Friday afternoon

Hola,
We took a long walk to the park to play on the jungle gym and in the sand box this morning. Actually I end up carrying Jon about half the time, he gets tired real fast. It was sunny and very warm this morning so after the park we were thirsty so we went to McDonalds for cokes and chocolate sundeas. I had one of those great mocha cappachinos. Jonathan and luke played in the play area for a long time before we came back to the residencia for lunch. A lot of the resturaunts around here have play areas for children. The Jeno's Pizza has a huge one with a three story slide and big ball pit and trampolines. There must be lower worries about liability and getting sued. The adoption conference all the social workers were at is over today at noon, so everyone is hoping to hear some news soon. I still don't know anything about where our adoption petition is in the process. Debra, who is adopting Isabella and is also single parent here, is in the same boat as me so we comiserate together. Tomorrow we are going to a childrens petting zoo for a change of pace. I'll post some pictures of that when we get back. I put some pictures on flickr but it takes just as long to upload them there as to the blog so I probably won't add any more till I get home. They are at www.flickr.com/photos/dvantol/
Love from Colombia Dwight and the boys

Friday morning

Buneos Dios,
It's friday morning and I'm not sure if the driver is coming today to take us to the zoo or tomorrow. Jon Felipe had another seizure while I was putting him to bed last night. It only lasted 30 to 40 seconds. At first I thought he was just joking with me and pretending to be sleeping but then I relized it was for real. When he came out of it he was confused and really tired so he just dropped of to sleep, and slept in a bit this morning which was nice becasue he is usually up betwen six and six thirty. I'll post some more later today.
Love Dwight

Thursday

Some pictures of Jonathan, can you see that mischievious look in his eye.
This is one of the reliqueries at Monserrate
I don't remember If we posted this one before. It is also on top of Monserrate.
No good news for us today. Perhaps tomorrow or Saturday we will go visit the Zoo.

Wednesday night

I was just chatting on line with Kath and Colin. It's nice to be able to keep in touch in almost real time. Some families here do video conferencing with their families back home, but I don't have that technology. It rained all afternoon. Actually it thunder stormed to beat the band. I think at one point there was continuous thunder for over 10 minutes without a break. Since we were stuck inside, we worked on homework with Luke and I tried to teach Felipe how to write his new name which was a challenge because he doesn't know how to write his old name. He does know what the alphabet is and can recite the letters although not always in the correct order. It took a while, but I got across the concept of tracing over and copying the letters that I drew first. We had a bit of a discusion about what his name is. He insists that he is Juan Felipe Pinzon Gomez. I tried to tell him that he had a new family and a new name, Jonathan Felipe VanTol. Right now we have both compromised with Jon Felipe. No news on when I will be coming hack home. One of the couples who are our friends here, Phil and Laura, spent last night and all day in the hospital with their four year old son Daniel (who they adopted previously - a picture of him as a baby with Jon was on the blog a couple weeks ago). He had swollen up like a basketball after dinner last night with his tummy really distended and in a lot of discomfort. They ran a lot of tests on him, but could find no cause. By this afternoon he was over whatever it was, so they discharged him with orders to put him on a restricted diet. Laura is going home with him on Wednesday, which is the earliest they could get a flight. Phil is hoping to be able to leave with the baby then also, but it depends on all the paperwork coming through tomorrow. So pray for them, they have been here more than six weeks. If you are wondering about Jonathan's health he is doing well. He had one seizure since we have gotten him, that was on the first Saturday after we got here. He hasn't had any since. He has pretty good use of his left hand, he can grab things with it but not with much strength, and it isn't as coordinated as his right. He walks well when he has his brace and special shoes on with just a little hitch in his stride but he does get tired out and ask to be carried after a bit. He gets around without his brace okay too, although he does drag his foot more. He doesn't seem to think of himself as disabled at all and participates in all the activities all the other children do and is even a bit competitive. He also is quite charming and makes friends easily. I'll post some good pictures of him tomorrow.
Love from the boys in Colombia.

