It was a normal day at Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport. Up before the crack of dawn, through ticketing, security, and customs, we presented ourselves at Passport Control.

“Dokumenti,” demanded the bored, matronly guard.

We were adopting our first son’s friend. It took us four years of official red tape, adoption agency scams, governmental denials, and regional shutdowns. In a matter of an hour or two, he would at last be exiting off of Russian soil.

Not so fast.

“Adoption decree and court papers,” the border guard insisted, eyeing our family of four, noting that only the two kids had Russian Passports.

This was a new one. Why not just the passport? I slid the packet under the plate glass window, upon which she settled down to a long morning’s read.

Ten minutes passed. Twenty minutes passed. She, no doubt, enjoyed the more sordid parts of such a horrific history, chronicled for the sake of court testimony, not the prurient interests of a bored border guard.

“Eezvehnite, pazhalista—“ I interrupted her concentration. “Yest problema?” Is there a problem?

“Nyet,” she went back to her reading.

I felt my blood boiling as the preteen boys shifted from foot to foot. Her coworker in the next booth asked her why the slow-mo treatment of the tourists. She shrugged her off, as well.

At forty minutes standing before the little glass booth, I’d had enough.

“Excuse me, please, but why are you reading his court papers?”

She looks up, obviously irritated at my interruption. The sleeping bear awakened.

“Ohn russki grahzdanen,” (He is a Russian citizen) she testily explained. “I must make sure that his documents are in order.”

So I figure if we’re ever going to get out of this holding pattern and make it to the Golden Land of Duty Free, I needed to insert my two rubles.

“Da, and here is his Russian Passport… and it’s in order.”

She goes back to reading.

I go back to talking.

“I mean, let’s think this thing through… Doomahyete,” I encourage, feeling as though I’m instructing Dorothy in her ruby slippers to concentrate. “What’s the likelihood of us finding a child on the street with the same last name, having all of the paperwork to obtain a passport, and making him agree to come to America with us???”

“We have to be sure,” she sneers, not amused, not impressed, not in a hurry.

About an hour later, she comes up for air and asks for our first son’s court papers.

“Nyetoo,” (He has none) I affirm. “He’s been our son for over five years. You already have his Russian Passport and here is his other one.” I considered calling for a supervisor, but that struck me as less than a positive Russian chess move. Might cause us more problems to make too much of a stink. If she had missed the “Service With a Smile” seminar, there was not much I could do about it now.

She glances at the dual passports, while meanwhile, I can picture Petya passing out in a cold sweat as he understands every word spoken. Perhaps one day he would come back to study in Russia, but for the present, he wanted to go home. Pasha had never been home, but even he knew that it was better than this. At last, the stern woman, who was probably younger than me, but appearing and acting much older, slowly slides the stack back to us.

“Horoshoh,” (Alright) she waves us through, an indelibly harsh reminder to our sons that you don’t mess with Mother Russia. Escaping her clutches, we make a mad dash for the plane.

Which reminds me of the time I was heading to Israel, a regular shuttle I traveled for some years. A sting operation was underway for diamond dealers.

I boarded the transatlantic flight in New York, and there on the jetway, leading to the plane, were Federal Agents stopping most every Hassidic man, right next to the stacks of Yediot Aharonot and Ma’ariv newspapers. I put mine back in the pile and reached for the Herald Tribune, instead.

“Do you have any diamonds or large sums of money to declare?” the agents inquired.

The men tried to brush by, mumbling something in Yiddish.

“Yiddish?” the agents pursued them. “No problem. Read this,” they said, presenting a printed card with all of the laws stated in their own language.

I strolled past, pockets bulging with rare stones and stacks of foreign currency.

Alright, maybe in my dreams….

But I should have known the bubble security cameras were in full operation. It wasn’t until exiting the country that they nabbed me.

Once again at Passport Control, this time in Tel Aviv, a guard examined my passport front to back, or I should say, back to front, Hebrew style. Flipping it closed, the young twentysomething female soldier met me eye to eye.

