The Joys of Homelessness

Homelessness is a serious problem and we have empathy for those that find themselves in that situation unintentionally.  We are currently homeless, but this is a blessing in our lives - and entirely temporary.  This is the second time that our family has been "between homes" and both times have been a good experience.

The first time that we were homeless was in the summer of 2008.  We had a three year old, a two year old and twins  who were only about two and a half months old.  We sold our house in Logan at the beginning of July, but were not moving to Iowa City until the beginning of August.  We spent that month living mostly with my Aunt Kathi in her large house in South Ogden.  The basement of her house was larger than the house we were living in.  In addition, she cooked for us and we got to swim in her pool.  That was a great experience for all of us.

This round of homelessness is more meaningful for us because of our house in Iowa City.  We had it under contract to sell when we moved to Las Vegas last summer.  The financing for the buyers fell through, and by that time the market had slowed.  That meant that for the past year we've been paying for two houses.  The house in Iowa got an offer on it in June.  The offer was lower than what we were planning, but we went with it.  Then the house flooded.  We ended up getting some insurance money, and making some cash concessions to the buyers, but the house sold and we don't have to worry about it anymore.  The house sold on July 17th.  We moved out of our Las Vegas house on 21 July.  We are truly homeless, but not without a place to stay.  We've spent time staying with my mom and with my sister and her family.  We fly out to Kazakhstan in a few days and we know that we have an apartment there waiting for us.

Our Penske Truck Packed and Ready to Roll: Leaving Las Vegas

Until then, however, we are basking in the feeling of being freed from the burden of an unsold house - and free from paying rent for two weeks!

Traveling to Kazakhstan with a Dog Part I

We've traveled to Russia before with the whole family.  The first time we did this was in June 2009 when our twins were just 14 months old, Polina was 2 turning 3, and Nika was just a few months past 4.  Many people thought that was crazy.  It was quite a bit of hard work, but it was doable and fun once we arrived at Babushka's house in Krasnoyarsk.  The fact that we made our first trip with the kids so young made our second trip there with everyone 3 years later seem like a cake walk.  We learned a lot about packing, organizing, and traveling together as a family. Now we are moving to Kazakhstan with the crew - plus we've added our dog.

This seems a bit crazy for us because in addition to worrying about travel for the six of us, we are having to do quite a bit of work to figure out Yuki's travel plans.  Right now we are feeling pretty confident that we are where we need to be with things, but we still have some things to do.  Hopefully this post will contain some information that is helpful for anyone else that is planning on something similar with their own pet.  I would also like to add that we've gotten a lot of good help and advice from one of my colleagues at Nazarbayev University.  He and his wife have a couple of dogs and they have been our main source of information on what we should plan on as far as pet supplies and dog ownership in Astana.

Yulia putting boots on Yuki

Veterinarian

Kazakhstan doesn't have a lot of onerous regulations on importing pets, but traveling with dogs requires quite  a bit of veterinary preparation. We've gotten her shots updated and needed to do a new rabies shot for her because Kazakhstan requires that the rabies shot is given within the last year, but not less than 30 days before you enter the country.  

Yuki will also need a veterinary check up and pet passport that is done within 10 days of traveling.  We are working to schedule this in Utah since we will have moved from Vegas by then. In addition to vaccines and some documentation we picked up a year's supply of worm medication.  

The veterinary process has not been quite as onerous as we were expecting.

Transport

This has been our biggest issue.  We are flying on Delta from SLC to NYC, and from there we are on Turkish airlines the rest of the way.  Delta does not fly pets as luggage between April 15 and September 15.  They will fly her as cargo as long as the temperature at take-off is below 85 degrees Fahrenheit.  We are fairly confident we'll be okay because our flight leaves SLC at 12:30 a.m.  Flying Yuki as cargo adds a few wrinkles to the front end and NYC portions of our travel.