Christmas Season

This is a bicycle vendor in Zipaquira. He steped out of the frame just before I took the picture. He is selling deep fried pig skin and the front of the bike is an actual deep fryer.These are people out bicycling and jogging on Sunday when they close many of the roads. The population of Bogota is, I was just told, 9 million, and something like 400,000 new cars are added to it's streets every year, so the government is struggling to prevent pollution and grid lock with policies like this and odd/even driving etc.
Christmas decorations, Feliz Navidad.

Talk to you again real soon. Love, The boys in Bogota.

Tuesday and no new news

Hi faithful readers,
I'm sorry I didn't post yesterday but I couldn't make the keyboard type the @ sign so I couldn't sign in. Actually we've been having lots of problems with the comunity computer havin kernal panicks and shutting down here at the residencia, and internet connection is a bit spotty during the business day. The person who usually kept it at least running left for home a few days ago. I've been trying but all the screens are in spanish and it's a pc not a Mac so I often just guess. So far it's worked.
Yesterday was a trying day with Jonathan Felipe. I think the honeymoon is starting to wear off and he is testing to see where the limits are. He has found out that he can't grab other childrens stuff, kick when he is angry, grab food off from other people plates and poke people with a fork. Time outs are loud affairs but we have so far agreed that he will be good and that we still love each other. I can say that in spanish but I can't spell it because my spanish is phonetic and I can't even spell in english. Today Jon F. was very well behaved, at least so far. I hope that yesterdays unpleasentness as payed off. We walked to the big park and he spent a long time playing in the sandbox and on the jungle gym. If you are wondering what it's like to adopt, one thing you do is spend a lot of time waiting for other people to do thing like make rulings and sign papers. The adoptions workers try to keep you as informed as they can but they don't have crystal balls either. Isabele our worker is a a conference this week so I probably won't know any thing new until Monday which is discouraging, but I am not the only one in this boat so at least I have someone to comiserate with. Two families left today for home, one to Arizona and one to Paris, another is leaving tomorrow morning and others are making thier final preparations. So I will be saying good by to people whos have become friends and probably welcoming some new into this community. One thing that is great is to see the joy that new parents get interacting with thier new children. The majority of couples here are adopting because of infertility [and they are not afraid to share their stories ] and most are younger than I. In fact i'm the only one here with a child old enough to be in college by a long shot probably a good 16 or 17 years. It reminds me of a day 19 years ago when we brought Colin home from the hospital. Of course I don't miss diapers and spitup getting up with a crying baby in the night. I'll gladly leave that to younger folks. Tomorrow I will post more pictures of something. I haven't done anything new since Saturday.
Love Dwight and the Boys from Colombia

Lazy Sunday

Here are some more pictures from the Salt Cathedral and Zipaquira. The picture above is sideways and I can't turn it so you'll have to turn your head. It is the baptismal fount and behind it is a wall of salt crystals that look like a flowing waterfall. it is being formed by water leaking down from the surface and redepositing disolved salt.
This is a picture of one of the big iron kettles at he resturant where they boil the potatoes in brine. There are six of these kettles with a big coal fired oven beneith. The water is so salty that there is a crust of salt on the surface. The potatoes in the basket to the left are done and have a crust of salt on them, and the mound to the right is salt that has been formed like building a sand castle when they drain the potatoes as they remove them. They are quite tasty.
This is across the square from the Catholic church it is either the Episcopal church or the municiple palace. I don't remember from the tour guide anymore.
Another shot of the square. These building all have touristy shops in them selling everything from handmade arts and crafts to Itailian luggage.
I continue to recover from whatever resperatory infection I had. We went for a long walk today because they close many of the street to cars so people can bicycle or rollerblade for exercise. The really serious do a circular tour of the entire city which would be quite a few miles I'll check on a map and get back to you on that. We did duck into a store calle Pepe Ganga which is a sort of Toys R Us to buy some batteries for my camera not realizing they were having a one day Christmas sale. Christmas sales are a new thing in Colombia and a lady I talked to said she had waited in a check out line over two hours in the morning and had come back again after lunch to buy some more stuff and expected to wait in line for over an hourt again. It was pretty crazy in there, then again I have never gone shopping on the Friday after Thanksgiving.
Talk to you again tomorrow, Dwight

