It was a hard to sleep after our first night back in Addis Abba with the time change, but never the less, I was ready to go out and share the love of the Father to the fatherless. We had our breakfast of Ethiopian Waffles, then a quick time in prayer, then off to love on some babies.
The 1st orphanage we went to we pulled into the gate, and low and behold, there were all of the young children ready for us. We got out of the vehicles, and we made our way over to the toddlers, and immediately, 5 or 6 children surrounded me at once. Then Simon brought out a few balls to play with, and I was left with one faithful child. She had the most beautiful big eyes. She stayed by my side during our stay there. I picked her up and began to play catch with another child while holding this beautiful little princess who will refer to as Jane.
Everywhere I went Jane was right there with me. We went over to where the bigger children were having class to look inside. There we found a small classroom filled with beautiful little people all wearing these bright green neon shirts that said, “Jesus loves the little children of the world.” There was no light in this classroom. They had a small opening as a window that could be closed by a sheet of wood, then a door. All of the children were so happy to see us. After that happened, class was dismissed. Thanks to the Americans.
Some more children then mobbed me. We sat down so that I could touch all of them without letting Jane go. With this entire going on, they had seen my tattoo. What fun! They tried to rub it off, then they read it, then they went and got other children to look at that tried to rub it off. It was funny.
After some time playing with the children we went to one of the toddler rooms for them to eat. This room was small, and on top of that, they had just changed the nastiest diaper that I had ever smelled in my entire life. The smell just lingered in the room for several minutes, before we got use to it or before it just left. During this they brought out the food for the children. I fed Jane while I held her. I think she was just fine on feeding herself, but she waited until I picked up her food and started feeding her. As one other little girl came over and wanted the same attention, she tried to push Jane out of my lap so she could be fed, even though she had been feeding herself. I pulled her aside and told her no, and then I took her food and began to feed her too.
After the children had eaten all of their food it was time for a nap. I laid Jane down in her crib, and then it started. She began to cry, so I stayed there, and the workers asked us to leave. I could not leave Jane there just crying. So I stayed. I will say, that they were probably not happy with me. So I picked Jane up and held her. The workers seen that nap was not going to happen anytime soon so they let the children go back outside to join the rest of the orphanage. So Jane and I made our way out side.
There we enjoyed ourselves, just the two of us walking around, at times we would sit down and I would sit her beside me. Other children would come over to be held or sit in my lap. Jane did not mind as long as she could still touch me. The other children would get up and play, but Jane always remained right there with me, as though I was the only thing that mattered in her life.
A little later one of the workers came to get Jane so she could lay her down for a nap. Jane was gone just like that. I really did not get to say goodbye, and she did not cry as she left.
We soon left from there to go to the A Hope orphanage where either the children there live with the HIV/AIDS virus or they were orphaned because their parents had it before they died.
Here we would put on a puppet show that would have me walking around with the children blindfolded and lost looking for my friends. What great fun it was. As I made my way through the chairs of children, bumping into them on purpose, they would laugh as I said “yike'rta” which is, “excuse me” in Amharic. I learned this from my friends Konesh and Joseph our drivers for our time there. They taught me a few words that I had already forgotten by now, but will soon relearn.
Oh! I almost forgot. When we left the Guest House, we were in two cars. On our way over to the orphanage, Aki was in one car and I was in the other, and we had the puppets hanging out the window yelling, “Salome” which is, “hello”. The people there loved it. At one time we passed a big truck and did it, and they laughed, then they sped up to us and the passenger grabbed a towel or something like that and made a puppet out of it. It was so funny.
Now back to A Hope. While we were waiting for the director to get back, and for the children to awake from their nap, there were 3 men chopping wood with some really dull axes. They were doing it in sandals. Yes, sandals. So Nate went back to the Guest House to get some shoes for these guys. When he returned, what a blessing it was to them. They took some time to try them on only after we washed their feet for them first. Then they took them back off, put their sandals back on, and went back to work. They were so appreciative of the gift we gave them, that they let us chop some wood too.
When the children woke we did our puppet show, (I know, I am all over the place with this blog. Remember it was two weeks ago.) I got was the face painting person. How on earth did I become the face painting person? I never painted faces before in my life. Well I made a small attempt at it, and guess what? They loved it. They loved so much that I had a line of children who wanted to get their faces painted. Then they had seen my tattoo. It was all over then. One child brought me a pencil and wanted me to draw what was on my arm on his arm. LOL! I just laughed, told him that I could not do that. Then another child wanted me to use an orange marker, then he left when he seen that I was not going to draw a tattoo on his arm. A few minutes later he came back with orange markings on his arm from him giving him his own tattoo. Funny. We soon left there to go and get some coffee at Kabali Coffee. Which is their Starbucks in Ethiopia. It is better than Starbucks though.
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