[momto2gals]

Hello,
We are in process of adopting from Poland and already have children at home who will be traveling with us. My question is will I still be able to keep my kids "plugged" in Poland? With so many things now like Wii, Nintendo DS's , portable DVD players, disney channel, internet, I don't know what my kids would do if they had to do without for a while. I imagine their electricity is different but hopefully we can find adaptors to bring?? Also, are there any English channels on television? I plan to bring a lot of DVDs and I'm assuming there will be some kind of internet connection available. Any of you with advice I would love to hear from. My kids are 9,7, and 4.

Thanks!
B Brach

[mschaefer]

We brought our son who was almost 5 y.o. We had a portable DVD player and Leapster. We had our laptop as well. He LOVED to watch movies in Polish, he didn't care that there weren't any kids shows in English. While there were a few English channels which helped us correctly understand the world new events (versus us trying to poorly understand the Polish channels) and the lap top to email updates to home, we really did not need all the hi-tech things we needed or used at home.

The DVD player and Leapster were good for the airplane, airports and waiting for "business related" stops. Otherwise, our son loved to explore the hotel and Poland. He loved to play with kids on the playground even though he only knew a few Polish words and they did not speak English.

Internet connections are not always available, you need to make sure your hotel or apartment has that capability. We did make sure to find a hotel and an apartment with access and had no trouble.

You will need adaptors to be able to charge you electronic -- Radio Shack had everything we needed.

[MN_Mom]

We brought our 11 year old son with us for the last three weeks of our trip.

We had a portable DVD player, laptop, and DS systems. They could all be charged with regular adapters we picked up at Travel Stores. The biggest bummer we encountered was that Netflix Watch It Now option does NOT work overseas. Nor do watching American TV shows over the internet. But we packed a ton of American DVDs into a CD case that packed up well and did not take up much space. Our apartment also had a DVD player in that we could watch rented, Polish DVDs on.

I second the notion to only book an apartment with wireless internet access. It was a must have for us as we needed internet access before our 11 year old arrived to Skype with him, and then he needed it to access his e-mail when he arrived to keep up with school work back home.

Also - once our bio son came to join us, he brought a DS for our newest son (age 9). He loved the DS just as much and was really good for bonding for the two of them.

~sarah
based on a true story...

[jola_nyc]

If you want to bring DVD's from USA I would recomend to bring along a DVD player as well. Poland and USA are in two different regions of coding for DVD's and you might not be able to play American DVD's in Poland. You can read more about DVD regions on Wikipedia DVD region code - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[momraine]

I was able to get BBC while I was in Warsaw, but they only seemed to have preschool type children's shows in the mornings and then soap operas and then sit coms and such in the evenings. I mostly watched it when ds was busy or sleeping, cause I wanted to hear some English during the three weeks we were alone there.

[MenloAve]

We are currently in Poland with our 6 year old son and are adopting a little girl. He brought his shuffle with him which I loaded before we came. I also have a few games one an itouch and iphone for him to play. We also have two computers and use skype to talk to the grandparents. Having wireless in our apartment in great, but we havent' found it everywhere and in some places it is expensive.

I would prep for deplugging so that the kids are happy when they do have access. Also remember not to make yourselves a target for theft. Too many electronics that are visible to others can make yourself a prime target for theft. Try to get the kids to limit use to your apartment or places that expect to see this like the airport.

Regarding netflix and watching movies on the internet.... Just yesterday I downloaded four new shows from the itunes store to our computer and it worked just fine - albeit a bit slow. I wanted to get Thomas the train and Calliou. We took a big trip to Indonesia about a year ago and I invested in the itouch. It saves bringing along so many DVD's because you just download the movies and songs to the itouch (and it is lighter than a DVD player.) I must have 15 movies and 30 or so shows and I have at least 1/2 the space left. Plus you can download to your computer and just play from there.

I've been pretty successful at uploading photos to blogger, shutterfly, and picassa as well.

Good luck with your trip. I hope you are here soon.

[MN_Mom]

I wish I had thought to download from I-Tunes! I was so sad when I realized I couldn't watch shows online... We didn't have an itouch with us, but that is one investment I would have made in hindsight. We did all have ipods, so music was plentiful as well.

I will note that we made space for the portable dvd player and I am SO glad I did. We can also watch dvds from our laptop (both American and Polish), but when the kids were watching dvds, it gave me some quiet time to be on the laptop.

Good luck!

~sarah
based on a true story...

[lastpaige]

What a great opportunity to unplug the children. Let them each pick one 'gadget' to bring that has to fit in their backpacks, and that's it.

We brought a laptop for communication, photo loading, bill paying, and movie watching, but that was it. Each of the girls brought their ipods, and they loaded them with different songs so they could swap. The ipods only came out in the privacy of our apartment/hotel/train car, or on the plane. With more than one child and plenty of luggage, you are already going to be watched. You don't need to offer a thief more reason to pick your family over someone else to target.

There are too many things to do, play, places to go, etc., all that are fabulous for relationship building. It would have been hard to start tying heart-strings together if the girls were always plugged into one gadget or another and the boys were always watching movies or gaming online.