pitifully poor nation, and recovery has been slow to say the least.  I read today that more than 600,000 people around Port-Au-Prince are still displaced and living in encampments like these:

If I didn’t know better, I’d swear I’m in Africa and not just an hour and a half flight from Miami as we drive to and from the office.

Tomorrow we’re being driven out of the city to a beach resort for the day.  I’ll be interested to see what we drive through.

I also took some pictures at a couple interesting places, though I was pretty discrete with the camera.  First is the Faisal Mosque, in the outskirts of Islamabad. It’s a huge complex, stark outside, but wonderfully ornate inside.

One of the things I remember about Iran is all the different modes of transportation you’d see in the city. People would, of course, walk, bicycle, ride motorcycles, drive various motorized contraptions with 3 or more wheels and, occasionally, you’d see more traditional transport like these.

All exist side-by-side and fill the needs of the people.

I’ve got to say that I’m looking forward to heading back.

These past few days have been days of discovery for us.  I’ll not spend a lot of time on things, but it’s been eye-opening.

• We’ve met a Spanish couple and a single French woman who are adopting from this same orphanage. The Spanish couple met their son for the first time in 2007. We met our son in April. The whole process for us has been long, but these folks have really had a hard time of it.  The woman from France is lovely and is adopting a beautiful little girl, but she’s having a hard time connecting with the girl.  Roman was uneasy with us at first, but now we’re a “normal” part of his life.
• One of his caregivers, Svieta, truly cares for Roman. For his birthday this year she gave him a little golden cross. Today she earnestly asked if we would mind taking the cross with Roman so he would have a memory of her. Of course we said yes. We also got her mailing address so we can send pictures so she can continue to share in his life.
• Today the photo album we made when we were here in April reappeared.  It’s obvious that they have been showing it to him.  He was so excited and flipped through the pages, naming mama & papa, mama & roman, papa & roman, pointing to our house and saying “dom!” (house), pointing to our parents and naming them baba and dyeda (babushka, grandmother, and dyedushka, grandfather). He wouldn’t let go of the album for the better part of an hour. Whenever we moved from one part fo the room to the next, he was clutching the picture book and he really objected when he thought someone was trying to take it from him.
• He’s quite comfortable riding in a stroller and he even got concerned when I began to push the stroller before his seatbelt was fastened. This bodes well for the airport.

Tomorrow’s a busy day trying to get paperwork done as fast as we can.

Here are a few pictures of Topkapi Palace from earlier today:

Caligraphy at the gates of the inner palace

Views of the outside of the Throne Room pavilion

Inside the Throne Room pavilion

Inside the innermost court of the palace where only the Sultan could go

A beautiful fountain in the innermost court

Some of the most impressive sights were forbidden to photograph. There are several rooms with holy relics such as swords of the Caliphs, golden rainspouts from the Kabbah in Mecca, the Mantel of the Prophet Mohammed, jewelry that makes your eyes pop and so on.  May of the items from Mecca were brought to Istanbul when they “wore out” and were replaced; such holy things were not discarded, rather they were placed into storage and are now on display some 400 to 1300 years later.

The court hearing was held in a very modern building in a spartan, but comfortable room. There were 8 people in the room:

• My wife and me
• An interpreter
• The head doctor of the orphanage
• A social worker reporting on our interaction with the child and delivering a recommendation if the adoption was in the best interest of the child
• The Judge
• A Prosecutor, whose role is to listen to the proceeding and see that the law is followed
• A court recorder

All, except the recorder could speak, though the interpreter didn’t deliver testimony. All had the right to ask for questions to be repeated, and to ask questions of other participants.

Orphans in Russia have the right to be adopted, so the hearing was to determine if our petition for adoption was in the best interest of the child.

The hearing began with introduction of all participants, an introduction of the purpose, some other administrativa. We then spoke, first me and then Rachel. Our “speech” gave our motivation to adopt, the timeline of our adoption activities in Russia, a description of our trips and meeting with the child, our parental philosophy, preparation to parent, our understanding of the medical condition of the child, our understanding of the legal consequences of the adoption and our legal responsibilities, a description of our home, etc. It was prepared from a list of questions and issues provided by our agency.

My part lasted approximately 20 minutes (40 with translation), and then Rachel spoke for approximately 10 minutes. Throughout, the Judge would interject with questions as she saw fit. After Rachel was done speaking, the Prosecutor opted to question her further for a total of about 20 minutes (with translation).

After we spoke, first the Social Worker, then the Head Doctor spoke. We learned some additional history of our boy through their testimony.

By 11:00 (the hearing started at approximately 9:20), all but the judge exited the room while the Judge quickly deliberated her ruling. At 11:10 we were called back in and she delivered her ruling. It was all quite businesslike and, in some places, I rather got the impression that participants were going through the motions of a ceremony that had been repeated so many times.

We understand that the Judge could be quite harsh with her questioning. Her questions for us were quite reasonable and few, and focused mostly on confirming we understood our obligations, had been given medical information, and understood what care for our child was required, given the medical information.

The preparation for this even was quite stressful. It was the focus of our lives for 8 months. Now that it is over, we need to re-focus on doing what is needed to become a family.

This time, we decided to take advantage of our layover and sightsee a little.  Once we landed, we checked in to ensure that our connecting flight was still on schedule, rearranged our carryon so we could check most of it in the left-luggage stand at the airport, and then jumped on a train that went up the Rhein to Mainz.

Mainz is a long-established city (thousands of years old) and the part we saw is a charming collection of platz’ surrounded by pretty buildings, connected by small streets.  The city is most noted for is honored son, Gutenberg, of printing press fame.  One of the churches in the city has a set of stained-glass windows designed by Marc Chagalle; they were the last windows he did before he died, and they honestly look like watercolor paintings captured in glass. The subtle variations and softness in the colors is amazing!

In the main platz near the cathedral the Christmas market (Fasnachtmarkt (I think!)) was set up and full of people out socializing. The booths selling Gleuwien and roast chestnuts were the most popular, however you could find every kind of food, sweet, or craft you wanted if you just looked enough.  There were lots of tourists, yes, but there were a lot of Meentzers too.

After walking around for a couple hours, it felt good to sit and enjoyed a cup of Gleuwien, before winding our way back to the train station to catch our flight out to Ekaterinburg.