Day 10 Thursday, June 30th 2011

Woke up feeling better today in hopes that, that feeling would last the whole day. Went back to Korah doing our classroom routine. The children are really doing well with English and today has been our best day yet! The last classroom we visited, which is usually pretty chaotic was extra good today. So quiet and obedient! We put a bit more rules to the prizes this time and their behavior was much better. Kids are so much cuter when they behave well.... haha...

Speaking of cute kids. There is one kid here that has completely engulfed my heart. Her name is Deborah. Deborah is four years old and is the size of a two year old. Everyday our bus arrives to the orphanage in Korah and I get off, I see Deborah searching through the crowed of children and my other teammates looking for me. It's really funny to watch her while she is running around looking through the crowed to find me. As soon as she sees me she runs up to me with a big smile and arms open wide reaching upwards for me to embrace her and pick her up. What a HEART MELTER!!! UGHHH!!!

I carry her around all day with me as I go from class to class teaching English. She's my baby. My little black baby. I wish I could take her home with me. Her mother actually works there at the orphanage/school, so she is not an orphan. She just hangs around the place as her mother works. If she didn't have a mother to look after her I would seriously consider adopting her. I'm a little selfishly sad that she has a mother.... I want that kid.... Isn't that horrible! oh man.... I'm terrible...

Anytime Deborah sees me holding another child or holding another child's hand she comes up and beats off all the other kids away to get to me. HA! One time I was holding a girl, Deborah comes up and slaps her on the legs and tries to pull her down. I finally put the poor girl down and pick Deborah up for the other girl's sake. That girl stood their with her arms reaching upwards to be picked up again.... crying... (oh my heart was so sad!), so I decided to hold Deborah on one hip and the other girl on my other hip carrying them both around. Big mistake... Deborah was not happy about sharing me. She knows hardly any English and doesn't talk much but when a kid attempts to take me away from her she'll yell at them with her tiny Amharic voice. HAHA! I love that little kid.... .....This is me and itty bitty Deborah. If you see my pictures on facebook that I've been tagged in she is in a majority of them.

During lunch time I got to feed my old leper friend again. Every time it does my heart and soul good. And Every time he thanks me by saying a blessing for me. I never understand what he is saying because it's in Amharic (not all the time there is a translator near by), but my soul and heart understands and appreciates it. After he's done I always give him a kiss on the head to let him know he is loved and that I appreciate him as much as he appreciates me.

After lunch we split up into two groups to do house visits again. The family we visited today had a little bit better place. It was one room made of mud walls painted white with a metal roof instead of a tarp roof. A lot of the homes with tarp roofs have holes in them... allowing rain to pour in when it monsoons. The room was smaller in size than my room at my apartment. They had two twin sized beds that slept the entire family of 6. While we were there she made us a traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremony, which consists of popcorn and three rounds of tea glasses of coffee made from roasted coffee beans ground up using her pistol and mortar (is that right? is that what their called?...). We got to see this whole process from the washing of the beans to the roasting.... to the final product of hot coffee, all while we are in this tiny room sitting on the beds watching her. As she was going through this whole process we got to hear a bit about her situation ( with the help of translators), while seeing her children outside peeping in on the company, smiling and making faces at us... sticking out their tongues. So funny!

There was also a cow right outside you could hear mooing and peeing during the whole visit. HAHA! The cow is their land lords. Their rent is 200 Burr a month (divide that by 16.75 and it = the U.S. dollar amount). She makes cotton thread to sell, which only makes enough for soap and a little bit of food. She also searches through the dump for wood to sell. Her husband was an officer in the military and lost a limb. He is retired and now begs for a living. The government doesn't take care of him because he was in the military while they were under the communist government. I'm not sure wether or not they even take care of their veterans now. If you lose a limb or your life, tough noogies for you and your family! At least for the veterans of the past government, I really don't know what it is for their veterans now.

I asked Sammy if it was possible to support an entire family in Korah. You can. That was encouraging to hear and something I am seriously considering. If I could just cover their rent every month that would take so much pressure off of them! 200 Burr is almost 12 dollars a month! SERIOUSLY?!..... uh yeah! I can do that. I wish I could just take care of everyone in that community. Solve poverty. But I can't solve poverty, and that is saddening to me right now seeing all this and feeling and knowing I can't solve it. How do I go back home to my everyday life doing my everyday job, living life comfortably while they are struggling to even make or beg enough for one meal? Sometimes they don't even get to eat for an entire day.

After the coffee ceremony, we asked her what we could pray for for her.... protection and health.... so I did just that...and lead our group in praying for her and her family before we left. We thanked her for her hospitality as we left. That was the best coffee I have ever had. They do it right over here. We met up with the other half of the team and headed back to the house. Michael wanted to go for a run when we got back with Christy and I. I was still feeling drained from being sick but agreed to go anyway. I needed some sort of exercise and thought I could run this cold out of me...(seriously? I'm an idiot. I blame it on my rowing coach from college.) Just FYI, we are 8,000 ft. above sea level. What do I live at in Charleston? 3ft. BELOW sea level! Michael had been exercising everyday since we got here (how? I have no idea!!) so he was use to it by now. Christy and I? We lasted 4 minutes. Were we dying? Yes. Did we push ourselves you ask? Yep!.... This is stupid.

When we got back from our run I gathered my clothes and washed them in the kicthen sink using warm water from the bathroom shower. I went back and forth with one of the pots, filling up the sink. Danielle lended me some laundry soap. Thanks Danielle! After I was done my forearms were so tired! I was also starting to feel a LOT worse and was debating on whether or not to even join the team for dinner. I went anyways and thank goodness because they had soup at the salad bar. Just what I needed and wanted. The salad bar was free with our meals we ordered. I ordered fish "breaded with herbs and lemon sauce." WORST FOOD DECISION YET! The fish was literally (not even joking, I wish I took a picture of this thing!) paper thin! All it was, was the breaded part. No lemon sauce and it came with "French fries", which were fries without the potatoes in them.... This meal was a joke. Sammy even raised his eyebrows in disbelief. At least I had soup. That's all I really needed. Warm soup. I couldn't even eat lunch today because of how sick I've been feeling. I'm pretty much wasting away right now. I weigh about 112 lbs. now. How much did I weigh when I got here? mmm....bout 123 lbs. yep. A lot of it is from being sick all week and dealing with everything here. I had to borrow one of Christy's belts to keep my pants from falling down.

