Sunday, April 3, 2011

We wake up praising the Lord for several hours of sleep last night! What a difference a few hours of sleep can make on your outlook and attitude.

We headed downstairs this morning for the group breakfast, where you can sit and visit with other families who are here. We have a full house at the guest house, so there are quite a few people. We all packed an extra comfy, lightweight outfit in our carry-on bags, which mean Scott had sweats, but nothing else he felt comfortable about wearing to the church service this morning. If Scott won’t wear his jeans, you know they must be bad! I think they are standing up in the corner by themselves.

So, my adventurous hubby decides to head down the alley to the main street to purchase some jeans from one of the gazillion small shops. He finds one with jeans and motions to the man, pointing to his legs and saying, “pants – pants!”. The man goes to back and brings back sweats. Scott shakes his head no, “pants-pants” and points to the mans jeans. Ahh...the man pulls out some dark denim jeans. Scott had taken the time to calculate his size in centimeters, since they use metric, but the man disregarded that and asked, “32?”, so he understands our sizing system too. Scott bought his size 34 jeans for 500 birr ($30 American dollars) , which one of our guides said he could have gotten for 400 birr if he had been there, but Scott felt good about doing it himself. He comes back to the room with his new jeans and slides them on…a little tight in the legs, a little low in the waist, and also emblazoned with fancy script writing on the back he had not previously seen, but clean and able to be worn to church. Sweet! Now my white Irish man is a styling Ethiopian in his dark new jeans.

One of the guides (Job) arrived this morning to help us call the airport to check on the status of our missing bags. We found out they had arrived! Scott and Job took a van to go fetch them, while Victoria and I joined the group to head to an International Church Service. Savannah was still not feeling well, so she opted to stay in our room to rest and recuperate some more. We’re not sure if she has some altitude sickness, or nausea from the fumes/smoggy air, but she is still not ready to head out of the room.

There is SO much I want to describe about what it is to drive around the city…my mind is completely blown away with the sadness of it all. I am going to have to process the whole thing and then devote an entire blog post to that alone. Homeless people everywhere, sleeping along the streets. Women holding little babies, coming up to our van windows as we are stuck in traffic at an intersection (think one hundred cars/taxis, no stoplights or signs, no rules or designated lanes..enter the intersection and honk until other cars let you through. Unbelievable.) Donkeys eating grass on a middle road divide and carrying loads down the streets; crippled, deformed men and boys laying in the ground or using sticks as crutches; a young boy with a badly burned face looking at you as you drink your healthy, clean water in a water bottle; old men and women with hands out for money sitting everywhere.

But at the same time you also have to imagine beautiful, smiling children waving at you as you drive everywhere, little kids coming up to you as you walk shouting “hello! hello!”, a beautifully dressed woman sweeping her dirt entrance to her home and coming outside to light a fire to cook on for dinner. There is just so much to say and not enough time. As I said…more on that to come.

SO…the church service was awesome, and I really felt refreshed after worshipping with an amazing mixed congregation. I think that is a little bit of what heaven will be like…all nations and people praising the Lord together. After church the group was taken to a restaurant to eat lunch (a tropical theme restaurant serving burgers, quesadillas, kebobs, etc. All stuff we know and like), and then we stopped by the Guest House to see if Savannah felt ready to head to the Transition Home. She still was not up to the outing, so the rest of us went on to visit our kids.

It is a very weird situation to be in, having new children whom you can’t talk to, and you want them to know things will eventually all be okay, and that you love them and want to help them. Things seem to be going well and the boys are responding happily, but then their mood will change and they are suddenly sad or sullen or withdrawn. G’s whole face will change from smiles to sadness, and he may walk away for a few minutes or go sit by himself. We are trying to figure out how long to let him “process”..do we go sit with him? Give him space? Hug him? Leave him alone? Who knows…we are flying by the seat of our pants and praying God will give us wisdom.

Y. was not happy today, but he also has some bowel “issues”, so I have now officially changed my son’s first disgusting diaper. Yeah for me! As I changed his diaper in the baby room, what should totally surprise me but a beautiful picture hanging on the wall right there of….Samuel Alldrin! Victoria points at it and says, “MOM!”..we both can’t believe it. We motion to the nannies and say, “Biruk? We know Biruk!” They light up and begin saying, “You – Biruk? You – family?”..so over the next 15 minutes we explain how we know little Samuel, we fetch our picture album from our backpack and show them little Biruk now, a year later, smiling with his family, hugging his sister, driving in his fancy little car with a huge smile. They just eat it up, kissing the pictures and chattering excitedly to one another. I told them I will leave them those pictures when we leave, and they told me to kiss him and make sure he is okay. So, beware, Samuel…lots of kisses are coming!

We spent time with the boys, and then were taken back to the guest house to get ready for our traditional, Ethiopian meal at a local restaurant. Savannah finally felt up to heading out, so all four Grants plus about 16 others left for a fun night of loud Ethiopian singing and music, dancing, food, and fun. It was a good day!