“Go to the police, please,” she said, as though this were an everyday exchange.

“Ha’mishtarah?!” (The police?!) “Why? Where? What?” I wanted to know.

“The police. In the corner room.”

And thus I made my way to the Border Police, like one of the old fashioned “Alt!” border gates had just lowered in front of me. Could family dogs visit incarcerated persons? was uppermost in my thoughts.

“Shalom,” I introduced myself to the chainsmoking blond in charge.

“Darkon, b’vahkahshah,” (Passport, please) she smiled.

Hmmm… everyone so interested in the small document stating very little and with a less than ideal photo prominently featured.

“You come and go a lot,” she noted in Hebrew.

“Ken….” (Yes….)

“And do you have an Israeli Passport?”

“No….”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes….”

She checked back in her computer and tried a different tack.

“Think back, maybe a long time ago….. Did you ever declare citizenship here?”

“No….”

“Maybe you forgot…” she tried to help, at which I burst out laughing.

“I think I’d remember something like that…. Is there a problem?”

“No, no problem.”

Gee, I’d heard that before. Maybe this was some joke being played on me by my Israeli lawyer. With my demographic, I couldn’t imagine that they’d want to draft me for the Israeli Army. I mean, they didn’t even offer high-heeled infantry boots, plus, entering the paratroopers would result in too much windblown hair during the jumps. The navy might make me seasick. They would have to make me… a border guard!

No, their interest could not be the draft. The only thing I could think of was tax evasion of some sort. I wondered if they served felafel balls in prison. I could survive.

At last, the policewoman decided to take my sweet face at face value and believe my story that I didn’t play fast and loose with my citizenship, spreading it here, there, and everywhere at will.

“Okay, look, I’ll let you go, and I’ll mark that all is okay,” she reassured me.

I assumed she was entering our Important and Enlightening Conversation into her computer. Again, I was missing out on sampling the fine eau de parfums of Duty Free.

She returned my passport, wishing me a nice trip and I hightailed it to the bank to exchange my remaining shekels.

Taking the currency and my passport, the clerk gave a small gasp and turned to look me up and down.

“What happened?” he inquired. “I’ve never seen such a thing!”

“Mah zeh?” (What is it?) I asked.

“FREE TO DEPART BY ORDER OF THE MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR,” he read the stamp and handwritten permission penned in Hebrew all around its edges. “Did you do something?” he laughed.

“Not that I know of!”

I took the money and ran for the plane, a recurring theme in my life. The only comfort I received in these inconvenient airport interrogations was that, while being detained, at least I was staying out of any more trouble. I didn’t need additional International Incidents. With all of our international travel, there were bound to be bumps. Yet with a fast-paced lifstyle, the small bumps could develop into major speed bumps, resulting in one big careening crash of a learning curve.

No time for that. We had places to go, things to do, people to see. Best to fly below the radar and leave the big bags of diamonds at home for now.

If I were a tourism minister orchestrating what might attract the largest numbers of visitors to an area, authentic cultural activities and shopping opportunties would be high on the list. In Moscow, one of the best examples of this is Ismailovsky Market.

Here, history, craftsmanship, and souvenirs galore mean that there’s something for everybody. Peter the Great was said to build his first boat model here. Today, you can glimpse historic-looking buildings, and wooden, market structures, all beckoning you to come and enjoy stall after stall of everything from icons, to matroshkas, linen tablecloths, fur hats, military memorabilia, stamps, lacquerware boxes, items crafted from birch bark. Need some handcarved Christmas decorations featuring traditional Russian figures? Need a Russian rubashka, or ethnic dress complete with kokoshnik? It’s all here at Ismailovsky.

Though far-flung and nowhere near the center of town, the market is easily reached by the Moscow metro. A round-trip ticket will probably run you just over a dollar (in rubles), and will take you maybe 20 minutes from downtown. That sure beats $60+ that a taxi might charge, along with the travel time at least tripling due to the ever-present Moscow traffic jams.