After dinner we got coffee at Kaldi's again.... lot's of Kaldi trips here... and used the internet cafe next to it. I emailed Susan and my sister to send out an update. I also looked at some pictures from when family visited in Charleston before I left. It was so good to see some familiar things and touch base back home. As the night progressed I kept feeling worse and worse. I definitely had a high fever. When we all got back to the house we told Danielle about our night (she stayed back to get some alone time before Steve, her co-leader, leaves us Saturday) and then, like every other night, we had our team nightly meeting telling everyone our highs and lows of the day.... and then someone always tells their testimony. When it was my turn for highs and lows I started balling because of how awful I was feeling. I was totally dreading this moment... I knew it was coming... like a bomb ready to blow.... I thought I was getting better the last couple of days but then today was a sign I was only getting worse. Was I ever going to get better?!... it was just disappointing and I had kept how horrible I was feeling today in so long that it just came out in tears. I finally composed myself and told my high of the day... haha... My high today was Deborah.. and how she just continues to run up to me everyday and is by my side the whole day while in Korah. In the end, it's not to bad of a day (even if you feel like absolute shit) when a child seeks you out of a crowd everyday running up to you to be held.

*Other Notes*

-Emily and Danielle shared their testimonies. .... Let's just say there was a lot of crying going on tonight.

AHEMMM....... Emily. :) ....oh yeah... and ......me.

Day 9 Wednesday, June 29th 2011

Today was a hard day for me. I felt as though I have hit a low. I woke up feeling a good bit better from being sick and had some time to spend with the Lord.... sort of.... mmm maybe not really. I read some in the World Harvest book called "My Luggage Is Not Heavy" a couple of my friends gave me.... So that doesn't really count. It's actually disappointing to me how little I've been able to spend with the Lord in quiet time. I am constantly with teammates or out doing stuff during the day with the children. There is never a good time where I can just say "hey I'm going to go off by myself and just spend time with the Lord...." Is it enough to say that I see Him throughout my work here? Is it enough to say that I spend a lot of time with him through my daydreams? Is that a tool He has given me to get through the day with Him? When Jesus was teaching he was constantly being asked to heal, being tugged and pulled on. People all around him. Even in trying to find places of solitude he was bothered. Bothered to feed 5,000 people with two loaves of bread and 5 fish. Boom! a miracle! Jesus is bothered (I'm sure not in His mind it was bothersome) and He answers them by feeding them and preaching to them.

I can sort of relate to His tiredness and still wanting to give back, although I am sure it is not as graceful as Jesus himself. Just being tired trying to spread your attention to so many children is mentally and physically exhausting. Yet you forget about how tired you are while your in that moment, because of the overwhelming compassion you have for these children.

When we got to Korah today we all settled into our routine. English was a lot better today. I think the children enjoyed the sentences they were learning a lot better this go round.... and I think they actually learned something. Score! We had them write out sentences and fill in the blank with their answers..... 1.My favorite subject is_______. 2. I like to play_____. 3. When I graduate I would like to be_____. 4. The Pet I would like to have is_____. or The pet I have is_____. Not only were they doing much better, but it was a lot of fun to listen to their answers. A lot of the children were saying english was their favorite activity today. Whoo Hoo!

The last class we went to was a bit more chaotic. After the lessons we gave out prizes to all the children and one received a medal. We gave out glow sticks to all the kids, and in my mind totally out weighed the medal in awesomeness. They loved them! and in the last room the kids were grabby and very impatient. Even having a translator wasn't any help in getting order with the kids. Lots of the children hid the prizes in their pockets and would come back up pretending like they didn't get one. A lot of these kids are beggars so I can't really blame them for how they are, but sometimes I think that they don't get the discipline they need because the excuse "well they don't have much, and we feel sorry for them." I'm sure it's different during the school year when it's not just ferengis (white foreigners) teaching them. Today I did not feel sorry for them.... this class was getting on my nerves.

After the regular routine today with "school" we hung out with the kids playing with them, singing, and etc. until lunch time. They always wait for lunch in one of the classrooms singing songs, clapping and drumming. So fun! I got to feed my old man again :) I just really love being able to spend time with him...... even though not much is said back and forth. I was less messy feeding him today because I had injera to scoop his food instead of just picking up rice it's self with my bare hands. He blessed me again after feeding him and I gave him a kiss on the head. He is a quiet old soul. The other men that Christy and Michael fed where quite the talkers..... singing songs and being picky with how big their bites were. It was hilarious glancing over at them hearing what all was going on.

When the children were done with lunch we hung out a little bit longer and one of the girls who is sponsored to stay there, took me by the hand to show me her room, which she shares with seven other girls. She was 14. She sat me down on one of the beds and handed me a small book of pictures with pictures of she and her family, and her sponsors. Her family photos look like her family wasn't that bad off and confused me a bit to why she was even here. I guess her parents died (possibly from HIV/AIDS) and she had no where else to go. I'm not really sure though.....

A little while later our group split up into two groups of five. We were going on house visits to a couple of the students at the project 61 orphanage/school. Not all the children are orphans that are sponsored. Some don't have parents but they have guardians looking after them. The home we went to was right by the dump field and stunk like no other. They were so excited that we were coming to visit. That is something I admire about the people in Ethiopia. They are very hospitable and are not self conscious about what their homes look like. They are just happy to have people come visit and have company.

We had a couple of translators come with us as well as a couple of the orphanage workers. The mother of the boy's home we visited was there and welcomed us in. She told us how glad she was that we came to visit, and told us about her family and how they got here. She was from the country and moved here to try to have a better life. Her rent is 150 Burr and I think her family barely slides by to make even that for the month. That is not even 17 us dollars. She searches through the dump to collect wood to sell for burning, which a lot of the time they can only find plastics and use that to burn instead of wood.

