Day 7: The Rain Finally Came

On Friday, we were excited that this would be our last day in Ethiopia. We woke up and finished packing all of our suitcases. We had brought four large suitcases (2 1/2 filled with donations), These were some of the donations we had taken!

so we had to combine suitcases since we were taking back much less than we had brought. This was a good feeling!

Here is a last look at our guest home. We shared a floor with two other families; however, when they left on Tuesday, they left us to ourselves for the rest of the week. Relevance: we then had our own bathroom for the last three days. This was nice, not that it wasn't nice sharing. It was just nice to have our own. :)


When we got everything packed, we headed up to the other guest house to tell Jen and Abram goodbye. While there, we got to connect with another family who highly suggested eating lunch at Island Paradise. They said it was very "American". That sounded good to us, so we booked a driver and headed over there! Getachew (sp?) was our driver for the last few days, and we grew to love him. He ate lunch with us and was gracious in telling us details about living in Ethiopia. We were so thankful we had gotten to know him. He took great care of us. And, yes! The food was excellent! (We recommend the pizza.)

Here are a few parting shots of Addis. There were donkeys everywhere! This picture was taken in a very busy, "downtown" area.

There were so many people on the sidewalks.I never got used to seeing mothers with their babies, just sitting along the side of the roads.

There were vendors everywhere. We saw many spots where people were roasting ears of corn on the side of the road. Here, a man is getting it all set up.

Here is an example of the government housing that is being built.

You might be able to see the goats toward the right of this picture. We drove by this every day. The goats were painted pink to show that the taxes had been paid. I assume that people would come and buy one as they needed a goat. It was just interesting that they were always there.

Here is a sneak peek at an Addis traffic jam!

After lunch, the rain started to come.

We had been fairly "lucky" because we had avoided any huge downpours during our week in Ethiopia, but the rain was definitely on its way!

We headed out of Ethiopia at 11:30 p.m. When we started to fly away, Chris handed me the I-Pod full of worship songs. I Will Rise started to play, and my tears started to fall. It felt so good to hear this song, but my heart was so torn at that moment. So, while Chris slept, I cried over everything I had experienced over the previous week. I cried about leaving our son. I cried about the man who I saw scooting down the highway because his legs didn't work. I cried for the little girl whose prize possession was a pink plastic sack. I cried for the babies who are not able to be saved by Drawn From Water. I cried for the orphans who are saved and will live their entire life in an orphanage. I cried for Isaiah's birth family. I cried for the kids who have been infected with HIV. As you can tell, I cried for a long time. (Amazingly, I hadn't cried much the entire week--except on Tuesday--so it all just came flooding out.) Luckily, I have long hair, so nobody even knew. Finally, after 35 total hours which included 17 hours of layovers, 20 bottles of water, 12 security checks, and 4 tries at connecting to the internet . . .. . . we arrived home to our waiting family. We were so glad to have them in our arms. It was so tough for us to leave 1/4 of our hearts in Ethiopia, but it helped to know that we had three waiting kiddos here.

Now, we wait for an embassy date. We have heard that it will be 4 weeks, and we have also heard that it may be closer to 12. Please continue to pray for us as we look to finish this journey. I know that the wait will get increasingly difficult as we watch days melt into weeks and months. We pray only one month passes before we get to go claim the missing piece to our hearts!