Sept 2 and 3 – to get y’all caught up…

Sept 3 - 6:30 am - Hi everyone sorry we haven't posted any updates but we're having lots of internet connection trouble at our apartment. We - OK the royal 'we' as it's been all Paul - have spent hours trying to get it going - we got connected once on the first day and then a couple of times for a few minutes each, but that's been it so far. We think it’s the phone line at the apartment, so we’ll see what we can figure out (ya that’s the royal ‘we’ again)… :-)

Other than that the apartment’s OK – unfortunately we still have no hot water, and turns out we don’t have the satellite channels we thought, but we’re still comfortable here.

To back up a bit - later in the afternoon on the 1st we got hit hard by the jetlag- after our first visit with Angelique we ran out of steam once the adrenaline and excitement wore off. I (N) fell asleep at 3:30 pm, thinking it would just be a nap - well when I woke up 7 hours later I guess it wasn't so much of a nap but a full sleep! So I was up all night, but at least I got a good rest. Paul chatted with our apartment owners while I slept - they have moved to an apartment on the 2nd floor while we live in their place on the third floor. He speaks a bit of English and Paul was able to have a good chat with him.

Sept 2 - we again visited with Angelique in the morning - it was a fun visit, she ate some yogurt we brought and we played with the same toys as before. She wants to do and wear everything we've brought all at the same time, including the sunglasses, hairband, bracelet and also carry around the bear and the beach ball. Makes for an interesting look! And yesterday she again had the 'poofs' in her hair - frilly ribbons tied to 2 pigtails on top of her head. For those who saw the photos from our first trip, it's the same look she had the day we took her in the car, but this time with white poofy ribbons instead of blue – odd but very cute!

She seems particularly interested in the little photo album we brought filled with pictures of her from the first trip - I guess all kids are enthralled with looking at themselves, right? :-)

After our visit we caught up with Jen & Bert from Ottawa who had court yesterday morning - we're so happy for them that it's over with! They live close by us - we're close to the TSUM store with the pedestrian market we had visited on our last trip, which is also close to the Green market and the beautiful parks, so we'll have lots to walk around and look at.

So we went for an afternoon celebratory drink with Jen & Bert, which turned into dinner with them plus Pam & Grev and their daughter Saltanat, Gretchen and her daughter Ana, and Chris/Christine from Montreal with their son Maxime. They've all just received custody of their children in the last 10 days and are on their final stretches in Almaty. It was great to see them!

In the evening we talked with our translator Anel who will accompany us to court on Wednesday. Then we both managed to sleep a few hours overnight before waking up around 4:00.

That’s all for this entry, so it doesn’t become ridiculously longer than it already is – another update will come shortly!

Thanks for the comments and calls, we really appreciate it!

Take care
Nicole and Paul