Sunday morning

Hello Everyone.
I can't believe that I have been in Colombia for two weeks today. Time is certainly going by fast as we try to keep ourselves busy. Today we are going to walk to an open air flea market which is set up every Sunday. Thing are going pretty good here, I was sick the last couple of days with some kind of respatory infection but seem to be on the mend and feeling much better. Felipe is doing well, He seems to have adopted us as his family and has especially bonded with Luke, they spend a lot of time wrestleing and playing with legos. Felipes behaivor is also improving, the naughty attention seeking behaviors he was doing at first are fading as he relizes that he can have our attention at any time just by asking politely, but we will ignore him if he is rude. Since today was Sunday we had pancakes for breakfast, our weekly treat. I am also drinking alot of coffee, I'm not sure why but the coffee here is way better that what I've had in the states, maybe because it is so fresh. Many of the families that I have spent the last two weeks with in the residencia have finnished all the steps and are getting ready to leave so I will be saying goodby to people who have become close friends although we have promised to stay in touch via e-mail. I'm thinking that not many new adopters will come before the holidays so the residencia will get quieter and quieter. I think I will miss the sound of playing children and crying babies and adults speaking in a world of languages as they leave. I should be done with the first court stage by the end of this coming week, the second court stage can take up to 13 business days after that and when that is done I have to get Jonathan a passport and a visa before we can come home. Please pray that the court I am in moves speedily and the paper work gets processed quickly. Love Dwight, Luke and Felipe from Colombia.

More Zipaquira pics

A reproduction of Mike's famous Sistine Chapel mural done in salt.A Creche carved into the mountain.
This is a Piata sculpture done by a local artist and the figures' features are those of the native culture.
This is a picture from the town square, Plaza de los Comuneros of the Catedral Diocesana de San Antonio. It wasn't open so we couldn't go inside. It was built from stone quarried locally, but not the salt ore or it would have dissolved by now.
Salt is still mined from the mountain as it has been since prehistoric times. Now it is mined with high pressure water hoses and the brine is pumped out and processed. The guide said there was enough salt ore to last for another 500 years at the present rate of mining. In this square there were some musicians busking, which is a high art is Colombia. They were playing traditional instruments like guitars and pan pipes and dressed in costumes that looked straight out of a John Wayne movie with buck skins and feather head dresses. And they entertained us with a nice selection of Beatles tunes.

Catedral de Sal

This is the town of Zipaquira, which is just down the mountain from the salt mine. It has a feel to it like it has been there a very long time.This is the entrance to the Salt Cathedral, we got there early and there wasn't much of a line and the eight of us had our own English speaking tour guide. when we left the Cathedral the line stretched way past where this picture was taken.
As you descend into the mountain you go past all the Stations of the Cross carved out of the salt ore. Here we are standing in front of one of the many crosses. After you get past the Via Dela Rosa, you get to the cathedral proper. The pictures are kind of dark, but I will post some on the next installment. There were monks and nuns doing chants in the cathedral so it was cool but there wasn't a mass going on.
This is the view from the parking lot of the restaurant where we had lunch. They were setting up for a wedding there. It is a lovely spot to get married, or you can get married underground.

Black Friday

Hi all, Today is Friday and the cold in my sinus's has moved down to my throat so that I have no voice. I will give you the menu of what we had to eat for Thanksgiving here in Colombia and you can compare it to your feast. We had a green salad with green olives, green beans, raw onion, and hebenaro peppers and pickle slices with vinagrette dressing. We also had black beans and rice, mashed potatoes and dressing that the american ladies made, but no gravy. Pumkin custard with prunes that Yolanda made. Candied baked apples. and some kind of ham loaf thing although it may also have had poultry parts in it stuffed with eggs and black olives. For desert we had apple and banana cream pies and ice cream.