Because she is flying as cargo we need to check her in early at the cargo area.  Their office closes at 9:00 so we need to be at the airport by 8:00 p.m.  This isn't too bad since we'll have a lot of bags to check and our family that is dropping us at the airport can get home at a late hour instead of getting us to the airport late night and then not getting home until it's extremely late/early.  This is a minor, minor inconvenience.

The main complication with transport is that in NYC she will be transported to Delta's cargo facility rather than luggage.  That means a separate part of the airport instead of the terminal where we are landing.  We have a five-hour layover, but are not sure if we'll have to re-check our bags (Delta and Turkish are not alliance partners), and whether everything will be on time.  Our options are for me to get a cab, find the cargo area, get Yuki, and then get back to our terminal to check her as luggage - or - for us to hire a company to pick her up at cargo and bring her to us.  We have opted for the second option to allow for some wiggle room in case things are not 100% smooth.  Once she is dropped off to me at the terminal, I'll check her as luggage and we'll be set through Istanbul and on to Astana.

Supplies

I'll end this post with some fun.  It was suggested that we bring some dog boots for Yuki to help her walk in the snow and ice (ice especially).  My colleague even sent a link to some boots.  While Yulia was picking up other supplies she saw some boots at the pet store and got them to try.  The picture at the top of this post is Yulia putting those boots on to Yuki.  

It turns out that those boots were a bit big.  She was also REALLY bothered by the long "socks" that are built in.  The ones that were suggested are just little ankle boots.  We also measured her feet and got the right size.  We've ordered those and they are on their way.  

Packing, Decisions, and Sacrifice

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Or in the case of our journey of 6,000 miles (as the crow flies), it begins with a series of interconnected and complex steps.  One of those steps is deciding what stays and goes in general, and then what goes to Kazakhstan with us, specifically.  We are packing up our household and the accumulated possessions of 12 1/2 years of marriage, 4 kids, and the accumulated goods that come from home ownership in temperate states.  In general we are in favor of downsizing our possessions, but there is also the idea that we are likely going to return to the United States within the next 5 years and there are things we would like to have when we come back.

So we are renting a storage shed near my Mom's house in Payson and keeping many of our possessions there.  All of our winnowing of stuff will not leave us empty-handed, just lighter for the future. The packing of our things requires a number of decisions to be made for each item.  If we are keeping it AND taking it with us, we need to set it aside to pack later.  If we are keeping it, but leaving it in Utah, we need to pack it.  Another category of items are those that we are leaving, but which we want to have access to for later - on our trips home - to bring back and forth.  We have a number of books for kids that we plan on rotating back and forth on our trips home, so those need to be packed, but kept accessible when we unload our truck in Utah at the storage shed.

When I (Spencer) was a kid, our family moved out of our large house in Ephraim, Utah to a trailer in Payson Utah.  We had to get rid of most of our things to make the move work.  That was a valuable exercise in learning about the true value of possessions in relation to the rest of life.  Our time in our single-wide trailer in Payson with 5 teenage kids was one of the best of our family. One of the appealing aspects of our move to Kazakhstan is that our kids will be able to learn some of those same lessons about what is important in life.

This morning (Friday July 11, 2014) the girls did just that as we packed up their toy room.  On our last move from Iowa City to Las Vegas the kids didn't need to really make any hard choices about what to leave behind.  We gave away a bunch of their kids toys, but not anything that they were really using.  We limited the four of the girls to one stuffed animal to take with them in their carry-on bag and to one large duffle bag of other toys for all four of them.

Lina helping to sort out the toys.

The Kid's Toy Bag

They all did a great job of making hard choices.  After we had gone through a few things, the kids voluntarily gave up a number of items to the Deseret Industries (thrift store) box and got rid of previous "treasures" that were little more than trinkets and garbage (the trash bag in the second picture above).  We are blessed to have great kids who are willing to embark on a grand family adventure and to make the tough choices along the way that make that journey possible.