When leaving the Partizanskaya Metro station, turn left and walk toward the arched entryway reading, “Vernisage”, kitty-corner at about “10:00”. Along this path, you come to the everyday market featuring shirts, hats, cosmetics, wallets, underwear, along with household goods. Cross the next street and the souvenir market lies before you. Women in Russian dresses at the main gate will give you a ticket, priced at 10 rubles per person (about 30 cents today). It’s worth it even if you simply decide to snap photos. The market is open most every day, but the real selection is found on weekends. Just avoid the chained dancing bears, the overpriced shashlik on the grill, and any artificial amber… and you should be fine.

Some of the vendors paint their own nesting dolls, or sew their own colorful dresses for sale. Chat with them and you will receive a wealth of information. I was looking at lacquerware boxes the other day and learned quite a bit. Mind you, I’m no collector, my goal was to pick up a few gifts for the families that had hosted our boys in our absence.

The lady at the lacquerware stall gave me an entire mini-tutorial while simultaneously holding up fingers indicating prices to Japanese businessmen. She explained to me in Russian that there were four different schools of lacquerware.

“Not just Palekh, that is a common misperception,” she said, pointing out examples before us. You could see the distinct styles.

She showed me at the base of each lacquerware scene or portrait, there were three things listed in Russian, from left to right: 1) the school listed (not actually a school, but a type of style); 2) the scene name depicted; and 3) the painter. Novice that I am, I inquired about one flaw in a box as a streak cut across the shiny black surface.

“Nyet,” she corrected me, showing that it was actually imbedded mother of pearl, to enhance the box’s scene. Then she pulled out more works of art, delicately painted on huge egg-shaped shells, about the size of a mini-football. This lady loved her merchandise and enjoyed introducing others to what she knew so well. We bought several smaller pieces.

But not all vendors are so warm and user-friendly, particularly if you spy something on the non-tourist side of the market. Our eyes were drawn to track suits with the Imperial Russian double-headed eagle symbol across its back with the word “Russia”. Sold by Turkish touts, we felt like we were back in the Middle East with such high-pressure sales.

They started the price at 2,000 rubles, about $65, for one track suit. Considering that we had two boys back home to clothe, this was not going to work. With much haggling, the price went down to 1,800 rubles for two, about $30 each. Considering that they come from Turkey, ranking right up there with China, Egypt, and Myanmar as cheap manufacturing meccas, we were still not impressed. What did they take us to be, rich Americans?

In true, old-world market style, we walk away. They don’t chase us. Not a good sign. So we head off to the souvenir side of the market and forget about the Turkish touts until the end of the day. We have to walk through there anyway, to get back to the metro….

Petya and Pasha would love these track suits from the homeland. I consider them a super-souvenir, reminiscent of our visit, yet with everyday practicality since they play sports. Because I am the designated Russian speaker, this business venture falls on my shoulders. However, I don’t enjoy the back-and-forth banter, the bickering, the haggling, the royal waste of time that’s a well-beloved pasttime to these Middle Eastern merchants, all sons of Ali Baba.

“Ask the price first,” reminds Benedetto.

“What marketplace vendor in the world will tell you the price first? They want to know what color you like, how much you want to spend, how big is your son…?” I wave him off.

Sure enough, with the slightest level of interest on our part, in one minute’s time, there are men our son’s size trying on the jackets for us, modeling them, holding up cigarette lighters to the fabric to prove that they’re impervious to cigarette burns as though that were a selling point in pre-teen wear. We now had before us several jackets in the wrong sizes, wrong colors, and high prices. They press us to learn how much we’d pay for their Ankaran articles… that we didn’t want in the first place. Now I wondered where our first vendors were.

So we walk away.

Hot on our tail, the Turkish touts run beside us like sheepdogs guiding us to another stall, down the way, half the size, but with the items we want. Here the vendor could lower his price without nearby shopkeepers being privy to how low he would go. Ali Baba whips out his calculator, punching in a number. He holds it out to me, showing the number 800.

