A Year Ago Today…

Was our last day in Ethiopia.

Our last day in Addis was wonderful. We got up early to go shopping on Church Hill Rd. We had found a cab driver that we really liked, and he took us to a great store that had everything we wanted. We loaded up on scarves, key chains, t-shirts, a table cloth, carved wooden animals and other little trinkets and souvenirs. We also stopped at a couple of book shops to find some Amharic/English children’s books.

When we got back to the hotel, I went to use the internet café to email home while Josh and Ben went to play. When I got out to the playground where Josh and Ben were, and all of the kids from the care center were there too! I had forgotten that the care center brought all of the children to the Ghion playground every Friday morning. Josh and Dan were headed off to visit the Leprocy Hospital and a few other sites with our missionary friends, so Ben and I decided to stay and play.

We played with all of the kids and nannies and ate snacks with all of Ben's friends. It was a lot of fun to play with all of the kids and I think Ben really enjoyed seeing his friends. He even insisted on showing his favorite teacher our hotel room…it was really cute. I worried how he would react when they all got into the van to go back to the care center and he stayed behind with me. We explained to him that we would go back to the center later for his party, and Ben waved bye to all his friends as they climbed into the van and was happy to go back to the hotel with me. He continually amazed us with his easy going and happy nature.

Ben and I ate lunch at the Ghion, and then curled up together to watch a movie for a rest time. When Josh got back we headed over to the care center for the going away ceremony for Ben and the other two children that were going home that week.

What a wonderful experience.

When we got to the center there was such a sense of excitement in the air! All of the kids that were leaving were dressed up in traditional Ethiopian outfits as a gift from the center. Ben was really proud and was running around like he owned the place.

All of the children at the center were lined up in little plastic chairs. One of the teachers gave a little talk about how loved the children were. She presented each child that was going home with a paper shaped like a heart. She said that the large heart represented the love and care from all of the nannies and teachers to the children. Then she said that the little hearts on the big heart represented all of the other children at the center. On the other side of the heart there was a finger print of each child and a letter from one of the teachers. It was so touching! Then they presented me with a huge folder of all of the school "work" Ben had done while he was there... coloring pages, letter writing, math work, etc. It was just priceless to me to have that stuff.

Next the nannies formed a circle around the three children and blessed them. It was very, very touching. The teacher told us that they were sad and would miss the children, but were also very happy because they knew that "they could not replace a real mom, dad and family". Then she told us to always remember how loved our children were while they were there. Talk about your emotional experiences. I was trying not to cry, but it was useless.

Continued...