They use to allow people to visit the dump to minister to the people in there, but now they don't allow outsiders to go in because they are ashamed about their poverty. They don't want people to see how bad it is, but their government isn't doing anything to help them. Maybe they can't... I don't know... I doubt it though. You can always do SOMETHING! Maybe they look at other countries and see the "richness" they have and get caught up in trying to catch up. But in the end looking at those "rich" countries you have to realize the facade of it all..... Like America, we are so far in debt... TRILLIONS to be exact. We've blinded ourselves to what true richness in life is. Here in Ethiopia they live true richness of life, yet some don't even know it.

Sometimes I think God has given me a pare of spiritual glasses that see things some people can't.... seeing some things the way God sees it. Those that do live in unbelievable poverty literally scraping the dirt to get by, have such a bigger potential to flourish in the Holy Spirit than those who crowd their hearts and minds with the things of the world with the amount of success and trying to make more than they need. I see that in the people of Korah who live at the dump. They don't ask for prayer for a better house or for more money. When you ask them what they need prayer for, they ask for good health and protection over their family. Of course I'm sure their are the ones that live there who are angry with why their lives are the way they are. I just have yet to meet them. That is one thing (out of many) I have learned from Korah.... what I knew I would learn here... how much they rely on the Lord. How much they HAVE to rely on the Lord, and how content and joyous they are in the Lord.

Just to give you more of an idea of what the area setting is like.... When you walk down the streets it's not a bad idea to wear rain boots. Since we've visited Korah it's been pretty gloomy and with that.... rain.... and with rain.... mud. The streets are just paved with piles of mud and rocks and a lot of the puddles of water could just as well be puddles of urine from roaming goats and donkeys. Scraggley dogs and cats running to and fro to where ever they are going, or sometimes we'll just pass by them sound asleep in the road not budging even for cars. Street venders line up the main road with their fresh produce covered in dirt, waving off swarms of lazy flies. Flies also cover their own clothes and faces not even bothering to shoo them away. All the fence walls are made of metal tin. Most are rusted and some have holes. These metal "walls" are seen everywhere throughout Addis.

As we were walking to the house we were visiting, we got closer and closer to the dump. The stink in the air got more and more potent, and could eventually see mountains of trash in the distance blurred by a cloud of smog. It looked similar to something you would see in a holocaust movie. Like scenes when people would be sorting out the mountains of clothing or the scenes of still shots of the mountains of bodies covered with clouds of moving smoke/smog, not allowing you to quite make out what you were looking at. The whole setting... and just how that seemed to connect in my head.... ugh... I can't even describe other than deep sadness I felt. My spirits hit real low today.

How do people live like this day in and day out? I've visited Korah for less than a hole week and am already feeling down from the whole experience. I at least have a way out in the end. A plane ticket back to the U.S. in a few weeks, home safe and sound in my palace of an apartment. In my own bed with a cloud of down feathers for a comforter. All things which these people don't even know exist. They don't get any break from this lifestyle. Summer, who moved here from the mid-west U.S. and works at Project 61 in Korah, sees this everyday for the past year and staying for two more years. H does she do it? In my heart I hoped that I would be willing to do something like this full time, but now I am discouraged of thoughts that I don't think I can. I can't. There is no way, and that saddens my heart. Why does my heart want to follow God and give everything up for Him, yet in selfish desire I am not able to because I want to be comfortable. My heart weeps for these people, yet I am not willing to give up my life in the U.S. to physically help them. Oh Lord, I am so broken! It's very discouraging to come to this point today, having a heart to help and love people for my life's work, yet realizing I don't know if I can do that here. Or anywhere like this where it is needed most. Wow, what a low... what a rock bottom low today.

*Other Notes*

-Heather shared her testimony tonight. what an incredible and strong soul. Very moving

-Julia also shared her testimony. Turns out she was the Bean Queen of Michigan and knows more than she should about beans... (Julia, you HAD to be the real farter from last night during Steve's testimony).... nickname dubbed "Beans"

Day 8 Tuesday, June 28th 2011

Cereal for breakfast. Cloudy and gloomy for most of the day except for the first part of the day in Korah. Today was a good day. We started out the day dividing the children up into classrooms by grades. I went into each room teaching two different groups english with Carrie. We each took a group and then switched at the halfway mark. I taught colors making them tell me what color I was holding up (using markers) and then eventually making them speak in sentences using their color they received saying “This color is....” and then teaching them the difference between “This and That.” I got a little discouraged thinking that I don’t know if they were getting anything out of it. Sometimes (most of the time) they didn’t seem to understand what they were learning. After the last class I taught, I asked them (using Selam as my translator) “So, was this easy for you or hard for you?” They all chimed in “easy.” Well, they sure fooled me! It was encouraging to see more enthusiasm out of these kids than from Little/Big AHOPE, yet it was because of the fact that this was a rare thing and a privilege that most in the community don’t have. They understand more the value of what they are learning and I think they actually enjoyed it.

During the school year they are taught english, but from Ethiopian staff. So they were excited to try their english in conversation while we played with them. Having us here to talk to also improves their pronunciation. A LOT of the kids had a really hard time with the word purple and brown and graduate. There were times it was hard for me not to laugh. All these kids live in the slums of Korah and all these kids are so happy. They all wanted to play, joke around, hang on all our arms and legs, be picked up and hugged and kissed. Precious babies. Precious stinky happy babies. Ridiculous.

We fed them for lunch again and while they had their lunch Surafel needed some of us to feed some of the old men who had leprosy. Some of them were unable to feed themselves so we had to hand feed them. Today they had yellow rice and bread for lunch. They don’t have utensils so I used the bread as much as it would go, and then straight up used my hands putting them in his mouth to feed him the rest of his rice. I was a little grossed out, but that just didn’t matter to me. He was so grateful for me to feed him. The whole experience blessed my soul to be able to do that for him.

