I Never Want to Leave!

Can i sound any more cliche? But it's true. My time here always feels too short, and especially now more then ever. Every place we've been has felt a little bit rushed, so I was glad to spent a few full days at the transition house... because with 25 kids and 10 nannies there's always so much going on! Today is my last day in Ethiopia before we leave for Congo so I'm going to sum up what we've been up to from where I left off...

The 4th day, Wednesday, we started out slow and spent the morning at the Hilton... which was basically a small taste of the pleasures we are used to at home. Internet, pizza, A/C, and lots and lots of "forenge" that look like us. After mom was done with meetings there, we headed off to the transition house. I love that she has a liscense now b/c we feel so independent... but it means we REALLY have to learn our way around... We spent the rest of the day at the house taking, video and pictures of the kids and having the best game of frisbeen in our new large-ish yard. We had an exciting and very random encounter with our next door neighbors who turned out to be American's, so Yours Truly was dubbed the one to shout over the wall and introduce everyone :P It turns out they were just as curious about their new neighbors as we were. They actually enjoyed hearing all of the "joy" coming from the house. That was truly a suprise b/c some of that laughter sounds a lot like screaming sometimes... ;) We'll see how they feel in a couple months, hah.

The 5th day was essentially the 2 hours we spent in Wolita. It was about a 6 hour drive each way and the roads are just awful. My manner of coping is by popping a couple Dramamine and hoping that it knocks me out for most of the drive. Although it was a very quick trip, we had a very successful and worthwile use of our time there :) But no thanks to my new favorite yellow pill I actually have "0" new pictures from this Thursday in Ethiopia.

Day #6: So I didn't get to go to Nazareth to see the babies that many others are coming from far and wide to see while bearing gifts of clothes, toys, and love. But I did however spend ALL morning with the group of kids from Nazareth that came to Addis for a doctors visit. Some were not in pleasant moods after spending a good 5 hours in the car to come down, while others were happy and content to just be out of the car. I loved seeing some of their personalities come out throughtout the day, sometimes quickly dampened upon being sent in to the doctor to get shots :( But all in all, they were a great group and I am excited for anyone that ends up with one of them in their family. After that, Mom and I got to REALLY know Addis Ababa a little better after mising a turn and finding a new way to get to the transition house! It even took us down Churchill street so we could get some last minute shopping in ;)

Day #7: We went back to Miskaye for the morning to finish up some unfinished business that were weren't able to do when we were there a couple days ago. But upon talking to the orphanage director we discovered another child that we would need to go see immediately. We wanted to go see this child ourselves and talk to the birth mother in person while we were in country. It was truly a touching experience and hearing the mothers story about why she was giving up her child was truly heartbreaking and... well... there wasn't a dry eye in the house. Seening the pure love behind what she was doing makes it easy to see that this is what all this is about.

The best decision I made though, was to spend the night at the transition house. I knew my time was running out and I didn't want to miss a minute. And the nannies had only just started doing my hair when my mom had to leave! It was a typical rest of the evening... wagon pulling, jump roping, looking at old pictures of kids, kids skyping home to parents... But after dinner I got to break out my movies that I promised them that I would bring this time. The kids all watched Monsters Inc which I may have enjoyed more than some of them did... and after we put the little ones to bed the older boys picked Men in Black. Good choice. After a few minutes all of the nannies joined in and it was a big party. Everyone was laughing through the whole thing and were completely hooked. And my favorite part may have been the long in depth conversation afterwards about aliens and vampires, and A LOT of things that I thought were common knowledge... but apparently weren't :)

My 8th and last full day in Ethiopia I got to wake up to laughing kids and Ethiopian music playing on the Ipod we got the house last year. It wasn't a sad day though. Although we all knew it was our last day we didn't really talk about it and just enjoyed being there. Each of these kids are really special and really made my time here truly enjoyable. Writing this now it's just starting to sink in and I'm really really going to miss them. The nannies were always great company and although communicating was difficult it didn't stop us from finding a way to have fun :) And I promised to go home and learn more Amharic for the next time I come back. One of the girls even showed me an Ipod App that I'm really going to enjoy practicing with!

Tomorrow my mom and I leave bright and early for the DRC along with our Ethiopian lawyer to protect us! hah I've been told many times that Ethiopia and Congo are very different and right now i will welcome the HEAT as opposed to this COLD Ethiopia that I've been experiencing. I'm excited to finally see this country that i've heard so much about.

I will add more pics (so check back for that :) and I'll update as soon as I can!

Julie

... Free day?

This morning my mom told us that it was our free day since she had to spend the whole day getting her Ethiopian drivers liscence (she's got to be absolutely insane :-P) so we could do whatever we wanted. So what did we do? We visited another orphanage. We didn't get to spend much time at Miscaye when we came a few days ago, so we wanted to spend more time with them and get to know them better. And we LOVED it there. We were so impressed with the kids. They were all very sweet and really enjoyed having us there, almost as much as we enjoyed being there. As we came in the door we were greeted with a welcome song and each one of them greeted us with a handshake and a kiss on the cheek. They wanted so badly to make us feel welcome and they did so without even trying. They each had an A+ personality and had me laughing almost the whole day. I took to the older kids as Christy spent more time with the babies. I could ramble on about each of them but that would probably take the rest of the evening :-) I really hope we get to spend a little more time there... the problem is we finished all the work we had to do there and dont have a reason to go back... Why didn't I think to stash my camera behind the couch so we'd have to go back till now?? :-)

Throughout all of my trips to Ethiopia, the older kids are the ones that end up stealing my heart. I love seeing their personalities and playfulness despite some of their really hard, short lives some of them have had. They're mature and experienced beyond they're years, not to have been able to enjoy their childhoods. They're the ones that really left a huge impact on me. Siblings that have had only each other for so long take care of each other so intently. It's so sweet to see a 7 year old brother grab 2 pieces of bread at dinner and hand one to his 4 year old sister before taking a bite of his, but heartbreaking to know that that's what he's had to do for the past 4 years in order for them to survive. Right now they don't even have a concept of "eat until your full" or even leftovers for that matter. They have no idea what their new life will be like where they will always have enough to eat. But my hopes and prayers that they'll be able to adjust to life in America and enjoy the many pleasures that we have, without feeling guilty, or sadness for the people that they've left behind in Ethiopia that have not been given the same opportunity that they've been given. I've gotten to see many kid's lives completely turned around once they've found a family, and the new joy in their lives have tuned the saddest kids into the most joyful I have ever seen. It's then that we're really able to see what a beautiful thing adoption is and the new life they now have through the gift of a family.