“Vosyem dyesyat rublay?” I confirm.

“Da.”

“Horoshoh.” You’ve got yourself a deal, buster. It came to about $27 each.

We get red, Petya’s favorite, in XL, and bright blue, perfect match for Pasha’s eye color, in L. Only by Turkish standards are my 12.5 year old boys at the top range of the men’s clothing charts. The pants are way too long, but I can hem them, I say. The guy slips the suits into plastic shopping bags. I watch him to ensure that there’s no presto-chango sleight of hand.

Time to pay and Benedetto pulls out 1,600 rubles. Suddenly, the fellow wants 100 more.

“I need 100 more,” he starts.

“Stoh? A hundred? For what?” my eyes narrow. “It was 800 and 800.”

“Now it’s 850 and 850. For chai.”

“Chai?” I say disdainfully.

“Tell him,” he motions to my husband, either unwilling to finalize the deal with a woman, or thinking my husband will be some naïve newbie who falls for anything. Wrong on both counts. “Tell him,” he insists.

“Tell him what?”

“That I need 100 rubles for chai.” He is absolutely serious. Two can play this game.

“Benedetto, he needs 100 rubles for chai,” I repeat deadpan.

“Get outta here!” Benedetto shouts at the little guy.

I put the two bagged track suits on the ground, and out we walk, cash still in hand.

“Okay, okay,” he chases us, relenting, leading us to recover the track suits, while he has to buy his own chai. Not to mention cookies.

I think back to the very first time I was in the market. It was a snowy and cold day in December. We thought we would eventually be bringing home Russian twin baby boys. As fate would have it, an ancient babushka attached herself to me, holding up handknit angora baby booties.

“They’re beautiful,” I murmured. One pair was larger, one pair was smaller, not really anything I could use. But who knew about the future?

Her gaze met mine. She was working, not begging. A couple of dollars a pair might make a world of difference to this mobile merchant who furtively fished the corners of the market in an effort to find the odd buyer.

Apparently I was it. I pressed the rubles into her hand. We still have the baby booties somewhere, probably in the Great Closet of All Unnecessary Purchases. But their warmth remains close to my heart from a very special time and a very special place.

A most unusual thing just occurred. As I sit out our mandatory ten-day wait in Starii Krai, the powers that be call me one night. I happen to be outside, in front of the hotel, speaking with another adoptive family. One of the desk clerks comes running to me.

“Vlad is on the phone,” she announces. So I come, quickly, there must be news. Today I anticipated something all day, sending him an e-mail, asking if perhaps I could visit the girls tomorrow. It’s been one week since court, seven days, seven hours, and seven minutes. Or something like that.

“Alexandra?”

“Da?”

“Good news and bad news. I think you’ll like this, but it has some bad news associated with this….”

As I’m trying to figure out what in the world he’s saying, while I stretch my body across the front reception desk, new arrivals coming and going at the hotel, another clerk holds out the other front desk phone to me.

“America,” she says, like I’m supposed to be talking on both phones simultaneously.

“Just a minute, Vlad,” I say, calling out to the other, “ask him to call back, please.”

It’s the appointed hour for Benedetto to call from the US, but there’s latebreaking news on this side.

“Alexandra? Alexandra?” Vlad impatiently demands. “Can you hear me?”

“Da, Vlad, I’m here.”

“Okay, listen, I got your court decision, it’s in my hand. You can go and get the girls tomorrow, 9:00 am, understand? I need to consult with Alex right now and see what is possible, but I believe that you can get their birth certificate from ZAGS, plus their Russian Passport, all on Friday, and fly to Moscow on Saturday. I know that means changing your flights and everything, but overall it would be good, right?”

“Yes, yes, absolutely, that could save us four days,” I start calculating.

“So I will call you in half an hour, I am going to speak with Alex and I will call you. Will you be available?”

“Yes, I might be on the phone with Benedetto, but I’ll be in my room waiting for your call.”

