US Embassy

Hey to Everyone! I have been a slacker in updating our blog, so I am a couple days behind. Today is Sunday morning in Armenia. We had our US Embassy interview on Friday afternoon at 2pm. It was our first visit to a US Embassy anywhere so I have to admit that there was a level of coolness to it :) The US Embassy in Armenia is located in Yerevan and is the 3rd largest Embassy anywhere in the world and filled with all the latest technology. You may wonder why Armenia has such a large and high tech Embassy. Well first of all the Armenian US Embassy has over 300 stationed Marines working inside. We thought this was interesting too. Well some information that might explain this...because Armenia was a Soviet country Russia still offers protection in case of war against Armenia. Russia also does not approve a US military base to be in Armenia. So the country of Armenia allows the US to station military in their US Embassy. Most of you are probably thinking like we did, over 300 stationed soldiers is a military base. The Armenian government wants to please the American government so they allow these Embassy assignments. This allows the US to have operations set up very close to Iran for intelligence, etc. Yerevan is located close to the Iranian border. This piece of education was all very interesting to us. Maybe some of you already knew this, but we certainly didn't.

Now back to the interview. It was very very easy. Our appointment was scheduled for 2pm. We waited to see a consulate until 3pm. Once we were able to have our interview. He interviewed us and our attorney. He was essentially asking questions to make sure all the Hague adoption guidelines were followed, that we did not pay any monies outside typical adoption expenses, and we outlined the process we went through starting from the beginning until now. We really talked about the adoption very litte. He was most interested in the YMCA partnership that has been established with the YMCA of Armenia. He asked about this because he was curious about our visit to Armenia in June. He thought very highly of the program and was excited about the great opportunities that this will bring to the youth in both America and Armenia.

Once we finished the short interview process, he told us that her VISA was approved and that we would be able to pick it up Monday or Tuesday of the following week pending no database issues out of Washington DC. We are really praying that the bad weather going through DC right now first doesn't cause any injury to the people in that area and secondly doesn't delay our getting home. Our plan is to leave Armenia as soon as we have the VISA in hand. We are looking at Wednesday as our most likely departure day.

Payson is still thriving. She is learning so much and is so much more interactive and active than 9 days ago when we brought her home with us. She still has a minor freak out when it comes to meal times if she thinks that the food isn't coming fast enough. She is also teething like crazy so there has been the normal fussiness that comes along with that.

Will and I have both been pleasantly surprised at how the bonding process has gone. Of course there will still be bumps in the process, but she really appears to feel a strong sense of comfort with us and we have really bonded with her. We have even seen bonding occur between her and Caleb. It is totally and completely a God thing! We know that we will have more adjustments once we get back to the US and she has to adjust to everyday life, but we feel confident that God will see us through that too.

Today we are planning on traveling to the head Armenian church to take in the culture of their national church. Love to everyone and hopefully we will get to see everyone soon!

Jenn