Rock the Boat: Days 3 & 4

God's beautiful creation

Day three was another travel day, but only twelve hours this time. We hopped from London to Amsterdam. Seriously, what is up with that airport? There is no train to connect the terminals so it's A LOT of walking. Most of the moving sidewalks were not on and quite a few of them ended at a door that went no where. Just a door. Cade got quite a kick out of it. So, we hung out there for a couple of hours, met some other Holt families, and then got on our final plane to Addis!

Addis here we come

It was a great flight. The plane was only about half full and many of the passengers were Ethiopian. That happened on our first trip, too. I love how the flight seems like a social occasion for them. Many of them moved around the plane, laughing and talking and having a good time. Fun.

We landed around ten local time, I think. Our driver was there as expected, but there were too many people and bags so he had to call for another van. Eventually we made it to the Jemimah Guesthouse and it felt like arriving home. Love that place! We quickly settled in and fell into bed exhausted.

Our old friends, the rooster and the cow, helped us to have a restless night. ~~Someone seriously needs to eat that rooster.~~ The call to prayer at four and five in the morning partnered with them to ensure that our sleep was limited. We rolled out of bed exhausted, but excited that the day had finally arrived when we would see Eyob!

Headed off to Holt

The driver was right on time [what!?!] and we zoomed off to the Holt offices to go over embassy paperwork and the agenda for our trip. I was nervous since Justin was not traveling with me. I had to bring extra paperwork and several notarized things and if I messed it up, well we were basically screwed. But, everything was in order and I was soooo relieved. We sat through a little presentation, paid for our trip down south to Durame, and got to look through our file again.

All of our paperwork

From there, we went to lunch at a restaurant with an amazing view of the city [Top View???]. We got to know our travel group, Cade told some bad jokes, and we had yummy food. All of us were anxious for the afternoon to get started. Four hours with our kids!

At the restaurant

Eventually, we piled back into the van and ended up at Niana, Eyob's care center. I was relieved to find it as clean and bright as his previous one. We were with two other families. Their kids came in first, one at a time, and ran into their parents' arms. Pure sweetness! Finally, here came Eyob. I opened my arms, said his name, and..... he veered off to the left and ignored me completely. Haha! So Eyob! So much like our middle daughter, which we'd been saying since our first trip. I scooped him up anyway and gave him a bunch of mooshy kisses. I introduced him to his Poppy and his wehn-dem [brother]. More mushiness.

Eyob obviously overjoyed to see me again

The afternoon passed with us playing with our kids and trying to figure out what our role was when they would fight and whack each other on the heads. There was a lot of interest in playing with a power supply, which seemed to be okay with the nannies, but was freaking me out! I thought it would reflect badly on me as a parent if I sat and watched Eyob electrocute himself during our first real span of time together. I don't know. Maybe it's just me?

The most popular 'toy'

We went outside to play and the van was already there. The kids got in it and climbed all around and had a great time. Until it was time for us to leave. Until I realized that Eyob thought this was it and that he was going with us. Until they had to drag him out of the van. He screamed and reached for me and, of course, I started bawling. I was okay until that happened. I knew I took custody in a day and a half and I was really okay with leaving him. But his reaction just tore my heart out. I later heard that he asked for us the rest of the day and all day Saturday, wanting to know when we'd be back for him.

Eyob all ready to go

We went back to the Jemimah and they had a traditional dinner planned for us. We went into the kitchen and helped make injera and other things. I made a mess with the injera batter all over the floor, but Cade and my dad did really good. We ate and then headed upstairs to bed. We had to be out the door at 5:30 the next morning...