(From Adrienne): Not that we are counting down or anything, but as of tomorrow we only have one week left in Moldova! It is amazing how in 2 weeks, the children at the orphanage "know" us and look forward to seeing us. I think the softest spots in our hearts are still for our first group. This morning, their caregiver took them on a walk to our area of the yard today. When Andre and Nicollietta saw us they went crazy. Andre has this wave that uses his entire body, and his face literally lights up. Even my heart of stone [View Full Entry]

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(From Adrienne): Not that we are counting down or anything, but as of tomorrow we only have one week left in Moldova! It is amazing how in 2 weeks, the children at the orphanage "know" us and look forward to seeing us. I think the softest spots in our hearts are still for our first group. This morning, their caregiver took them on a walk to our area of the yard today. When Andre and Nicollietta saw us they went crazy. Andre has this wave that uses his entire body, and his face literally lights up. Even my heart of stone [View Full Entry]

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Hello, Friends and Family -- Wendy here. Adrienne and I find that, since the majority of people here do not speak English at all, there is no censorship in verbalizing our thoughts. We had another microbus incident the other day when a man was getting off the ahead of me and slammed the door in my face as if he were the last person off. Out loud I told him exactly what I thought of that, and this became the subject of much laughter between Adrienne and me that afternoon. This new behavior of saying precisely what we think will have [View Full Entry]

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Hello, Friends and Family -- Wendy here. Adrienne and I find that, since the majority of people here do not speak English at all, there is no censorship in verbalizing our thoughts. We had another microbus incident the other day when a man was getting off the ahead of me and slammed the door in my face as if he were the last person off. Out loud I told him exactly what I thought of that, and this became the subject of much laughter between Adrienne and me that afternoon. This new behavior of saying precisely what we think will have [View Full Entry]

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It is Wednesday, and Wendy and I figured we are over halfway finished with this leg of our journey. Even though we feel we have bonded with the children at the orphanage, and adore our time with them, we are definitely looking forward to moving on to our next stop: Istanbul (not Constantinople). Yesterday we woke up to the greatest sound in the world...rain! The temperature was around 10 degrees cooler than the previous few days, and our spirits were immediately soaring. Because the children stay indoors when it rains, and because our current group just stays in their cribs when [View Full Entry]

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Hello, All -- Wendy here. Adrienne and I are here at the Internet place again, and have a few things to say regarding our last couple of days. Today found me conducting another business transaction -- this time buying camera memory. In my younger days, I have always done my best to learn the native language and use it as much as I can. I don't know what's happened, but now I prefer to talk in English and gestures, and I find this works just as well and is much easier. I won't describe all the times this has worked for [View Full Entry]

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It is Wednesday, and Wendy and I figured we are over halfway finished with this leg of our journey. Even though we feel we have bonded with the children at the orphanage, and adore our time with them, we are definitely looking forward to moving on to our next stop: Istanbul (not Constantinople). Yesterday we woke up to the greatest sound in the world...rain! The temperature was around 10 degrees cooler than the previous few days, and our spirits were immediately soaring. Because the children stay indoors when it rains, and because our current group just stays in their cribs when [View Full Entry]

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Hello, All -- Wendy here. Adrienne and I are here at the Internet place again, and have a few things to say regarding our last couple of days. Today found me conducting another business transaction -- this time buying camera memory. In my younger days, I have always done my best to learn the native language and use it as much as I can. I don't know what's happened, but now I prefer to talk in English and gestures, and I find this works just as well and is much easier. I won't describe all the times this has worked for [View Full Entry]

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Hello Friends and Family -- Wendy here. Adrienne and I looked forward to being with the kids again on Monday, after having one day off. We were, however, not prepared for our children showing up in the playground looking like zombies. They looked like little robots, each with a toy in their hands. Their caretaker, a woman we had not yet met named Anna, was not interested in engaging the children in play, and seemed to view us as intruders in her orderly world. After some time, we did get some of the boys to play ball, and they are slowly [View Full Entry]

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It's Adrienne, and I wanted to write a quick update about our Monday. As Wendy mentioned, our morning did not go well. One reason may be the weather. It is so hot and humid here, so we are constantly miserable and sweating, with nothing but a cold shower to provide relief (I never thought I would appreciate a cold shower, but there you go). Our host said it was 40 degrees Celsius yesterday, and there was no breeze. The thermometer in our room said 84 degrees Fahrenheit last night. Needless to say, we did not sleep well. So today did not [View Full Entry]

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