Netta's Pages

I am not totally clear how it is possible to love someone just because you have decided to adopt them. It worries me that we will find ourselves in a position where we adopted Paulina and this strange girl (strange as in unknown) will be part of our lives but we won’t love her. How does this automatically happen. I can understand when it is your child that has grown up from infancy with you. I am sure there are parents that don’t love their children but usually it happens almost automatically by virtue of the fact that the child is so much a part of you.
Maybe that is part of an explanation concerning adoption. Maybe the child is also very much a part of you because you have decided to adopt her. I don’t know. The thing is that it does concern me and I will just have to wait and see.

The logistics of getting all of us from our respective airports worked out eventually. I met Katya at airport number one and we drove to the hotel. Our driver, whose dreams of being a race driver were dashed when he flunked his driving test, flew us there using hitherto unknown driving tactics making full use of sidewalks and all lanes of the road simultaneously. Right after I got off the plane I was somewhat drowsy, but after the first Mikhail experience I arrived at the hotel surprisingly awake. I also realized my knuckles where white, some of them showing teeth marks. Airport number one, the hotel and airport number two turned out to be the furthest you could place three locations in Moscow and still be in the city. We picked Michelle and Gaul up at airport #2 and headed back to the hotel. They too seemed to have been revived by the drive and it took an additional hour to get their pulses back to normal.
The hotel is great with a wonderful pool and health club. Since it was not possible to see Paulina today we are just taking it easy and getting ready for tomorrow.
I got to spend many hours with Katya on the road (somewhat breathless conversations) and in the airport waiting for Michelle’s flight.
Katya recommended leaving Paulina in the orphanage as late as possible in trip #2. The reason being that Paulina has not experienced any of the outside world yet, I hadn’t thought of it. She has not been in a car, in a city or anywhere really outside of the orphanage. It is all going to be very overwhelming for her. We need to try and expose her gradually first of all to us and then to the world. I can’t imagine what this will feel like for her.
We are going to have a taste of it on Tuesday when we take Paulina to have her photo taken for passport and visa, this will involve driving her (with Mikhail!!) to the photographer’s.
Tomorrow is the big day when we meet Paulina!

In order to keep this trip from becoming too boring, we have split up and are flying on different airlines and into different airports in Moscow.
This made Michelle and Gaul wait longer in Boston for their flight to take off, and when I arrive I will have to meet up with the interpreter and driver and then hop over to the other airport, as far as I could tell, on the other side of the city and collect Michelle and Gaul three hours later.
I am wondering if we will possibly be able to get to the orphanage today, probably not since it will be quite late once we are done with that maneuver, and they have strict visiting hours at the orphanage.
My flights were uneventful but packed. And despite all my efforts to get some sleep, including many pillows and a sleeping pill, I wasn’t able to turn off the din in my head running through various scenarios, and get to sleep.
Once this trip is over, it will be even stranger, we will already have met Paulina and yet we will be going home, leaving her at the orphanage for several weeks before we return and pick her up.

Next Saturday we are flying to Moscow to meet Netta for the first time. We will spend a week there, visiting the orphanage and then going to court to petition for Netta’s adoption.