When he was finished, he took my hands and kissed them, saying something... I got Sammy to translate for me. He said that he was blessing me and blessing me for a long life of years and prosperous life. Oh my gosh! Seriously?!... What a blessing to have been able to do that for him. I hope I get to do that for him tomorrow as well.

When we were done there (about 2-2:30) we headed back to the house. Everyone ate lunch on the bus while I was still playing with the children outside. I apparently didn’t get the memo about lunch on the bus, so when we got back I fixed a PB&J sandwich. Not too long afterwards Surafel, Danielle and I went to the new Women At Risk factory in Addis with Barrett while everyone else stayed at the guest house chilling. Barrett had asked for me to come and look around at the factory building (where some of the women weave scarves for the Fashionable line Mocha Club has) and outside area to see how and what we needed to do to make the place beautiful. He knew I was an artist and wanted to get an artists input on the situation. This is a new building they built for the women in Addis that are Women At Risk who make the scarves for “FashionABLE.” Inside the building, it was pretty cramped with looms everywhere! I don’t think I’m going to be able to fix the cramped-ness of the place, but making it Beautiful won’t be a problem. I’ve got some exciting plans for that place. Our team is going to be working on it sometime while we are here. I’m pretty stoked about it.

When Barrett dropped Danielle, Surafel, and I at the house, everyone looked bored out of their minds. We were gone for a good bit because Barrett had a buisness meeting while we were there as well. So, when I was done looking around and making plans for the factory, we just sat in listening to their conversation. Barrett was using Surafel to translate for the meeting. It was super interesting to just sit in on the meeting and listen. Usually that would sound super boring to me, but it totally wasn’t. I think it was interesting because it was a meeting on how to make this business grow and profit in a way to make things better not only for their business but for the workers as well..... among other things.

We went to dinner shortly after we got back, and went to this place in the city that seemed really nice. Ridiculously nice for what we are here in Ethiopia for. Again. Body odor. Even in nice restaurants the waiters reek of pit stank. You can’t get away from it. That is one thing I appreciate about America... clean air and nice smells. When I first arrived in Addis and got off the plane the smell was overwhelming of curry, spices, exhaust fumes, and body odor. I ordered beef burgundy and was a bit disappointed in my decision after I got it. Something I seem to be doing rather frequently. It had marinara sauce that was no good, but the meat was good! I was totally coveting the fish Heather got. She let me taste it. Off the chain good!

When dinner was over we headed to Kaldi’s coffee shop for after dinner coffee and ice cream. I would describe Kaldi’s as the Starbucks of Ethiopia. Except their coffee isn’t disgusting. It’s actually quite the opposite. Coffee here in Ethiopia does not keep me awake, so I was able to go straight to bed when we got home. Before bed Steve shared his testimony and we talked a bit about our plans for tomorrow at Korah.

Every night someone shares their testimony and then we always go around saying our highs and lows of the day before we all go to bed.

Day 7 Monday, June 27th 2011

Today’s write up might sound a little blurry since I’m writing it now. (Tuesday). Sunday night I had skipped dinner because of feeling under the weather. This morning (Monday) I felt a tad better. I had all the same symptoms except I didn’t have the chills or aches anymore. So I felt as though I would at least make it ok throughout the day. To start out the day, after devotion time we headed out to the town of Korah.... Just two minutes down the road. Driving through the town just set the tone for what we will be dealing with this entire week.

The main road was mud and ankle twisting rocks, making it quite the smooth ride. Certain parts you would see piles of bones on the side of the road scattered everywhere, some knowing exactly where on the body it came from.... of whatever animal it was. Sometimes seeing dogs sniffing or chewing on some..... A dog’s paradise. Full spines, skulls, femurs, etc.... you name it. All of that mixed in with thick mud and swarms of flies. We passed a strip on the way where people were lined up selling the “freshest items on the market” with mud and flies covering the produce (and anything else) and the sellers constantly waving the flies off their products as well as themselves. THIS is the poorest part of Addis Ababa.

We arrived at Project 61 with children curiously staring at our bus as we attempted to make a 3 point turn that turned into an 18 point turn. We finally parked the bus next to the church (in the church “yard”) and got out to children swarming around us holding onto our arms and legs (depending on how little they were) with smiling dirty faces. Beautiful faces might I add. It was very muddy outside... so I wore my rain boots. It rains almost everyday in short strong spouts leaving very little room for sunshine in between each spout. The children were so excited to see us and followed us everywhere we went as Summer was giving us a tour of the orphanage. We first went into the church to let her explain a little bit more about the place and what we will be doing this week. The church was covered by a tarp, which is apparently a luxury to have. Beside the church was a small building big enough for one classroom with one window. It was maybe the size of a standard bedroom..... maybe a little bigger. Very dark inside, even with the one window open. No lights. Another classroom was located behind the church outside. All it was, was a roof and gravel..... and a little bit of tarp for “walls”,

Next there was the third classroom across the road. These roads are only about 15 feet wide. This classroom was much like the first one. A building in it’s own. It’s also where they feed the children. The last classroom was in a bigger building that had a porch on it. You walk into the classroom which is about the same size as the other ones but has another room a tad smaller attached to the side... No doors. That room is a storage area (an empty storage area). Going through the storage area, to the right, there is a tiny room with 4 sets of bunk beds. That is where the girls sleep. Their roof was a tarp... we saw the rest of the place (cooking area and etc.) but I feel as though I have already recorded too much info.

After the tour we started to work on moving the benches in the church into some of the classrooms along with chalkboards. When the children saw that we were cleaning up and getting the classrooms into order, they started swarming to help us. So little they have yet SO eager to help and just be around us! A big truck came by and stopped in the road at Project 61 and dumped a big load of gravel. The gravel is this red volcanic rock which we spread throughout the orphanage, into some classrooms and outside areas including the road it’s self. The rock will help with the drainage and mud when it rains. We lined a bunch of it along the tin walls to fill the gaps between the ground and the bottom of the walls. Hopefully that will help during monsoon rains.

