Krystina and the 20 pound jar of honey

I woke up this morning at 8:00 after getting a good night sleep.  Felt like a new person and I've put complaining about the travel behind me.  It was no surprise to see it snowing when I looked out the window.  There must have been 6 to 8 inches that fell over night and it was still snowing hard.  The thought of driving 2 hours each way to pick up Krystina wasn't a pleasant one. 

I hired a driver to take me and an interpreter to Drebin, actually ABRO arranged it all, I just had to pay him.  It was well worth the $40 since he was with me from 11:00 to after 5:00 and successfully navigated the snow covered roads with ease.  Anastasia would be my interpreter for the day, everyone calls her Nastia for short.   (Another very common name here)

After arriving in Drebin, Krystina met us at the bus station.  The look of joy on her face when she saw me made the long trip worth while.  She took us back to her foster mom's house.  I did a very poor job of getting pictures or video of the house, I needed my help from my companion from last year, Elaine.  She was great at helping me to document our experiences.  Unfortunately I was on my own today and could only manage to take a few pictures.  The house was a nice place for Belarussian standards.  Krystina shares a room with two other foster children, Leeza (8), and Victoria (15).  Although I didn't get to see them, they also have pigs, chickens, a cow for milk and cats and dogs.  Maria told me that they rarely have to go to the store to buy food.  She grows and bakes everything they need, or it is provided by the animals they keep.  (Krystina refuses to milk the cow)

Maria is a rare woman who raised three children of her own, farms, manages farm animals and is raising three foster children.  I'm convinced there isn't anything she can't do.

Maria was very nice and we had a long discussion about Krystina.  She is concerned for Krystina's future and wants to help her.  With the help of Nastia, I talked to Maria for over an hour.  Actually, I mostly listened.  She told me many things I already knew about Krystina from having her live with us for 6 weeks every summer for 7 years.  She also told me some things that I didn't know.  She asked that I not buy Krystina a cell phone (I had no plans to) because she would just use it to talk to boys and would get in trouble....what teenage girl doesn't want a cell phone to talk to boys??  Trouble is something that Krystina doesn't need in her life right now.  She will have plenty of tough decisions and difficulties to deal with next August when she is too old for foster care. 

The most shocking piece of information Maria gave me concerned Krystina's real mother.  Over the years we had heard many stories of what happened to her mother.  Getting accurate information is very difficult here for many reasons, not least of which they don't seem to do a great job keeping records.  At one point we heard her mother died, another time we heard her mother was in prison.  In either case, Krystina had been in the orphanage since age 3 and has very few memories of her mother.  The most notable that she has told us about was how her mother burned Krystina's arm which she still has the scare today.  Well, Maria told me that her mother was out of prison for 5 days now.  I guess she is alive and the prison story was true, and she is probably living in Bobruisk in the flat that was supposed to be Krystina's when she got out of trade school.  It would definitely not be a good idea for Krystina to have any contact with her mom.  This creates many additional problems for Krystina that she nor us have thought about.  That flat in Bobruisk was Krystina's only hope for a place of her own to live.  Now, who knows what she will do.  Please join me in praying for Krystina.  This would be a great time for some divine intervention.  What happens to many of these children who age out of foster care and have no place to go is not a pleasant thought and something I don't want to think about right now. 

The roads were getting worse by the minute so it was time to say goodbye to Maria and head back to Mogilev.  As we were getting ready to leave, Maria gave me a couple of Russian chocolate bars to take to Grace and Jay.  In addition to the chocolate, she gave me a jar of honey.  This is not your typical jar of honey.  Apparently Maria also has honey bees that she keeps.  This gigantic jar of honey must weigh 20 pounds, and I have no idea if it is even legal to bring it back to the U.S.  Anyone up for a honey party when I get home???

Tomorrow is going to be another busy and exciting day.  Frank and Joe will be joining me for the trip to Olya's village.  I am looking forward to spending some time with my old buddies as they have been staying at Vadim's house and I haven't seen them.  We will be meeting with several ABRO children to help hand out gifts and candy from their American host families.  Then Olya will come back with us to Mogilev to stay until I leave.