Virgil

There are not a lot of people here in Shymkent that speak English. Oh some people know a word or two, but hardly more than that. We’re lucky in a way. A couple from the United Kingdom (Wales, specifically) is also out here for their adoption, and my wife has been in contact with them for at least a month through email. She met them through an adoption online community. They have been in Shymkent for this past month and they had a good feel for the town. Once we got settled we met up with them ...

Good grief. It's been a hell of a journey. We just got internet connection a few hours ago. The thirty something hour trip was an adventure. We left on Saturday and we got to our destination Monday, and there were no hotel room stop overs, just travel and layover. Not sure I have the energy to talk about it. Shymkent is an interesting old world type of town. I will blog about it as I get to know it better.

Yes we have news and it's mostly good news, but there are still the ...

Ok, we’re set. Tomorrow we’re off, into the wild blue yonder of half way around the world to a place as remote and ancient as anywhere in the world, a place where westerners crossed over as part of the silk road to China, a place Marco Polo could have felt comfortable, though he didn’t cross that way, a place where the first horses were supposed to have been domesticated, a culture over the centuries mixed with Mongols and Turks and Cossacks and Persians and Chinese, a vast land mostly of steppe ...

This is a follow up to my blog on the woman who returned her Russian adopted child to Russia. Here: http://www.online-literature.com/for...og.php?b=10191

Now in spite of the stupidity of the adoptive mother putting the child on the plane alone to send the child back, I tried to point out that the Russian orphanage system has some real problems. Most comments focused on the mother’s irresponsibility, and that’s understandable, but I did not doubt that the Russian system produces ...

For the first time of this year today I did something I love doing – sitting, or more truthfully lounging, on my deck and reading, even catching a little catnap. It is really peaceful in the back and on a warm afternoon the only sound back there is that of the birds chirping and rustling through the trees, engaged in whatever social entanglements birds entangle themselves in. Now mind you, I don’t have a large backyard. I do live in the city, and city plots are small, and, while Staten Island ...