Next, we helped pass out food to the children for their lunch. It was injera with this chickpea sauce called shiera. Injera is an Ethiopian food that acts as a utensil as well. It’s like a very large flat spongy pancake.... almost as thin as pita bread. They pour their food on top of the injera and as they eat they tear pieces off using it to pick up their food. Everything is eaten by hand. When someone feeds you, you are considered their friend. and depending on how big a bite they give you determines how good of a friend you are to them. A lot of the children offered to feed me and I ate from two who seemed to befriend me. Another child offered and I had to leave the room knowing more kids wanted to feed me as I was passing them food. I almost gaged the second time I was fed. The smell of the community it’s self made me want to gag, so incorporating food, whiffs of the trash dump near by, and body odor from some of the children reaching puberty.... didn’t help with the gag reflexes.

The body odor here is pretty bad. So many stinky stinky people! The people in Addis Ababa as a whole stink (although our translators don’t stink....?... our bus driver totally does!), but the community of Korah is located in the dump. Most of the people in Korah, if not all of them, spend the day searching through the dump for wood, food, etc. Most of them search for wood to burn and sell. Sometimes when they can’t find wood they use plastic. There are a lot of random fires that occur in the dump and the people come out covered in ashes. When Summer came back to Korah to start Project 61 she named it after Isaiah 61:3 “To all who mourn in Israel he will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, festive praise instead of despair. In their righteousness, they will be like great oaks that the Lord has planted for his own glory.” This verse describes the people of Korah to a “T”.

Later, after having lunch ourselves, we came back to P61 and walked to the near by Leprosy hospital founded by the Germans. There, they just showed us where some of the lepers work and make fabric and weave grass mats. We didn’t see the actual leper hospital part, but we got to meet and see some of the lepers working, making threads and fabric. Some didn’t have fingers or other parts of their bodies. The leper hospital here in Korah is the nicest leper hospital in Africa. They get many patients here from all over Ethiopia and other parts of Africa everyday. Korah, was made up of a colony of lepers 75 years ago and is now made up of their descendants. Many have leprosy and are still considered outcasts still.

For dinner we went into the city to a restaurant called Lime Tree. They had “American” type food and i made the mistake of getting a cheese burger. It wasn’t that it was bad or anything, but with your standards of Five Guys being a really good burger, I just set myself up for disappointment. I just wanted something to taste like I wanted it to. It was a good meal none the less. Today was just a bit draining.... and we didn’t even get to the worst we would see yet. I actually got a “shower” tonight so that was good!

Day 6 Sunday 6.26.11

Today was pretty chill. Thank goodness! I woke up with a sore throat and weakness throughout my whole body. I think I must have caught something from one of the children at little AHOPE yesterday. My best guess is that it was from Joseph (pronounced Yoseph), the little 5 month old baby I held for a good bit yesterday. I think it’s a small price to pay to feel a little under the weather in order to spread some love and care to a baby that needs it.

After breakfast we all got ready to go to church. Today was the first day I was able to actually shave my legs. What a luxury it was! My legs feel awesome! It’s rare when we have running water. For church we went to our translator Sammy’s church. Surafel, Kat, Tiffany, and their friend sammy came with us as well. I’ve noticed there are a lot of Sammys here... and Selams. Selam is also their word for hello. Goodbye is chaio.

Church was wonderful! I didn’t understand a lick of it besides Hallelujah and Amen. Sammy sings in his church with a choir behind him. He’s the worship leader. I looked around the room watching all the people praising and singing to the same God that I praise and know. Such a beautiful sight and experience. Seeing worship in another culture is absolutely beautiful. Worship was about an hour long and then the sermon was about and hour and a half. A woman was the speaker and preached on 2 Kings 4:1-7 and then Acts 4:?. Since I don’t understand Amharic, I just read all of 2 Kings 4. I don’t think I realized or really knew the whole story about Elijah and how much of a tool he was for God’s work here on earth. I need to do some more research on him.... note to self.

During church I started to feel worse getting chills and aches throughout my body. After church was over some of the little kids came up to us (who weren’t already on the bus) and gave us hugs. That is one thing over here that I love. The people here are SO affectionate. You will see men holding hands together and women holding hands together. Holding hands is a sign of friendship. Pals. Best buds. It’s also apparently good luck to them to touch Americans (or foreingi sp?, which means white foreigner).... or at least among the children. That’s why they come and swarm around us when we visit the orphanages. Of course that’s not the only reason why they swarm us. They crave love and to be held and touched.

When we all got on the bus we headed to a restaurant called Antique. I wasn’t very hungry since I wasn’t feeling well. I was in my denial phase of admitting that something was wrong with me, but knew I was heading down south quick. I was quiet most of the day just for that fact. After lunch we got coffee at Kaldi’s, where we went our second day we arrived here. It was packed! A few of us wanted to go to an internet cafe afterwards because the times we had been able to stop by one, our time was rushed. So some of us were dropped off at the house while some of us went to the internet cafe. It was good for me to be able to write at least the rest of day one into my blog for everyone to be “updated” and at the same time not be rushed. I felt as thought I had accomplished a lot.

We came back to the house afterwards and chilled out. A bunch of us piled in the living room chatting and I went to take a nap in hopes to perk up some from this sickness. By this time everyone knew I was sick. Later Danielle woke me up, because Summer (the woman in charge of Project 61 in Korah) was coming to talk to us about what we were going to be doing this next week. Summer has been here for exactly one year. She moved here with her husband and three little boys, to help with the orphans in Korah. They are from Oklahoma.

Before they got here we devised a plan with the whoopie cushion for when Summer got here. Again, we pull out the whoopie cushion. It’s been a big hit with the team and we have yet to bring them to the children. Ha! We even went through several practice runs with our final plan, which was to have me let one go under my blanket and then rush “to the bathroom” and let a few more loud one’s rip in the hallway. When Summer came she brought 3 other girls with her. More audience for the show I guess. They all introduced themselves and a little bit about how they ended up doing what they do. Summer went into explaining the orphanage/school called Project 61 and by the time she was almost done I was getting glances from everyone around me wondering when I was going to put on the show.

