The long trip home

 
I had the trip home al perfectly planned in my head.....you all know what they say about the best laid plans.  
 
It started with me being told "the driver will be there between 8 and 9, I will call you when he gets into the city", he was driving in from Astana to take us to Astana.  At 7:30 the doorbell rings "hello?" ""It's Costa...the driver"  say what????  Good thing I was ready!   He came up and surveyed our pile o'luggage....asked if I was sitting in the back with Ciera, "yes" and then he picked up one bag and headed down the 5 flights of stairs with it (good thing he seemed young!).  At that point I realized, what am I supposed to do with the apartment keys?  Irina (the cook) had phoned earlier to tell me something, but with my very bad Russian and her not so great English we didn't quite connect.  So I call my coordinator to ask about the keys, I am told "Call Irina and she will come and get them". So I do and she literally runs over from her place.  She has a conversation with Costa and then next thing I know she is making him a coffee, that's ok as I really don't want to be at the airport at 10:00 anyway.  Finally the coffee is done, our large bags are all in the car and we pick up the small stuff and head down the stairs one last time.   I see a Mazda and am amazed how he fit everything in and still left the entire back seat open for Ciera and I and our carryons!  We hug Irina, again, and say goodbye.....I am still fighting tears.   It's 8:30PM.  Ciera and I get in and put on seatbelts for the first time in 52 days, this is a long drive so I insist on it.   As we turn off our little street onto the main road I glance to my right at the babyhouse, I am now choking back sobs, I had my arm around Ciera and I hear her sniffling, look down and see tears streaming down her face, "what's wrong honey?" "I miss my sister" "me too sweetie but we will see her in a few weeks", it was so incredibly hard not to loose it right then but I had to be strong for Ciera....she cried for a good 10 minutes.  It was an uneventful drive to Astana, Ciera fell asleep for about 1.5 hours and I cat napped off and on.  It's so weird to be driving along and not see literally anything, I looked up and the stars were amazing.   About 1.5 hours into the trip I looked ahead and could see lights of a city, I thought wow we will be there soon, but because the land is so flat you see it way way out and it took so long to finally get to the city.  
 
The Astana airport is very cool, it's shaped like a Yurt and at night is lit up with all coloured lights, it's also pretty much deserted at 11:00PM.  My plan was to have Ciera nap in the stroller and I'd stretch out and nap...no such luck, Ciera is wide awake.  So somehow we stayed awake until 3:15AM when we were allowed to check in for our flight.  I had already talked to the reps in the office as we had not assigned seats yet for Frankfurt to Toronto, we snagged a row of 3 right at the back, yeah.... surely we will get some sleep then.
 
We check in and check our luggage, we were not even questioned about the 4 bag between us, no extra luggage fees here!  I figured since we were awake we might as well go thru to the gate, note to anyone else leaving Kazakhstan with their previously adopted child.  I was questioned as to why she had 2 passports as under Kazakhstan law you can only have one, after some discussion and the woman leavingher post several times it is determined that it is in fact ok for person under the age of 16 to carry a Kazakhstan passport and the passport of another country.   I ask someone to take our picture so we have leaving Canada  pictures and leaving Kazakhstan pictures, you see for yourself what a difference there is between them! (not to mention at this point we had almost been up 24 hours)  A guard came over and told us we can't take pics...that's ok I already have the one I wanted.  No "anyone needing boarding assistance or travelling with children" here, they announce boarding and everyone gets in line, a very nice gentleman blocks the way for us to get into the line.  At our takeoff time of 5:10AM Ciera is still wide awake and ready to watch tv in the back of the seat.   I did manage to get her to sleep for maybe an hour/hour and 1/2. 
 
We landed in Frankfurt after 6.5 hours, we take our time getting off and thru as we have a 4 hour layover.....again Ciera is wide awake the whole time.  Bizarre though, our gate was B48 so we walk down to it, the last number is B46, so thinking we made a wrong turn, we walk all the way back up...nope not there, we did this twice (hey I was trying to stay awake anyway!).  I finally asked and am told "no it is there"...ok it just does not have a sign.  I noticed several people come down, look at the gate #, then their boarding pass, the gate # and then walk away, so I was not the only one. 
 
Finally we get boarded for the 8 hour flight........I finally convince Ciera she has to lie down....she slept about another hour or so, as did I and then I did catnaps.  Ciera was in the zone with the tv.  The temp on the plane felt like it was 30 below, I asked and was told that the cabin in front felt like the Antarctic and she'd see what she could do.  I know I was tired but I had on 3 blankets and my fleece jacket and was still cold.
 
Our luggage was about the last to come up, I guess as we had arrived in Frankfurt so early!  So as we pushed our way thru the door and I saw my sister my eyes filled with tears again.  I had expected to be teary when I heard them say "Welcome to Toronto" but I didn't.
 
I do have to say that Ciera is really an awesome traveller, no whining, complaining, and she is content to just sit and watch the movies!  The hardest part of the flight was in the row in front of us was a couple with a little boy around Mr. Baby's age, he kept making the same sounds she does...that was hard to listen to knowing I would not hear her for 4 weeks.
 
Close to 30 hours after we left the apartment we arrive at our house!  We got home around 3:00 and I headed in for a shower....man that felt soooooo good!!  I asked Ciera if she felt up for hockey (dumb question I know!), she said yes so we headed off to her first hockey lesson/practice.  Despite her tiredness (she had been up close to 48 hours at this point with a total of maybe 6 hours of broken up sleep) she did well, she fell a fair bit but she also had not been on skates since early June.  
 
As we were still awake I called L who had Dawson and said we were on our way to pick him up.  Within 5 minutes in the car Ciera was literally snoring.  Dawson was not overly excited to see me, but he did jump into the back of the track pretty fast!
 
Back home, I got Ciera changed and into bed and I tried to eat and talk to Michele who was heading out to Uralsk the next day, but I had to cut off the call as I could not stand up any longer.   I got to bed around 10:30 but was awakened at 5:30 with Ciera crying.  I don't think she knew where she was.  I crawled into bed with her until 6:30 when we both were up for the day.  Then off to dance for 10:00......back into the routine.
 
I spent Saturday doing laundry and cleaning.....I do still have one bag left to unpack, for some reason I am in no hurry to do so, I wonder why?
 
Pictures:
- Ciera and I leaving Canada
- Ciera and I leaving Kazakhstan
- The airport at midnight.....deserted
- our pile of luggage heading home
- Ciera getting ready for hockey
- Ciera all ready to get on the ice!
- Mama Fish and Deedee safely strapped in on the plane!