Our last day in Addis was a busy one. I went to bed the night before with the satisfaction of knowing that the waiver had been delivered and signed for at the Embassy…that the waiver was THERE, which meant that the visa would be done in the morning, and there would be no agonizing waiting around to see if it arrived or not.

I spent Thursday afternoon over at the CHS guesthouse, visiting with my friends, Keely and Josh and their sweet baby girl, and some of the familiar CHS employees, who we recognized from Ben’s adoption. When we got back to home sweet Hilton, I tracked the waiver and saw it had been delivered. That was a big woo hoo. That was when it really started to sink in that we were REALLY going home. Although I do have to admit that there was a small part of me that worried that the officer in Nairobi hadn’t really mailed the visa…that she had mailed an envelope of shredded paper, or given us the tracking number to something else….I had lost all faith in the process and couldn’t totally relax until I knew that the visa was done.

Friday morning we got up and had our customary banana pancakes and fruit platter one last time. I got Belane bathed and dressed and started organizing clothes for our carryon and pulling out clothes for me to wear for the day. I was surrounded by piles of clothes when the phone rang. It was 8:35 a.m. It was Gail calling to say that the Embassy had just called…our visa would be done by 10 a.m. Gail was busy and asked if I could get to the Embassy to get the visa by myself… I could have gotten myself to the moon at that point if that is what it took!

So I hurried and got showered and dressed and Belane and I went down to get a cab to the Embassy. You can’t park anywhere near the U.S. Embassy, so we had quite a walk, but it was so exciting to be going there to get her visa that I didn’t even care! We went upstairs and waited about 10 minutes until they called us up and gave me her passport with visa and her big visa packed for immigration. Her packet was so big that they couldn’t fit it through the slot in the window, and she had to open the door and bring it out to me. I thanked her over and over and got all teary eyed. It was an amazing feeling.

I had been so worried about having to leave Ethiopia without Belane…on one hand I kept saying I wouldn’t… I couldn’t…and then on the other hand I knew I could only be gone from home for so long. Knowing we were really going home together was beyond relief. It was sheer joy.

Continued...

The picture above is Belane and Sidisse, the director of AHOPE, at Belane's farewell party.