I finally got to an appropriate moment and let some air out while I coughed.... Heh heh! It sounded LEGIT! and rushed to the “restroom”. They looked a bit like they didn’t know whether to laugh or ignore it. Awkward!.... and HILARIOUS! Michael tried to explain that I had some bad milk or something. I think they were a bit concerned. Mission Accomplished.

Day 5 Saturday 6.25.11

I woke up to my alarm today with chiming church bells. I told Michael I would go on a run with him before breakfast but the water still wasn't on. We didn't want to get sweaty and stinky if we weren't going to be able to shower. So instead we slept a tad bit later and then went to get eggs for our pancakes we were going to make for b'fast, and also for a girl on our team that is allergic to gluten. She can't eat anything with wheat, oats, barley...etc. and there is a LOT of it in everything we tend to make. It's really hard to keep her in mind when planning meals, so we usually get her something separate. It's kind of annoying but I understand because she can't help it. I'm sure it's really annoying for her as well.

We also have two vegetarians on the trip which I got super annoyed at because I would hear them every once in awhile make snide comments if we forgot to take that fact in consideration, and had no intention of excluding them of meals. I think this is something that I struggle with because I've never really had to deal with anyone that has been a vegetarian and easily forgot that fact about them when I cooked dinner last night....

Anyways, Michael, Danielle, and I went to the market down the "street" to get eggs to make pancakes for breakfast. It was so nice because it was a chance to get outside the house gate walls and walk around without a bus taking us where ever we go. It was good to be in the rawness of the everyday life. Paved roads are a rare sight....except for the main city roads.... and we're in the capital of Ethiopia!

Danielle and I helped cook breakfast and Julia made the coffee..... and holy crap it was strong coffee too! :/ Since the water was still off we piled all our dirty dishes in the sink and left it while we headed out to the bus for the day. We went to a Bazaar this morning which is a market that the Women At Risk sell some of their goods. It was at the Kings College in Addis that Sammy (another one of our translators) goes to. Sammy is almost done there studying seminary. He is super sweet with a shy nature about him.

At the market I bought a beaded bracelet that caught my eye. I usually don't care for market beaded jewelry but this one caught my eye with it's color combo and design. They had some pretty good stuff! I also got a sling purse that is reversible. One side is black and the other side is striped with thick white and blue stripes. The material is flowy.....loved it! I don't know what it is but it feels really good and it was only 55 Birr (55 Birr divided by 17 = U.S. Dollar amount) Everything is pretty cheap here. We looked for the Women At Risk area for quite awhile and never found it. As we went back to the middle area, which is where we started, we ran into Barrett (the founder of Mocha Club) and he helped us find the Women At Risk room.

Barrett is one of the coolest dudes I've met. He is so fun and outgoing and love talking to him. I asked him if they had any jobs available with Mocha Club but there weren't any openings at the moment. Oh well.... just curious! He said although they don't have any openings he still loves to have that conversation with trip members. So we talked a little bit and we are totally going to chat it up more when we meet up with him again. Even though there is not a job opening at the moment, it will just be really nice to have someone to talk to about what I hope to do for a living in the future. He has a passion for helping others and making the world a better place and it will just be good to talk to someone with similar passions. Not that there isn't anyone else I know that has that same heart... but... I don't know.. It'll just be good.

After shopping around at the Bazaar we headed to Little AHOPE (I think for the last time?) for about an hour and a half, and had a scavenger hunt for the kids. While they were having their scavenger hunt, I snuck into the toddler room to spend a little more time with them. Again one of the children came straight up to me to pick him up. It was the same baby that laid that big kiss on my cheek yesterday. He was so precious. He sat on my lap for awhile just chilling out, got down to play with something, and then another child came and sat on my lap. The cycle continued, and eventually one of the girls in there who came from Germany to volunteer passed this 5 month old precious baby for me to hold. Oh my gosh! It was the sweetest and most sad thing today. This little baby had the snots and could hardly breath. It was having a hard time breathing and felt a little feverish. Poor thing, there was a moment where I couldn't hold him anymore because of how sad it was, but then I had to remind myself that the best thing for that child is not to be sad for him, but to love on him and hold him.

(5 mo. baby Joseph)

After awhile, I handed him over to Danielle and went outside to play with the other kids. Eventually, I ended up sitting next to a boy named Emanuel who is 6 years old. He was naming the colors of my bracelet and teaching me to Amharic words of them too. I just sat there next to him just he and I watching the other kids play out in the driveway area and play yard. I think he was just enjoying sitting there with the comfort of my arm around him. We didn't stay but only an hour and a half and headed back to the house to chill out and relax until dinner in which Surafel cooked. It was SO GOOD!

It was traditional Ethiopian food like we had at that restaurant we went to earlier this week. I have noticed a pattern with their food though. It gives me GAS! The kind that hurts! It's really good food, but man! Watch out! I've been writing in my journal since we got back from Little AHOPE, and Christy came to get me for dinner when it was ready. When I came out of my room for dinner I saw some new faces I'd never seen before. Surafel brought over some friends of his including his girlfriend Kat. It was Kat, Tiffany (who is from texas), and another Ethiopian named Sammy (not our translator sammy.). I enjoyed talking to them and really got along with Kat.

After dinner we all sat in the guest house's living room sitting and chatting. Some played the guitar and some kicked the soccer ball around to each other. I had the bright idea of taking out one of the whoopie cushions I brought and hid it under the blanket that was covering me. I waited for a quiet moment to let one rip. Success! Tiffany thought it was Surafel because apparently it's pretty common for him to let one rip, and he was standing up showing some dance moves. HA!

