You can't silence the press

Well, our laptop connection to a Wireless network in the hotel doesn't seem to be working, no doubt the work of the KGB trying to silence the blog and our freedom of speech and expression. Or at least charge me for such freedoms -- $6 an hour to use one of their computers in the Internet room (Room 718) in the hotel, which is made up of two computers and a bathroom in a very small room (we all know bathrooms are a must-have for the American Internet user). I hope I can figure out our wireless laptop connection because the hotel and its Russian spies have set up these computers in Room 718 not to allow photos to be posted.

In a couple hours we leave for Cherepanov, to see Yana in her baby home for the second day, and then in the afternoon we travel to Baby Home No. 2 to see Ruslan for the first time. It takes two hours to get to Cherepanov, so it will be a full day. To give you some idea of the state of this region's child population, there are five baby homes in this region (and there are 12-20 regions in Russia) each with about 50-70 children in them up to age 4. At that time, if they have not been adopted, they are moved to an orphanage. One social worked told me there are about 56 orphanages in this region -- who knows how many children in each.

Our schedule for the next few days.
Today (Saturday): Leave at 7:30 a.m. to head to Cherepanov and visit Yana. Return to Novosibirsk and visit Ruslan in the afternoon (before his 4 p.m. nap).
Sunday: An afternoon visit with Ruslan
Monday: Same as Saturday.
Tuesday: Court date. Hearing is set for noon. We will be prepped for what to expect from the judge/hearing at 10:30 a.m. by our adoption worker.
Wednesday: We will likely be picking up at least one of the two children, if not both, depending on when the paperwork from the court is finished. The paperwork must be finished in order to get the kids.