What will be her American Name? Eryna Maddison McPeek, we changed her first name from Iryna to Eryna so that Americans will pronounce it easier. It is pronounced E-rain-a.
When are we bringing her home? The process is very long here. Unfortunately it could take 5-8 weeks but so far everything has been going smoothly and it looks like we would be traveling home during the first weekend in October. That means we would have been here for 5 weeks.
What is the weather like? It has been in the 60’s during the day and it gets to the 50’s during the night and morning. The sun during the day makes it so beautiful but not when it wakes us up at 4:30am!
What size clothes does she wear? We measured her today and after looking at clothing conversion charts, she should be a 10-12 girls. Her shoe size is a girls 4.
Does she speak English? No. We have started teaching her small words but she has a speech delay so a lot of the words are difficult to say. She is coming along and we have 3 more weeks here so she will do just fine! Plus, she has Allison as her teacher J
Is it safe where you are staying? Yes for the most part. We have felt completely safe during the day and walking with our translator. We have not walked at night and are told not to. That is when there are more people who drink and it could not be safe. The orphanage is in a rural town and it is not safe there. That’s why we chose to stay at the hotel in a bigger town. It costs more but we are concerned more for our safety.
Was Eryna treated good at the orphanage? We were privileged to visit her old orphanage and based on meeting her care givers and seeing her room, we feel that she was treated with love and care. She has only been at her new orphanage for 2 weeks and we are happy about that. The orphanage has a lot of wonderful experiences for the kids to learn from (such as wood carving, sewing, knitting, etc.) but there are older kids there that are very rough and not always nice. The care givers for Eryna have been very nice to us and the girls seem to like them. The living arrangements are not as nice as her old place. They have no toilet paper for the kids to wipe with and stuff is very old. The school part is well kept but not the building where they live.
What is the transportation like there? Not as easy as in the states! We took a 12 hour train to get to the region of her orphanage and to get to the orphanage we pay a driver to take us each day. Not a lot of people have cars. They mainly walk and use bus transportation. In their capital, Kiev, they have an underground Metro system that a lot of people use.
Do we know anything about her parents? Eryna was abandoned at the hospital when she was born. The father is unknown and his name is not on her original birth certificate. She has been in an orphanage her whole life. She was labeled “Mentally Retarded” because they believe that if you didn’t get enough oxygen when born, you are not going to be able to learn. She has always been in an orphanage for children with “Mental Retardation” but she should never have.
Do we have a TV with American shows? We have a TV at the hotel that plays a lot of American shows but none in English! They all have Russian translation spoke over top of them. Its quite funny because Shawn likes to make up what they are saying! The only thing in English are the few music videos shown on MTV.
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