And with that, the other family comes inside and I tell them the good news. They are in shock. Their court date was before ours, and they will not get their daughter until Friday, and here I get my girls on Thursday. In any event, we may all fly out together on Saturday, on the one flight out of Starii Krai.

Benedetto calls.

“Sorry, guys,” I say to my three guys collected to talk on the other side of the world, “I just got a call from Vlad when you were phoning.”

“What’s up?” Benedetto’s radar is in full swing. He knows it’s Something, even though he’s just driven seven hours with two boys and two dogs, and is feeling his own jet lag and tiredness. He returned home only half a week ago.

“Well, I’m not going to be staying my whole ten days. I’m getting the girls tomorrow, their documents the next day, and I can fly out over the weekend to Moscow!!!” I announce.

Silence.

“Um, hello? This is good news,” I add.

“More changes? More changes?” He had finalized our tickets even though the travel agent said to wait a few more days, he wanted it done. I had been asking for our itinerary to print, as well, since I had no actual paper tickets. I knew he would be calculating change fees and penalties.

“Look,” I reason, “if this can shave off a weekend and another two days off the end of the trip, if I can do the medical for the girls and American Embassy stuff on Monday-Tuesday, do the registration of Russian citizens living abroad on Wednesday-Thursday, we can fly out on next Friday, about a week from now, rather than the next Wednesday, two weeks from today!”

Silence.

“Uh-huh… Va bene,” he finally says.

“Okay, listen, I had hoped that you would be supportive here. We’re all a little tired and surprised, but this is good. Even with any change fees, we will be saving an extra four nights in a hotel or apartment. Speaking of which, we need to see if the apartment is available, what flights are available…. I can handle the girls’ flights from here, but can you check on mine? Vlad will be calling back in a few minutes, can you call back in about a half an hour?”

“Alright, fine, here’s the boys….”

I quickly send them love and kisses, they are only too happy to get off the phone and have lunch. It’s been a long day for them, too. Oh, how I miss them!

Vlad calls back. “Okay, it’s a go, but Alex said he is coming to you. Can you make yourself available? He wants to review everything with you.”

“Sure, where?”

“In the lobby, in your room, just so he can find you….”

So downstairs I go with my notebook, pen, reading glasses. I make a list of questions as night falls and no one bothers to turn on the hotel lobby lights. We are lighted from outside, but basically sitting in darkness. About thirty minutes later, Alex arrives with his wife, we go out to the café to discuss the day’s events over capuccino.

“Do I need to bring their clothes?” I ask. “What if the shoes or something don’t fit?”

“You know what?” the wife suggests, “leave the clothes here, we can always return the old ones later.”

“A new room to accommodate all three of us?” I wonder.

“We’ll reserve it right after this,” and so we do, going to see it personally. It has two single beds, one mini-couch that will have to be Sashenka’s, and plenty of space. All I desire is airconditioning, we will have no need for a kitchen for all of two days’ time. So this means moving yet again tomorrow….

Photos, birth certificate, passport, they tell me not to worry about anything. They will take care of all of it with me on Friday. Be still, my heart. This is like a dream come true. In the past, we’ve been known to have to handle many things ourselves with less adept agencies.

“You can do it all in one day?” I want to make sure.

“We can do it all in fifteen minutes, if we have to!” Alex laughs, delighted that I am visibly impressed with their abilities. What a breath of fresh air.

I explain to them how important the official photos will be, the girls will have to hold onto these passports for five years. Mashenka will be 16 years old when it expires, Sashenka will be 13 before it’s time to renew.

“I want them to look great,” I muse aloud, “we’ll need to work on their hair and clothing, so they feel good about themselves.” Specifically, I’m thinking of Mashenka’s orphanage hair coloring escapade growing out, but I don’t want to give too many details…..

Alex responds that there are hairdressers in Starii Krai and I let him know that this is something I can handle for them, Lady Clairol tucked away in my bag for a reason.

