Day 2, Trip 1

Disclaimer #1: You'll notice that by Day 2, I got a bit lazy; didn't even use many complete sentences!

Disclaimer #2: This post is SUPER long; consider yourselves WARNED!!!! (Ok, it's not THAT long, I guess...)

4:00 a.m. wake up today. :( Feel wide awake. Go to the bathroom and eat a few nuts and drink from the enormous bottle of water we bought last night from the hotel for 20 birr (approximately $1.50 U.S.) Look out the window; try to read a bit. Fall back asleep around 5:30 a.m. Wake up again around 8:00, shower and get ready for the day. It feels GREAT to be clean! I can't get over how good I smell (which tells you just how stanky I was before :)).

We gather up our passports and all and head down for breakfast at the hotel lobby restaurant. We meet Andy and Jenny for breakfast, and have the buffet which includes fruit of various kinds, french toast, pancakes, hard-boiled eggs, rice with some sort of meat mixed in, and a variety of juices. Very tasty. We're done eating, and it's only 10:00 a.m.; Almaz won't come for us until 1:30 p.m., so the four of us decide to take a walk.

We go right out the hotel doors and walk maybe 1/2 mile or so. Many, many Ethiopians are out walking too - we are the only white people. Several of the children we pass by look at us and laugh (at us, I presume), a few stare wide-eyed, like they're scared of us. One boy, maybe about 8 years old, wants to shake our hands. The lady who he's walking with, his Mom (?), sort of shakes her head and chuckles at the same time. I wonder if she is embarrassed by the boy's uninhibited forwardness.

On our walk, we see many half-finished buildings made out of concrete with the wooden scaffolding still in place. For every building that is complete, there are two that remain unfinished, it seems. We see two men with three goats; they are not on a leash or anything, but the goats follow the men right across the highway. I wonder if they will get run over. They don't. I am relieved when the hotel comes back into sight.

At noon, we eat lunch at the hotel restaurant. Nathan has a ham and cheese sandwich with french fries; I have a bowl of chicken soup. The ham is not like regular ham, more like spicy, tough, bologna, and my chicken soup tasted like it was flavored with cinnamon or nutmeg or something. The french fries were wonderful though!

At 1:30, Almaz came to the hotel to talk to us before we went to Hannah's Hope. She welcomed us and we introduced ourselves, and told the name of the child we were each adopting. She spoke specifically to the parents adopting older children, telling them what to expect with the personalities of their particular child. She talked a bit about the schedule for the week, and how our court appointment would go on Wednesday. Then we all hopped into the AGCI van and we were on our way!!!!!

My first impression of Hannah's Hope was that it is big and beautiful - it looks like a mansion in an area of the city that is not particularly well-to-do. It is surrounded by a tall, concrete wall and an enormous black iron gate with a smaller door to let people in and out. The older kids came out to see us right away. They wanted to show off their hula-hooping skills; they were very good and seemed very happy and at home there.

Almaz took the adoptive parents with older children first. Then Kiersten, one of the Ethiopia case managers with AGCI who just happened to be here visiting, took us up into the baby house. She said, "Mamush's parents???" And up the curved, marble staircase we went.

When we walked into the back boy baby room, it seemed like there were babies everywhere. I was frantically scanning the room, looking for him, and Kiersten asked the special mothers, "Mamush?" And they pointed to the violet-colored Bumbo seat on the floor...At first I hardly recognized him - he is HUGE, and has SO much hair -BEAUTIFUL, tiny curls! But, then I saw those big eyes and long eyelashes, and recognized them from our referral photos!

He didn't seem afraid of us at all, and after having him grab my fingers, and talking to him a bit, I asked if I could hold him. The special mothers said yes, so I picked him up! He was cuddly right away! And oh SO big!! Size 6 month clothes already! We held him and played with some toys awhile. He loves putting anything and everything in his mouth! Then I gave him a bottle - 4 oz. He finished it and was almost asleep, but then started crying. A special mother brought him another bottle, and he drank a bit more. He settled down, and slept in my arms - AMAZING!!!

Then it was time for us to go. We came back tot he hotel, and took quick naps before we headed down for supper. Nathan and I shared a traditional Ethiopian beef dish with veggies, a spicy curry sauce, and injera. It was really good. We also each had Coke, in a bottle. That took us back about 25 years!

At 10:00 p.m., we "chatted" with Mom, Evie, and Sylvie over the computer for a little while. The connection would be good from 5 minutes or so, and then we'd lose them and have to call back again. But, it was very good to see them and hear them.

It was a WONDERFUL day!



All of us getting onto the bus to head over to Hannah's Hope and meet our little ones for the first time!!!




Hannah's Hope




Nathan and I just before meeting our little man :)




Our oh-so-yummy dinner (a.k.a. Zil Zil Tibs, or to some, Zoo Zoo Tips)