Our Adoption Story II

So, April arrived and we needed a home study done. This is where someone comes to your house and reviews everything about your life. It's not really about the house but about the couple, your background, marriage, family life, finances, etc. Well, in the States these are not a big deal. Every state has local social workers who will perform this service for you. But in the middle of Siberia?
We contacted an agency located out of Germany who specialized in just what we needed: international home studies. We booked a guy for the nearest date he was available. So, he flew in from Germany (mind you, we pay for all of this) and we drove 9 hours north to the closest airport to pick him up. We stayed overnight with some friends, picked him up and drove 9 hours back to our village. He was extremely laid back, which we thought was a huge blessing since we do live in a village without running water. He stayed with us two nights and Curt drove back up the 9 hours north and came back the next day. Our home study guy assured us the home study would be completed in a month. Excellent. At this rate, we could have the girls by September.
We began to prepare our friends in the village for what we were doing. We first had to explain adoption (literally translated "taking children"; not the best start). Then we had to explain that the girls were African.
That was tough. Russia, as a stereotype, is extremely prejudiced. There are the white Russians and the minority people, like those we lived with, who look Asian. Typically, anyone who wasn't white was an outcast, had a hard time finding work in the main cities, etc. This includes the minorities who are just as Russian as anyone else. So, the fact that our girls were so far out of the box was so strange. We never had any negativity. But we did have a lot of confusion. And then there were the few people who thought it was awesome and went as far as to say they even looked like us.
A month came a went. Two months went by. No completed home study. There were complications, none that had to do with us. The organizations were disorganized and everything was taking longer than planned. 3 months. 4. August came and went with no completed home study. Now we were mad. This process was never supposed to take this long. Getting the girls in September was no longer an option. Maybe the end of the year, if we were lucky.
I woke up at 5:30am one morning to an audible voice, "Trust Me". I had been praying about the situation and was so frustrated about the constant delay. After that, every time I started to get frustrated, I remembered what God had asked of me and I chose to trust that His plan was better than mine.
Finally, in October, all of our paperwork was completed. We handed in everything to our agency and now just had to wait for our court date. We received news that the girls were already in the orphanage. Their father had died of malaria a few years earlier and their mother was unable to provide for them. Usually, the agency and orphanage try to keep the children with their parents, parent or relatives as long as possible since they will get one-on-one attention. But for whatever reason, our girls were dropped off earlier than expected. In a way, we were relieved. This meant they were still available for adoption. It had been a year and a half since they were first brought in and nothing had been heard from them since. But sad, at the same time. Best case scenario is always to stay with family and if there was enough food, this would've been the best situation.