Court Today Was Intense!

July 8,2011
Wow, what a day! We met up with Irinna at 930am and then met Anatoly and the orphanage lawyer for coffee. We all went to court together. We arrived before 11am. We all took our places in the courtroom in front of the microphones. The representative from the SDA arrived, the prosecutor, the 2 jurors and secretary and finally the judge. He began and proceeded to review our dossier-he read every page of the very thick dossier out loud in court and pointed out mistakes in translation many times and wanted to know how this got passed me. I explained that I never saw the translations. After going through the dossier he proceeded with debate-more questions. This went on and on. He then wanted to bring the girls to court to ask them if they wanted to be adopted and have their names changed. Everyone else in the courtroom argued that this was not a good idea due to their diagnosis of down syndrome. He finally conceded. We again had to state what we wanted from the court--"We would like the court to approve me to adopt these 2 girls, Victoria and Marina. I would like the mother's name changed to mine, Jacqueline Louise Egan, I would like the girls names changed to Clara Victoria Dianne Egan and Abigail Marina Jean Egan. I would like their birthdays to remain the same as well as their place of birth. I would like a positive decision as quickly as possible." He then had Tim repeat the request and promise to adopt the girls once back home in the US. He and the jurors left the court for 45 minutes and returned with their decision. He very solemnly read their decision to allow the adoption etc. We were jumping with excitement inside but remained subdued until he left the courtroom. The jurors congratulated us as well as the prosecutor, orphanage lawyer and SDA worker. They were all very much for the adoptions. We went to the orphanage to see Vika who we hadn't seen all week. She was very happy to see us and remembered us. She is still a Papa's girl. She loves him so. She loves me but very much loves her Papa-you'll see in the pics. They wanted to leave to take her back to camp until next week. Poor Vika did not want to go. She hid behind her papa. Tim had to take her to the van and put her on and walk away. I threw her kisses and told her we would be back to get her. She started yelling "Mama!" and reaching for me. It was so sad. The van pulled away with our girl. Later we found out the van was involved in an accident with a motorcycle and the motorcycle person was killed. We are told Vika is fine. I just want to get her back here and not let her leave again until I take her home. Hope to find out more in the morning. Thank you Jesus for protecting our girl today. We then had to race to the US consulate to have Tim sign paperwork before he left. By this time it was after 5pm so we didn't get to see Marina (Abby). We will see her in the morning.
Tim leaves early in the morning for home. I will be leaving tomorrow afternoon to go to Irinna's region for a few days. So I may not have internet access for a while. I will get back on as soon as I can. The pics are of our sweet Vika today.