Ethiopia Part 3

Since we knew we were going to be in town for a few more days we asked the agency if we could go back to Adama to visit AJ one more time.  Semmy picked us up early on Saturday morning and we went back to the orphanage to spend some time with him.

Looking at pictures of his new brothers and sisters.

He likes to stick his tongue out a lot.

At one point in our visit he realized that all of the kids next door were eating food so he kept trying to sneak out of the office where we were supposed to stay and run over to the other room.  I couldn't blame him, I was getting hungry, too. Fortunately I had a granola bar with me which he thought was delicious. Finally we let him go eat and he came back when he was finished.

We spent quite a bit of time with him out in the courtyard, too.  He loved the balloons we brought and loved kicking soccer balls.  We watched him line up the small bag of matchbox cars we had for him to play with.  He would put them all in a straight line and then move them into another straight line the other direction.  He is a fan of throwing toys and then running after them and picking them back up.

He liked waving to all of his friends hanging out in the next room.

After about 3 hours it was time for us to leave.  We got into the car and just when I shut the door he ran up to my door like he wanted me to open it again.  When I did open it he reached his arms out to me and I scooped him up for one last hug in the car and then put him back on the ground and he walked away.  I'm not sure if he meant anything by it, but it was such a cute thing to do.  He liked being held and hugged, but he was also 100% boy and enjoyed running around and playing.

Before driving back to Addis Ababa we had lunch at the restaurant in the same hotel we stayed the previous Tuesday night.  I didn't get a good picture of the pool area then, but since we ate at a table poolside I decided to take a few during our return visit.

We had asked our agency if it was possible for us to attend an LDS church on Sunday and were told that someone would be by to pick us up at 8:30 a.m. We had absolutely no idea where we were going, or with whom we were going, but decided to just trust that it had all been worked out.  A guy did show up for us and had arranged a taxi to take us to the church.  We had only been in the taxi for maybe 2 minutes when the driver turned town a very bumpy road that was under construction.  I thought to myself, "Where is he taking us?" Then I saw my first glimpse of the chapel.  We had absolutely no idea what to expect as we don't know much about the church in Ethiopia, but I think we were both quite surprised to find a beautiful meetinghouse surrounded by spacious grounds.  It was all enclosed with a high wall and security people at the front gate opening it for cars to come through.

There is just something about seeing this sign that makes me feel at home.

We were even more surprised to go into Sacrament meeting and find that it was all in English.  The Branch President is an American who is currently working at the US Embassy in Addis.  We didn't know if there would be missionaries in Ethiopia either, but soon discovered 2 sets of missionaries blessing and passing the sacrament.  The hymns were sung in English and the talks were given in English and translated into Amheric, or vise versa depending on what language the speaker was most comfortable speaking in.

The congregation was mostly Ethiopian, but there were some Americans, too.  We talked to the Elders after the meetings and found that while all 4 were American, 2 of the 4 had been adopted from Ethiopia as children and were now back as missionaries.  They told us that the entire country of Ethiopia had only 4 branches with 4  missionaries serving in each branch and that they were part of the Uganda mission.  The missionaries were English speaking since most of the people in Ethiopia can speak some English and the mission covers a few different countries. They also told us there are currently 4 Elders in the mission that were adopted from Ethiopia as children.  I found it interesting that with only 4 branches in all of Ethiopia we were staying at a hotel that was literally 1/4 mile from this beautiful church building.  You could have seen it from our hotel room if it weren't for the trees. 

The next morning Adam and I packed up all of our stuff before we left with everyone to sign the birth certificates.  By this time I had had a few days to adjust to the idea of taking 2 trips and was at peace with it.  I was really looking forward to getting home to my kids as I had been feeling quite homesick during the trip.  We all left in a van at 9 a.m. for our last official appointment.

The other families had also made peace with the change of plans so we were all in high spirits on Monday morning because we were flying out that night and would be able to see our other kids at home after a week of being in the country.  After a morning of sitting in offices and signing official documents we were in the lobby of the hotel planning to go out to a restaurant for lunch when Michael said, "You guys, I just got an e-mail from Megan at the Embassy! She said that they have been working together with the Spanish Embassy who has 6 families in our same position and that MOWA has agreed to sign the papers for all 9 families because we completed court before the suspension!" What?! It took me 3 days to wrap my head around the change of plans and now in an instant our previous plan was back on.  With this new information we all canceled our flights for that night and started trying to prepare ourselves to get custody of our kids the next day. We were happy, of course, but at the same time I was mentally ready to go home and now I was back to having to be in a hotel room with our new 2 year old son for another 2 weeks. I definitely needed to change my mindset yet again. Not only that but on Saturday we took all of the supplies we had brought to care for AJ out to the orphanage as a donation because we figured it would be a waste to haul it all home when there was such a need for it all. Now we would need to go to a store for diapers and wipes and formula, etc. I definitely didn't wasn't feeling completely prepared anymore, but if it was actually working out we weren't going to do anything to stop it.  This was why we came in the first place!

Instead of going out to lunch the guys all went with Semmy to the MOWA office to get the papers signed and the girls stayed back at the hotel.  Semmy was nervous to let any of us go to the office with him as it just wasn't something that was done, but since all of this was completely unprecedented he decided it was OK. While waiting back in our room I realized my options of things to do were very limited because our power adapter was packed away in the backpack Adam took with him.  The TV picked up an English channel but it was BBC news and after just a few minutes I was so over watching coverage of the election in France that I just turned it off. Without a book or anything else to do I tried to take a nap, but sleep eluded me.  Fortunately I had already made a 3 p.m. appt for a massage at the spa so about 10 min before my appointment time I decided to go out on the balcony and look at the view of Addis for a few minutes.

As I stepped onto the balcony I saw a lot of knat like bugs flying around so I decided it would be best to shut the door so that they wouldn't get into the room.  As soon as I pulled the door closed I heard a loud click and quickly realized to my absolute horror that there wasn't a handle on the outside of the door and I had just locked myself outside. A quick assessment of the situation told me I was in trouble.  It was almost 3 p.m. and was very hot and the balcony had absolutely no shade.  I didn't have my phone with me and our only room key was locked in the room so even if Adam came back he wouldn't be able to get in the room and wouldn't know why I wasn't answering the door. The worst part of all of it was that I WAS GOING TO MISS MY MASSAGE! Aggghhhhhh!  I was 8 floors up, but decided my only hope was to get the attention of a hotel employee on the ground and hope they understood enough English to help me out. I yelled for quite awhile before someone finally looked up.  I said I needed a key and gave them my room number. The guy seemed to understand and went inside the hotel, but I had no idea if he really understood and would come to the right room so I sat and stared at the inside doorknob through the glass door of our hotel room for what seemed like an eternity.  Finally the doorknob started to turn and an employee stepped tentatively into the room. When he saw me waving at him from the balcony he burst into a smile and I could tell he was trying not to laugh.  "Thank you soooo much! You saved my life!"  (A bit dramatic, but so true) After the happiness and relief wore off what I really wanted to say was, "Why don't you guys have handles on the outside of your sliding glass balcony doors!?!" Seriously, what is the purpose of that? The good news is that after all of that I was only 5 min late for my massage on the 2nd floor. 😀 Phew!

The guys came back from MOWA that night without the needed signature on our papers.  The reason given was that the Minister had only verbally told them to sign our papers, but they needed to receive it in writing before they would sign. We decided to go back in the morning because at this point we had no reason to think that they wouldn't just sign it once the Minister provided the approval in writing. We spent the night preparing to get our kids the next day and were anxious and nervous and excited all at once.  This time it was really going to happen. . .