Sitting around awhile we decided to go to the movies further into the city. Surafel and I thought it would be a great idea to bring the whoopie cushion to the theater and use it during a quiet or awkward moment. So we brought it. We ended up seeing "Bad Teacher", and I think we all regretted that decision for many different reasons. Surafel and Kat sat behind me, Alex and Carrie were to my right, and Steve and some others to my left. Kat wanted to use the whoopie cushion to trick Surafel so I snuck it around to her. She ended up not doing it and fell asleep during the movie.

After that we all came back home and crashed.....

Day 4 Friday 6.24.11

The day started out with corn flakes and some kind of chocolate cereal Danielle got at the grocery store the day before. I’m actually a little disappointed in the lack of Ethiopian food we’ve been eating but hopefully that will not be the case as more time goes on. I do know that Su is cooking for us tomorrow night, so I’m really excited about that.

We went back to Big AHOPE to do some more activities with the children. The English lesson went a bit better this time. I was with a group of kids a little older than yesterday and Steve (one of the co-leaders of our team) teamed up with me. We all got in a big circle and kicked/threw a soccer ball around to each person. When each person got the ball they had to answer the question of choice, in a full sentence. The kids that were with me this time were more excited to participate in the activities.

We came back to the guest house to eat lunch and it started to rain outside while we were eating. When we came back to Big AHOPE there was a river of rainwater and mud outside the gate to the orphanage. Thank goodness I had brought rain boots on this trip. As I was stepping on the bus to go to Big AHOPE the translators were pointing and laughing at my rain boots speaking to each other in Amharic (the Ethiopian language). I knew they were making fun of them..... haha.

When we got to Big A. orphanage and saw that river of mud water, two translators Hannah and Selam understood why I was wearing the rain boots. They were both wearing regular shoes and asked to borrow my rain boots after I got into the orphanage. So Christy, who was also wearing rain boots, ran back and forth from the bus to the orphanage carrying my rain boots to Hannah and Selam. HA! Who has the last laugh now! :)

This time we planned on doing centers with the kids instead of doing everything all together. Everything went a lot smoother this time and I think it was great for the kids because the ratio of kids to one of us was a lot better than getting one person to explain the activity and having a lot of helpers afterwards. We decided to incorporate my origami box as one of the centers this time. It went a lot smoother than yesterday because I explained Christy how to do it so that she could help me. It also gave each child a chance to learn how to do it in a small group rather than a rally of kids playing survival of the fittest.

To give you an idea of what these two orphanages look like (little & big AHOPE)....... They king of remind me of the YMCA in Alabaster (my home town in Alabama) minus the pool out back and with additional buildings beside it (all in the same compound) made out of rusty time walls and roofs. It was a very well kept orphanage (is what I had been told by Danielle) compared to the one we will be going to next week. I’m trying to prepare myself in what is to come next week. I was told it is going to be a difficult week. I am preparing to see children naked covered in dirt or mud with runny noses and scabs with only sticks and rusty walls for shelter and having only a mud field to play in. It will be interesting to see how accurate or inaccurate that assumption will be.

After we finished up at Big A. we headed over to Little AHOPE. That was our last time to visit at Big A. I stayed at Little A. with the group for about ten minutes until Su, Danielle and I went to the store to go get food for dinner and the next couple of days. I volunteered to cook dinner for everyone tonight with curry chicken and rice on the menu. One of my favorites to make.

After we got back to Little A. we only had a few minutes left to spend with the children and it looked pretty hectic when we got there. So I snuck into the toddler room which is basically a closet stuffed with colorful baby beds and a little block of crawling space for about 6-7 two year olds and under. When I came in the room and all the little ones saw me, the ones who were able swarmed up to me reaching up with big dark eyes in a look of desperation to be held and loved on. Picking up one, another would cry in disappointment that it didn’t get picked up. Completely heart breaking.

Michael, one of the only males on this trip, Looks like he could pass as Ethiopian. He said that yesterday he went into the toddler room for awhile and some of the babies called him Papa. Oh the starvation for a male figure in their lives! It is so heart breaking knowing what they don’t have, yet heart fulfilling to be able to show these little children love that they deserve if even for just a short while. One of the children that I held in the toddler room pressed his pretty little lips and chubby cheeks to my right cheek and gave me a big long kiss. That was the sweetest moment of the day by far!

After a minute or two he noticed I had a raincoat on and tried to take it off of me so that he could put it on. I helped him out and rolled the sleeves up on his arms to where he could move his arms around. It was so funny because of how huge it looked on him. He giggled at himself in it and soon it became as much as a bad idea as the first attempt of the origami box yesterday. They took demanded turns trying it on. Not very long danielle came in to get me because we were leaving to go back to the guest house and cook dinner. It was sad to leave because I only got to spend about ten minutes with them before we left, but good to know we were coming back tomorrow.

When we got back to the house I pretty much started on preparing dinner in which Michael helped. He was an excellent su chef and it was a lot of fun getting to know him during that time. Some times the kitchen is the best place to get to know people. Michael is 24 and from Oregon, half black half mexican, and has a speech impediment that makes him sound Jamaican or from some other country. It’s a lot of fun hearing him talk and sometimes it takes more concentration than normal to understand what he is saying. He went into the military at age 17 and stayed in for 6 years. He did some college work while in the military. He’s only been out for about 6 months now....I believe. Now he works with mentally retarded people helping them to live life on their own or as best they can and be happy. Michael is a very fun and interesting friend.

Everyone loved dinner and afterwards I took the best hot shower I’ve had since I’ve been here. Probably the first shower since I’ve been here... After my shower we all sat down to talk about the day, our highs and lows, and listen to Michael’s testimony. He had pictures to pass around from back home in which I completely forgot to bring when I share my testimony. After all that, Christy went to take a shower and as soon as she started to rinse the soap out of her hair the water throughout the entire house shut off, leaving her with shampoo all in her hair. It never turned back on..... Welcome to Ethiopia!

Day Three Thursday -6.23.11

Christy and I woke up a bit annoyed at some of our teammates. Two of our teammates came into our room "quietly" leaving the door wide open to the bright lights of the hallway at 4am. They decided that instead of using the shower right by their room, (which worked probably better than the one in our room) that they would use our shower because it looked nicer. Looks can be deceiving. SERIOUSLY?! I AM TIRED! DON'T WAKE US UP FOR STUPID REASONS! I didn't think we were going to be able to fall asleep again but we somehow managed.

