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Consider This from NPR

The Harrowing Journey To Get Premature American Twins From Kyiv To The U.S.

Consider This from NPR

NPR

News, Society & Culture, Daily News, News Commentary

4.26.2K Ratings

🗓️ 5 May 2022

⏱️ 10 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Twin babies Lenny and Moishe were born via surrogate in Ukraine, just as Russia invaded the country. Their parents live in Chicago and had been anxiously awaiting the arrival of their new sons.

Rescuers exfiltrated the babies, dodging Russian artillery fire and driving through a snowstorm before finally arriving at a Polish hospital, where new father Alex "Sasha" Spektor met the boys for the first time. But a more difficult journey for the family was just beginning.

NPR's Ari Shapiro followed up with Spektor and his partner, Irma Nuñez, as they navigated the complicated bureaucratic process of getting their twins from Poland to the United States.

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Transcript

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0:00.0

About two months ago, I met a man in a Polish border town named Alex Spector.

0:06.0

He goes by Sasha.

0:07.5

Sasha had flown all the way from Chicago to meet his new sons, twin baby boys Lenny and

0:13.0

Moisha.

0:14.0

You're Sasha.

0:15.0

You're Sasha.

0:16.0

Oh my god.

0:17.0

Congratulations.

0:18.0

Thank you.

0:19.0

Thank you.

0:20.0

It's a, the twins are already in.

0:21.5

Lenny and Moisha were born prematurely to a Ukrainian surrogate just as Russia started

0:26.1

its war on Ukraine.

0:28.0

Following the boys out of Kiev was a feat.

0:31.2

Rescuers exfiltrated the babies and the surrogate in a mission called Operation Gemini.

0:36.3

They dodged Russian artillery fire, drove through a snow storm, and finally, after the longest

0:42.1

day of their very young lives, the twins arrived after midnight at the Polish hospital where

0:47.0

Sasha met them for the first time.

0:49.4

I spoke to him outside a few minutes later.

0:51.4

They're just amazing.

0:53.4

It's just that I didn't, because on the photographs they look so big, but in the early

0:58.1

years, it's just, oh my god.

...

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