Another update...more pictures!

Day 2

This morning Zach and I went with another family to a shopping centre. We decided against going to the National Museum again since we’ve been before. It was nice to be able to go shopping and think about the gifts we were getting and the people they would go to as opposed to our last shopping trip in ET that was so cutthroat we just started throwing stuff frantically in bags. :-) Our driver we hired gave us a really awesome tour/running commentary on the country on our way to the centre. Most of it we knew already but his language was so colorful (even explaining the reason why boys and girls are given their Christian names at different times-because Eve was to blame for the fall of man and thus women wait longer for their Christian names…they also, in case you didn’t know, have menses and childbirth because of their tempting ways). :-)

After the shopping trip we came back and both fell asleep, we seem to be struggling a bit more with the altitude this time around. Going from the flat plains of Iowa to the mountains of Ethiopia is harder on this body than I remember!

We just got back from hanging with the boys. To be quite honest, it’s exhausting. This is because we are all in the same room with the other kids in our travel group and so everyone is running around distracted. It’s really hard to hang with the boys when there’s so much else to do! We did notice that they kept coming back to us, which we think is a really good sign. Tomas, at the beginning of our time, wants nothing to do with me. He shrugs his shoulder at me and only gives Zach love. But I take him away from everyone else or read a book or wrestle him and by the end he has no problem holding my hand and sitting on my lap. Binyam appears to have fallen in love with us. One of our travel group peeps said “Binyam has the best personality of all the kids, I think.” I think he’s on to something.

Both boys are just supremely smart. I taught Tomas how to take pictures and he sat on my lap for quite some time taking his own pictures, a photographer in the making? Then he looked at the back of the camera and knew just how to play the pictures back to me. He then identified everyone in the picture. Tomas loves seeing his brothers and sister at home. The way he says “Dailah” melts my heart.

Though our time with them is fun and exciting, we are looking forward more to the time we will have with them in our hotel when we can come back into our room and just start the parenting part of this. Zach described our time in the care center with them as a play date, and that’s an appropriate description I think.


Tonight we go to the Crown Hotel for the cultural dinner and dancing. Though we’ve been there before we plan on going again because it’s terrific authentic Ethiopian food and just a fun atmosphere. Plus we have a better camera this time around (thanks Frank) and hope to get better pictures of the dancing.

We are starting to miss the kids and look forward to Tuesday when we have the boys in our care. We plan on calling home then so the kids can talk to the boys.

Tomorrow we leave for our trip south to Durame. We are looking forward to seeing the countryside of Ethiopia again and meeting various people who have touched our hearts. We will be staying the night in Durame so no blogging tomorrow.

It will be a long day tomorrow but one that typically makes the entire trip worth it.

Love you Trysten, Tariku and Dailah!