Our First Day in Ethiopia (pt 1)

I had met another family adopting at the Mestas Family baby shower before they went to pick up their kids. They already had their referral for a sibling group of three (two girls and a boy) and at the time we were still waiting on our referral. I had not spoken with the wife, Deanna, at all after the shower (a good 3 or 4 mos ago) but Eileen informed me she was pretty sure we were on the same flights to Addis! I was excited and when we recognized them in DC. As we waited to board we were able to share all that God has done in our hearts through our adoptions. I was so thankful for all that the Lord was already doing to sweeten our journey. We kept checking in with one another through the flight and saying things like "Can you sleep?" and "What will our first meetings be like?", it was so nice to have someone else on the plane with us that was going though the same process (except for them it was x3!). I kept thinking "wow, all these people are just having a normal flight, visiting Ethiopia, or going back home but no one can tell that we are sitting here so excited to get to Ethiopia to meet our child!" We arrived in Ethiopia at about 8:30am. My sleeping was on and off through the flight and I was able to journal and pray some. It was hard for me to rest when I would think of meeting her - what would she be like? Would she like us? What was Ethiopia like? Etc. Etc. When we arrived we got in line for our visa and then made our way to get our bags. Right when you get to the belt to swipe bags through security these guys come up and grab your bags onto the belt. It happens kinda fast and your still a little confused as to why we couldn't just grab the bags and set them on the belt in front of us but these guys wanted a tip. We gave them one (100 birr- $10 US) and then he looked at us and said "for two!" so we gave him another 100 birr. I guess you are supposed to tip around 30 birr a bag. Just a tip for future travelers :o) Then we spotted Travis and Joanna pretty quickly because they were the only two white folks in a sea of black. We met our driver and headed to New Flower Guest House. This place is great! We had read a blurb of a review on another site where someone suggested the surrounding area seemed unsafe. This is crazy! There is a row of 3 houses next to eachother and each has a gate and a guard and the area is busy with people (we saw a lot of people walking the road outside the compound). There is a lot of construction in Addis, they seem to be building everywhere. You know your in Addis when you say "Oh! Our guest house is the one next to that pile of rocks" :o) Anyways, we felt incredibly safe there, really we felt safe the whole time in Addis. I can't think of a time we ever felt uneasy while being there, even when we got looks its a curious look and not a glare. The people are very very friendly. The guest House was clean and they offer a menu of food choices. We ate in a lot for only $2-3 each time You could eat Ethiopian (very yummy), fries, grilled cheese, pasta with tomato sauce which was really good because the sauce has some zip to it and is not at all like American, a tuna sandwich and a few other things.

*Balcony we shared with one other room*
*Our wonderful master room with a private bathroom (a big plus!)*

*View from right outside the guest house gate*

*Berhane, a guys who helps run the guest house. We got to know him and he was such a sweetheart!*

It was nice because we got to meet all these other adoptive families. There was about 3 other families (just in our house) with other agencies and we would all commute at night in the living room and would get to know eachother. A lot of times we would all sit around the table and eat dinner together. It was like a little family and we were able to compare, ask questions and learn a lot from others adoption experience. We are people people though, we love chatting and such so it was nice to have the option once the baby went to sleep and not just sit in the room. We really felt like we had hit the jackpot at this place and were able to interact more with the culture of Ethiopia. We got to know our guard and housekeeper (as much as we could with speaking bits of English) and was able to talk to Helen, the owner. She is Ethiopian and lived in the US for a while. She really has a heart toward adoptive families. She was very helpful and had medicines for the baby if needed and mentioned a hospital that had good care that was close by. Our bedroom was a master with it's own bathroom so if you plan to stay here I would request a master bedroom with private bath. Everyone else had to split a bathroom that was in the hallway of the rooms. They always had toast with butter, jam and coffee for breakfast. If you wanted eggs and other things you could order it. The house help was amazing! These ladies would go and go and go. If someone came in at 9:p requesting something to eat/drink they would get it, they would clean our room each day and were always doing something to keep things up. Most houses have a compound around them in Addis and in the back two rooms are attached for a guard and a housekeeper to live. We were informed they make about 600 birr ($60) a month! If you stay here, be generous and tip these sweet people. They were such servants to us. We got laundry done about 5-6 times and it was I think maybe totalled $30, and baby clothes are FREE! You could hear dogs barking at night and of course could hear the local mosque at 5 but it really wasn't that bad and we were used to it after a few nights. The walls are thin and you can hear people talking if they are standing in the hallway. We saved a lot of money and really enjoyed our stay. We got a major glimpse of all that God is doing to bring orphans into families because there were a lot of other families we met and many were adopting older children (like older than 8). We were blessed by their faith and encouraged by how God is pursuing even the older children to place them in christian homes. I guess this is enough for one post but I will post about meeting Felicity next time