These are pictures of Sofie' s first birthday party which was on Wednesday. It was a big todo. George, pronounced Horhay, the dad is from Colombia although now they live in Porto Rico. Many of George's family came to the party. It was all done in Hello Kitty pink. This is Sofia.
This is Nora in her princess costume that she wore for Holloween. Her family is from Finland and have been in Colombia for 6 weeks already. They hope to get thier Sentencia today and then because they have no embassy in Colombia must wait another week and ahalf for the passport to be processed in Venesuala before they can leave. Felipe and Nora love to flirt and chase each other around.
This is the pinata, we didn't hit it with a stick though. It had a ribbon on the bottom that open a trap door and all the toys and candy fell out.
Everyday is a challenge to keep Felipe occupied, we do a lot of swinging and I usually end up pushing many of the children. Tata from Colombia for now I need to help Luke with some of his homework. Dwight and the boys

Thanksgiving Day

Hello from Colombia on Thanksgiving day,
Kathy and Maria are back home in Michigan so it is just Felipe, Luke and I. Felipe missed his mom a bit the first morning after she left and stuck right by me all day but he seems to understand that it tis only temporary and we will be flying on an airplane to Michigan soon. All the american ladies here are fighting for space in the kitchen to make thier favorite Thanksgiving dishes for dinner tonight. I'm not going to try to get in there to make mashed rutabega or sweet potatoe with marshmallows though, I'll have to settle for making it when I get home. I'm not even sure you can get marshmallows in Colombia. The American men are all looking forward to watching football this afternoon, they stream it over the internet and tie up all the bandwidth. For most people in Colombia though Football means soccer and they were very happy on Tuesday when Colombia beat Argentina in the qualifing tournanment leading up to the world cup. Everybody in the airport was riveted to the game and if something exciting happened they would all rush to the nearest TV including all the workers so the check in lines were realy backing up. We watch a bit of soccer here because there are at least three sports channels that show only soccer. The staff at the residencia hauled all of the Felize Navidad decorations out of the attic today and are busy getting the building ready for the holidays with all of the children helping it is very busy here this morning and everyone is in a good mood.
Happy holidays to all. Love Dwight and boys.

The girls are leaving

Maria and I are leaving Colombia tonight. We are a little sad to be leaving. We really enjoyed all the new people we got to meet and Colombia is a beautiful country. We are also glad to be going home, although we hate to leave Dwight, Luke, and Jonathan behind. We miss our beds and being in our own home. For our final dinner we had a kind of meat loaf. The meat was shaped into a log around hard boiled eggs and was quite tasty. We also had a fabulous chocolate cake which was still warm from the oven.

fun pictures

Matching t-shirts for the kids. Ole Colombia.Jonathan really looks up to Luke. they get along very well.
Arnold's next vehicle for Patsy.
Valencia is one of the managers here at Hotel Paris.

ICBF

The ICBF interview went very well. The children were well behaved and the court defender appointed for Jonathan was very kind and very pleased with the way things were going in terms of him feeling part of our family. Thank you to everyone who prayed for things to go well.
Maria and I fly out tonight just after midnight. Dwight and the boys wait for the rest of the process to be completed. One family here has completed the whole process in 2 1/2 weeks, other families have been here 6 weeks or more. We are hoping for a quick process, of course, but have no idea how long it will take.

