Goodbye

Posted on Jul 20th, 2010 | 1 comment

The dreaded airport. This is a very hard day for everyone involved. Many of us say goodbye then go about our normal lives. These kids say goodbye and fly back to an orphanage in a country where the outlook for orphans is bleak. Thankfully, there are those who are so moved by this camp and God’s leading that they take action. This ranges from praying, to getting more involved with our camp or other adoption ministries, to actually starting down the road to adoption.
We picked up the campers from the Roge’s house at 12:15 and slowly got them all loaded into the vans. Last minute photos needed to be taken, and everyone had to say goodbye to Heidi and Felix and Oksana and Vlad (who are staying in Colorado with the Frontier Horizons hosting program until August). We (the Volfs, Houghtons, Christoffersons, and Vicki) met Kris and the Stoesz kids at the airport, lined up the bags and got everyone checked in for their flights. The agent informed us that we were only allowed one checked bag per person (we had two 50 pound suitcases each), and that it would be $55 for each extra bag. After a short talk with the manager, all but 4 bag fees were waived, and then when the agent ran our credit card, it only charged us for three. The agent was kind enough to just let that go. Now it was time to go to security, so the hugs and tears started flowing. We slowly made our way to security for another round of hugs, goodbyes, tears, and more hugs. Eventually we made it into security where all the kids became Junior TSA Officers. Alyona’s bag was pulled aside to be searched, and they found some lotion that couldn’t go through. I asked the guard to hide it so she wouldn’t know he took anything, but some of the boys saw him trying to sneak it past them and soon Alyona was in tears (but only for a minute). Next we saw the crowd of supporters in their places above the escalators that go down to the train. This is where we all get to wave our final goodbyes and blow kisses from behind a glass wall. Everyone was holding their hands in the shape of a heart to let the kids know how much we all love them. It was an impressive sight and the kids really loved it, as did many other travelers – one even took their picture, and then took a picture of the kids. I was able to see it from the kids’ perspective this year since I went with the group to the gate.
We had two hours before their flight so we settled in the food court and Julia pulled out the snacks while I got water for everyone. This was a nice time for me to have all of the kids to myself so I managed to sit next to each of them for a little while and share their snacks, joke around, or whatever. Sasha T was looking through his pictures and I pointed out that he didn’t have any of me in his stack. He had a notebook with him so I told him to draw my picture. He drew this hideous creature with horns and got a good laugh out of that. I told him that looked more like Austin and he and Sasha V laughed and obviously agreed since he wrote Austin in Russian next to it. Then I borrowed the notebook and wrote in it, “Sasha, You are Awesome!”, and signed my name. He read it out loud and proudly showed it to Julia and Anya. After a while I bribed the kids with french fries. One large order for each two kids so they quickly paired up and took their fries to different tables. This was my chance to spend time with Sasha V as we shared our snack.
I checked the flight status again and they moved the departure time ahead from 4:39 to 4:20, so we headed for the gate. The moving walkway was fun. The boys wanted to see how fast they could go, while the girls walked backwards to see how slow they could go. By the time we got to the gate they were allowing anyone on who needs special assistance. I told Julia I think they qualify for that so she went to check them in while I started hugging everyone once (sometimes twice) more. Several waves goodbye as they walked onto the jetway and then they were gone. As I waited for their plane to depart I prayed for their safety and their futures. As with every camp, there are high hopes that some of the kids will end up back here soon. Our goal with UOO is geared toward raising awareness about all the orphans in Ukraine and not so much about these specific children, but it sure is nice when some of them come back forever like Joshua, Anastasia, Rimma, and soon to be Zina.

– Jim Volf

Click here to see more Scrapbook and airport pictures.