So...I think this is officially the longest time I've gone w/o blogging! But...let me just share with you a bit of this past month...or maybe just the last week- it alone will give you an idea of the craziness our life has been! Last Friday we left Krasnodar and flew to St Petersburg to meet with our collegues there and to see their church and meet the national workers there... After a long flight (and several episodes of Go Diego Go- thanks to the Mason's dvd player- love you guys!) we made it. We spent 2 whole days learning about the ministries that are going on there and seeing the city- beautiful! It has officially made the list of my favorite cities in the world! On Monday morning we got up very early and drove across town to the train station to take a 6hr train to Helsinki, Finland to renew our visas and have a few days of "rest"... As we're pulling out of the station we realize that we left our camera bag at our friends house...and my cell phone was inside of it! Nothing we could do about it now! After 6 crazy hours with a restless toddler and 2 very talkative Russian ladies in our cabin- I was about ready to pull my hair out! We arrive at the train station and head out to find the flat that we had rented for the night- it had been recommended to us by friends- it was only 8 Euros a night - though it was just a one room place and we would be sleeping on pull out couches...but hey, who cares! We wandered up and down the block for 2 hours in freezing weather and couldn't find the place! Nobody had any idea where it was asked and the person that was supposed to meet us with the key never showed and we didn't have the code to get in the gate to the building!!!! So, a nice man we met on the street suggested a nice hotel not far from there and even helped us get our stuff down there and showed us the nearest Metro station! So, we spend the night at the Fenno Hotel and enjoyed their complimentary breakfast buffet in the morning! The next day JB got up very early to go the the consulate to get our new Visas. He waited in line outside for 2 hours and when he finally got inside they refused our visas b/c we didn't have copies of our HIV tests that we had done in Russia! But the crazy thing is that they were required to get our Letters of Invitation (LOI) that we needed in order to apply for our visas! And the place that did our LOI's said THEY needed them and that the consulate would know we've had them done b/c we were issued LOI's! So...after hours of trying to convince them to give us Visas, JB came home, we packed up all our stuff, moved to the guest house (where we wanted to stay origionally, but was full for our first night!) And then we got on the tram and headed out to find a lab to do our bloodwork and that would give us same-day results so that we could return to Russia the next day! After very expensive blood tests we had Subway for dinner and went back to the guest house. JB got up again very early to wait outside the consulate and we got our visas! We had plans of going to the indoor water park- but found that it was closed on weekdays...so we went to the aquarium instead and Gavin enjoyed all the "fishies". Then we picked up our bags at the guest house and boarded the overnight train to Moscow. Our neighbors were so noisey and blaring music out into the hallway! During the four minutes the train stopped in St Pete to pick up/ drop off passengers JB met our friend outside our car to pick up our camera bag- THANKS PERRY!!! To top it off Gavin started to get a cold that afternoon and was coughing! By the time we make it into Moscow, I'm completely exhausted from sharing a bed with a wiggly toddler and not sleeping a wink and we're very worried about Gavin- his breathing is very labored- you can see his ribs with every breath and he's weezing terribly. As soon as we got in the car we called our doctor there and she got him in right away. It really scared me when they took him right to their emergency room and not to an examining room! They game his some steroid shots, oxygen, and breathing treatments and within hours he was feeling much better. I spent the day and night there with him (another night in bed with a wiggly toddler!) and JB picked us up the next morning to head to the airport to pick up his family who had just arrived. When we get to the airport we find that 6 of their 7 bags (one being our new Mac!) never arrived! They were still in Cleveland! They're still not here but Delta said they should make it down from Moscow sometime today? I sure hope so, b/c they're full of Christmas gifts for tomorow morning!
JB's family has been getting over jet lag and enjoying Gavin, Gavin is feeling much better and I'm still working on catching up on sleep! I promise I'll write more later-
Merry Christmas!
(insert Hecock family Christmas photo here- Blogger isn't cooperating and won't upload the pic! Sorry!)
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