More Monserrate pics

This is a view of the central city from the very top of Monserrate, it stretches quite a ways in either direction. There are 7 million people living in Bogotá and its suburbs.The inside of the cathedral during mass. It was standing room only with people packed into any open space.
The open air market behind the cathedral which I think follows the path down to the bottom of the mountain should one want to walk it. We bought some t-shirts from a vendor who lured us into his stall with his good English and promise of great deals for Americans. The man in the bottom right hand corner is Johny our driver, He speaks very little English but still managed to be a good tour guide.
This is the statute of Santa Guadeloupe across the valley. We gathered that it is a monastery or some such function. there is not a good road to the top of that peak so tourist do not go there but if you wanted to walk up there you could. The wall displays in the waiting line for the tram car showed someone walking a tightrope between two peaks so it might have been between this peak and Monserrate. If you could see a wide angle view you would see that this is quite a ways away and there is a deep valley between.
We have to get up early tomorrow morning to get to our ICBF appointment. Pray that it goes well and that we get assigned to the speedy court. (some judges are apparently much faster than others in getting through their paper work)

Nov. 18

We had a great day today. We took a trip up to Monserrate, which is the cathedral on the top of the mountain. The views of the city from the top were phenomenal. We also were able to walk throughout the church even though mass was going on. The place was packed with people who had come to hear mass. We didn't realize it, but Sunday is "cheap ticket" day to visit Monserrate. Mass is said here everyday and several times on Saturdays, but most people who come to mass here prefer to come on Sunday. We also ate lunch in a small restaurant near the cathedral. The restaurant seemed to jut out over the edge of the mountain. There were windows all around for enjoying the views. The windows were made of small panes of glass, it felt like we were eating in a fancy greenhouse. It was a very nice restaurant and I was a bit nervous about how my newly adopted child would behave, but he was great. Johnny had driven us up the mountain and had stayed with us throughout our visit. He had chosen this restaurant because I said we wanted to try Colombian food. The food was good. We had a thick soup that reminded us of chili. It had lots of beans, but no meat in it. The meat was on the side, both some beef cooked with some vegetables as well as chorizo sausage. In addition, there was a pile of rice topped with a fried egg, a rice cake (just pressed rice, not the type we buy in the grocery store when we are dieting), chunks of avocado, and fried plantains (we've become rather fond of fried plantains). The most interesting part was a strip of pork that still had the skin on as well as some meat and was deep fried. Dwight said it tasted like pork rinds. I didn't eat mine and Johnny took it home with him for later.

On the way up, we were in a cable car with a man who had studied some English and he was giving us tips for what to see. He and his parents were going to mass. He told us that everyone in Colombia is either Catholic or Jewish. I checked this with Johnny and he agreed. We have met so many interesting people here and everyone has been very friendly.

We rode the cable car to the top of the mountain and took a train down. The train went through a tunnel for a good portion of the trip. Just below the car park area is a very large, beautiful national park. Just getting up to the car park area involves driving up some very steep hills. We were surprised to see how many people were biking up. Biking is a huge sport around here. On Sundays many of the streets in Bogota are closed to cars and lots of people are out on them on their bikes.

Johnny doesn't speak any English so spending the day with him gave me the chance to practice my Spanish. The biggest challenge to my Spanish is when talking to Maria's friend Tatis. When talking to adults, I usually have an idea of the topic. Tatis, however, talks about all sorts of topics and changes topic without warning. She talks loud and very fast. When I don't understand her the first time she says something, she heaves this deep sigh and then repeats it louder. She and I have some very interesting conversations.

Going up to Monserrate

On the way up the foot hills we passed all these street vendors outside a church waiting for mass to be over.A view of the city from half way up the mountian.
The cable car we are going to take to the top of Monserrate.
The Cathedral of Monserrate. We still had to walk up that steep courtyard to get to the doors. Many people had come to hear Mass on top of the mountain. During the Easter season many people will climb the mountain on their knees. We think we did our penance by just carrying two tired children around the top of the mountain.

Another day at the park

This is a picture of what chaos looks like, some of the parents thought it would be cute to take a picture of all the babies being held by their older siblings. Of course they didn't want to cooperate. This is only a few of the children here, the rest had run off already. This is what bored parents do when they are adopting. They spend hours at the park even if it is sprinkling out. We were going to go on a sightseeing trip up to a cathedral on top of the mountain today but because it was raining our driver urged us to postpone until tomorrow.


