Embassy Day

Today we spent a quiet morning in the apartment for the most part. Breakfast was yogurt, fruit, and cereal. The kids had a lot of fun helping to make it.
Luke and I went to exchange a few more dollars into rubles and picked up a couple of Dr. Oetker's frozen pizza's for lunch. They were easy and cheap (by Moscow standards at least) and they weren't too messy. We didn't want food all over our clothes for the embassy visit.

We walked to the embassy since it is just around the corner. Since we could walk there, we did not have anyone from our agency with us. It was not a problem, the instructions that came with the appointment were easy and clear. Because we have U.S. Passports, we could go to the head of the line, in front of those with Russian passports who were waiting for visas. Inside, we went through security. They allow absolutely NO ELECTRONIC DEVICES at all. We THOUGHT we left all of our electronics in the apartment, but we forgot about the flashlight in Lisa's purse. We had to leave it with the security checkpoint (they are used to this, you can retrieve them when you leave).

Inside, we had to get a ticket, go the second floor to pay for the visas ($400 each child), drop off our ticket and receipt at the window and wait to be called. While we waited, one of the consuls came out and explained the USCIS process that we would go through once we get back to an American airport. We met a couple from Dublin Ohio waiting with us... small world (for those outside of Columbus, Dublin is one of the other Columbus Suburbs). When it was our turn, we all went up the window where the counsul had us sign a few forms, made sure all of our information was correct, and stressed again that NO ONE SHOULD OPEN THE SEALED PACKET before we give it to the USCIS officer in Atlanta. He also explained that once that officer stamps Kim and Peter's passport, they will officially become United States citizens. They will automatically have dual citizenship. They could not cancel their Russian citizenship even if they wanted to until they are 18 years old. After the interview, we had to wait to receive our final immigration packet. They say you will have to wait about a half-hour, but it was more like 10 minutes. Then we were done. One more GREAT BIG checkmark off of our list... the kids have visas. The last big checkmark starts tomorrow when I go to the Russian consolate to register the kids (our agency makes us do it here in Moscow before we leave... others let you do it once you get home).

In the afternoon (looks like evening because it gets dark so early here... we're pretty far north) we walked down to Old Arbat street. It is now a pedestrian street and is the tourist shopping area of Moscow. We bought several Matryoshka dolls and a few other souveneirs. We did some haggling and got reasonable prices. We will probably go back on Thursday or Friday to buy a very nice matryoshka and some other items for Kim and Peter for when they are older.