10 Days to court – it just can’t come fast enough. We’re doing OK without Luba, muddling our way through Ukrainian society. Today we’ve decided not to venture into town. We bought enough groceries yesterday to give us several meals, and we’re not going to upload a video today, so we’ll be fine here in the apartment. Had a nice visit with Juliana this morning – brought along a couple of balloons we bought in the market yesterday. Not sure if she’s seen them before, but she definitely got a kick out of me (Steve) blowing them up and letting them go. There’s no doubt, though, that she’s definitely a “mama’s girl” for now. We’ve heard that this is pretty typical, as the only caregivers she’s ever had have been women. She has bonded with Julie very well, loves to be in her lap, loves to be carried. That’s not to say I don’t get any of the action; I get to hold her hand sometimes when we walk, and she’ll give me a hug and kiss hello & goodbye, and she talks about me a lot to the other kids (of course, I have no idea what she’s really saying – “beware of the big, scary papa”?). When we’re sitting on the floor playing, though, she wants to be on Mama.

Shopping is interesting. We know the names of a few things, the rest we try to figure out by sight. Of course, even knowing what to call something is no guarantee. We ran out of milk, so the other night I went into a small store to get some. The milk we had bought previously came in small cartons, maybe 1 liter; must be ultra-pasteurized, because they sell it right off the shelf, no refrigerator. Anyway, this small store didn’t have our usual “brand” so I bought a small bag of it (yes, bag), maybe a pint or so, cost the equivalent of about 45 cents. When we got back to the apartment, we cut it open and this milk both smelled like and tasted like smoked ham. Julie joked that maybe it was pig’s milk. Ha Ha… she could be right. Anyway, we picked up the better stuff yesterday and will give the “pig’s milk” to the local stray cats. Another interesting purchase: a deck of cards. Now, there’s not much for us to do around here when we’re not at the orphanage, besides read and wait for our internet connection, so we thought maybe we could play some card games. We bought a deck at the (huge) outdoor market yesterday. When we opened it, we found that it was complete except for the 2-s through the 5’s. Missing 16 cards. Is this a standard Ukrainian deck? We don’t know. I haven’t called Luba yet to ask her.

We typically ride into town on a “mini” bus (holds 12-20 passengers), and they really do have an extensive bus system here in Mykolayiv, making it pretty easy to get wherever we want to go for about 20 cents each. Yesterday, we got on the bus and sat towards the back – Julie picked the seats, so I am absolved of all blame. There was an awful smell, and Julie was absolutely sick to her stomach most of the 10 minute ride. It wasn’t until he got off the bus that we realized the odor was coming from the man behind us. He was also muttering to himself the whole way, probably saying “I hope the beautiful American woman in front of me notices my cologne”. Gotta find humor where we can.

We’ll try to get into town in the next few days to post some more video. Miss you all, and God bless America.