More of the children are getting sick, running fevers and flu-like symptoms. Also, one of the girls has lice. So far, we are all still healthy. With our trip postponed and the weather not very nice, perhaps we'll just try to have a quiet afternoon although I'm not sure Jonathan will understand that concept:)

Shopping trip pics.

A Chocolate Crepe from Crepes and Waffles before we dug in, costs about $2.Felipe (as he prefers to be called) is getting tired.
Waiting for the slowpokes to catch up. The boots belong to a policeman.
There are many horse carts and push carts in this modern city. Maria likes to see the horses, they are often grazing in the medians.

shopping

Some things in Bogota are cheap, like taxi rides, and some things are expensive, like clothes and most anything you have to buy from a store. This afternoon we took a taxi to the Santa Ana mall where there is a French store that is slightly cheaper than the other stores in the area. It is sort of a Colombian "Walmart" except everything costs about three times more than in the states. We went to buy Jonathan a pair of pants that wouldn't be falling off him. Right now he's got a bit of the low rider look going. We were able to get a pair of pants with an adjustable elastic waist, but the clerk insisted we buy a larger size than we wanted (in fact the same size we were told he wears). I guess when pants cost that much, you don't want the kid to outgrow them too fast. We also got the sunscreen. We are planning to take a trip up into the mountains tomorrow so we might need it.

After the shopping excursion we went to Crepes and Waffles for a snack. We ordered different kinds of crepes for everyone, intending to share so we could try all different kinds. Jonathan totally lost it when he thought we were trying to take his food. Eventually he figured out what we were doing and then he kept trying to give everybody samples from the plate in front of him, so I guess it was a success but it was pretty hairy at first. The crepes came with different fillings. We tried different fruit types as well as chocolate. Each plate also had scoops of two different kinds of ice cream as well as whipped cream and a chocolate bar for garnish. The total cost for the five of us for this lavish "snack" including tax, tip and a beverage came to about $10.

On the way back, Jonathan and Maria were running and playing with each other. The ultimate indignity for Maria is that, even with his gimpy leg, Jonathan is faster than she is. He is quite strong and does amazingly well despite his physical difficulties. Eventually Maria wiped out and now she is lying here recovering from scraped hands and knees.

To the Notary

Maria and Jonathan are exhausted after our trip to the park on Thursday.
Jonathan and Angela are coloring together. Jonathan drew a picture of our casa.
This is Bogota. As you can see, there is a lot of traffic. This is not even downtown where we hear the traffic is much worse. You can see the mountains in the background. Today it looks like it is raining in the mountains.
Maria and Jonathan watching T.V. together. We have to keep reminding him to be gentle. He is very strong and likes to give hugs, but he can be too rowdy with Maria.

Nov. 16

We get up early here. It is already light out at 5:30. By 6 a.m., it is too bright to stay in bed, even with the heavy drapes closed. By 5:30 at night it is getting dark. By mid-afternoon, it starts to cool off. Many of the children here have picked up a virus and are running fevers and have runny noses. So far, the VanTol kids are still healthy.
Today we are off to the notary and then to a store. We need to buy some sunscreen for the lighter skinned members of the family. The big excitement is that we are having spaghetti for dinner and the man from Italy is going to help with the cooking. Yesterday we had this fabulous dessert. It was made with very thin crepes that were similar to what ice-cream cones are made of. In the center was a sweet filling that tasted of honey. Yum! It is a good thing we don't have those in the states because they would be my downfall.
For those who have asked, Dwight describes the elephant snot fruit as tasting like strawberry Kool-aid with very crunchy rice krispies mixed in.

Thursday, Nov. 15

Jonathan is fascinated with the game boy. As you can see, he wants to be wherever Luke is and doing whatever Luke is doing.
Playing in the park. This park is a pretty good walk from where we are staying.
Luke is trying to give both Daniel and Jonathan rides on the teeter totter. In the background is Maria and Tatiana.
Maria and Tatiana playing together. Tatiana and her brother Anders were also presented to their family on Tuesday. Their parents are from France.