And so it is that I rise four hours later, at 5:00 am, to touch-up my own hair color. No need for two (or three!) of us ladies dripping with chemicals at the same time. I don’t want to scare them…. I’m thinking more along the lines of a few slightly imperceptible highlights for Mashenka, simply to even out whatever damage was done from months ago.

Now it’s after 6:00 am, time to hop in the shower, throw the rest of my things in the suitcase, and be ready to go. We’ll change rooms after we get back. But for now, my life is about to change in a big way. We have come to the birth, and there’s no looking back.

I pull out the photo of my four Russian grandparents who will symbolically accompany us in spirit on this momentous occasion during the time of the wheat harvest in the south of Russia. As the sun rises, I glimpse a beam of sunlight penetrating the gathered clouds, spanning from heaven to earth in a most dramatic demonstration: the orphans are not forgotten.

I’ve heard the question, terribly nosy and nervy though it may be, asked of those couples who become pregnant repeatedly: “Was this a PLANNED pregnancy?”

The best response: “It is now,” followed by the vague and popular, “Why do you ask?”

But the average bystander never imagines that you can somehow “happen upon” adoption. It doesn’t accidentally follow a night of passion. It is deliberate, and costly, and time-consuming. And yet, here I am in Russia, wondering if we ever “planned” for this to happen.

Not really.

Benedetto and I were basically workaholics, traveling the world for the good of mankind, happy to come home at night and collapse. No little people to feed, tend to, worry about, console, mediate, monitor, wash or dry. Just us.

Then after twenty-some years of marriage, we started talking about kids. Biologically, the two of us seemed healthy enough to reproduce, yet we never felt the urge to replicate ourselves and our big noses. We knew of the many orphans in the world and how they needed families, stumbling by chance upon Russian adoption when we started to research. Given my family background, it piqued our interest and we embarked on that path.

We started out wanting baby boy twins if at all possible. Get two and be done with it. Which led us to an older, school-aged boy. Figure that one out. Long story.

After he came home, we tried to adopt his friends left behind. Another long story. No can do, they insisted. Following four years of blood, sweat, and tears, we got one of his friends. That was not accidental in any way.

By this time, the boys were both eleven and more than enough to fill our lives. Yet we started to update our paperwork, wondering if perhaps—maybe their friends in foster care would be returned to the orphanages? Best to be ready. Or maybe some siblings, younger children in the five to seven range?

Interviewing various international adoption agencies, a couple of them started heavily marketing us. All the agencies had waiting older children, those who had very few chances of ever finding a home. They sent us photos of exotic gypsy children, cross-eyed children, problem children with cute grins, boys with the same names as our sons.

Then one day we received a photo of two girls, sisters, gazing tentatively at the camera. My heart stopped for a brief second: they looked exactly like me. I searched their faces, somewhat sad and troubled in countenance, only one photo out of three with a half-smile. Did I see any sign of life? It was there, barely, calling out to me, as though these were flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone.

I tried to dismiss my feelings for them. After all, we had just been wiped out by a long and protracted four-year adoption, taking us through several scams ($$$), that finally ended in summertime travel for the four of us ($$$). Our savings had been diminished, then the stock market plummeted. This was not the time. And girls? We were more interested in boys, or maybe a boy and a girl.

But across the oceans, across time zones and nations, these girls called out to me. I was to come and get them. We asked all sorts of impossible questions: could I travel alone on trip one? It was winter time and I could go fairly quickly, whereas Benedetto would tend to our professional and family responsibilities and then travel on trip two.

Yes, they said. For only one person to travel, this already saved us thousands. Naturally, we made up those thousands with traveling again in the summer and paperwork that was ten times the amount of our last region, but it got us going down this path we had never planned. I think if we were fully informed about any major change of life, we might not ever pursue it.

So here we are, the accidental adopters, you could say. We have been awarded two beautiful sisters by the Russian Federation and their lives will be richer and more rewarding than could have ever been imagined, as will ours. Sometimes the twists and turns of life bring us into a beautiful place, unplanned though it may be.

“In all your ways acknowlege Him, and He shall direct your paths.” (Proverbs 3:6)