After waking up for the day, we all had french toast with nutella, honey, or peanut butter for breakfast. We had our morning devotion together and are going through the book of Mark. Then we all got on the bus and headed to Big AHOPE which are the children with HIV/AIDS 8 years and older. We started with a craft of making pictures out of torn up construction paper. A lot of the children knew a bit of english but you couldn't really tell sometimes because I sensed they didn't enjoy speaking it or like leaning it. Hmmmm..... I don't really know what to do for them with that area of things. I feel as though we are just another group to come in and pass by in a few days, unable to establish solid relationships. Isn't that how Christ is really shared? Relationships? But then again, the woman on the plane. I will always remember that and how God spoke through her to me. I'm afraid of the jadedness of theses children with groups like ours coming in that we will not be much purpose or shine bright for His glory. I think if I had to do this all over again I would just go with one or two other people and focus on one ministry and build relationships with the people. Probably staying longer than a month.

After Big AHOPE we had lunch at a place called Island Breeze. I was debating on what to get and eventually settled on pizza. Danielle who had come to Ethiopia before said that they had really good pizza there. Apparently Ethiopians really like Italians and Italian food. At the restaurant I sat next to Surafel (we call him Su for short). He is one of our translators. This was the first time I really got a chance to talk to him and thoroughly enjoyed it. Su works for TOMS shoes here and manages? the production site here in Ethiopia. It's where they make the shoes that are donated. He has a dry sense of humor and is very sarcastic. He was a lot of fun to talk to, and his favorite T.V. show is 30 Rock. That automatically puts him in my friend box. He also has a beautiful story. Su is 27 and has an adopted daughter who was a product of a rape. His maid was the one who was raped and she didn't want the child so he took her in. What is so beautiful about it is that Su was also a product of a rape. His mother was a maid in his father's house and he raped her. His grandmother (on his dad's side) secretly took her in and took care of them. His mom left and left him with his grandmother and father. He has never met his mother and doesn't even know if she is still alive.

When Su grew older he volunteered with Mother Theresa's hospital and worked with the women that had breast troubles and needed to breast feed their babies. They had trouble breast feeding because of mild build-up making milk clots (i think). Regular breast pumps wouldn't work so Su was the one who had to hand milk these women. He said it was the best job ever! with a mischevious smile on his face. HAHA!! Su has a girl friend from New York. "she's white." Su said. He is definitely a funny character to be around. One of my favorite people.

After lunch we headed to a coffee shop for some awesome Ethiopian coffee. It was like an Ethiopian version of Starbucks, but way better! I got a Machiato.... Delicious! Ethiopia is the birth place of coffee so you know it's good....

Grabbing coffee and getting a little rejuvenated we headed to the next orphanage under the same organization (AHOPE). It was Little AHOPE. These children are all under the age of 8. Many toddlers in the baby room.

Again, all these children are infected with HIV/AIDS. It is very sad when realizing the hard life they have to face, yet as young as they are they don't understand what they have and why... or why they have to live life the way they do. These kids at this particular orphanage lifted my spirits a bit because of their excitement to see us and learn.

We did and English lesson with the kids teaching them the words sit, stand, and jump, getting them to act them out and spell them. It was so fun and refreshing to see their enthusiasm after having to experience almost the complete opposite from the older children at Big AHOPE. As a group they learned these words and then each of us took three children and spent some time with each child individually (sort of) to see and help them with what they just learned.

While I was working with the three kids I grabbed, (or more like they swarmed up to me and grabbed me) there was a kid that came up to me wanting to show me the paper plane he was making. That gave me the idea to make him one of those Chinese origami boxes that are flat and then turn into a box when you blow air into them. He LOVED IT! It was definitely a hit and so much a hit that a swarm of kids came up to me waving paper in my face to make them one too. It became a rally of children around me starving to be the next one to get an origami box. Then it became a violent rally of children... haha... some of the kids were so angry if they weren't next that they would throw their piece of paper down and stomp away yelling.... coming back later to try to be next again. Not much patience in these kids. It was so stressful because of the amount of children fulling and tugging on me, and the fact that I was the only one in our group that knew how to do it.

The rest of the group had to pull me away from these kids to get me back on our bus to go back kto the guest house. We had a little bit of down time when we returned to our resting quarters, which was nice because it was the most down time we had during our whole trip so far. We had some exciting dinner plans to come after we rested up a bit.

For dinner we went to a traditional Ethiopian restaurant. The food was absolutely amazing and we got to watch traditional Ethiopian music and dancing as we ate. SO FUN! We were front and center with the stage they had, and men with instruments I'd never sen before were just jamming away chilling out. Then after awhile a group of men and women came out onto the stage dancing and beating on drums. The dancing was unbelievable! They did the shoulder popping thing that was unreal and could put "so you think you can dance" to shame. They did something with their necks and heads that looked ridiculously hard. The whole Ethiopian dinner experience was just amazing and left me craving more for culture. You're probably thinking it was one of those touristy restaurants..... probably. but it was still cool. Everyone in there seemed to be Ethiopian besides a few and us. There are a lot of Asian people here too.... which I thought was kinda weird... but I found out apparently the Chinese send their prisoners here and put them to work... huh... I thought that, that was interesting.

Day 2

We finally landed in Ethiopia about 830am (1am eastern time) went through customs and got our visas. By the time we went though everything we needed to get through to get to our driver and finally head to where we were staying, it was already about 1030am

The place we are staying is in Addis Ababa, in a guest house. There are three different rooms and me and a girl named Christy got lucky and got the room with two beds.... instead of like the others where they are packed with bunk beds. The two guys on our trip (Steve and Michael) sleep outside of the house in a little hut out there. I kinda felt bad for them... Another perk was we had our own bathroom with our room, which I later learned was not so much a perk. That will be explained later...

After we settled in for a bit we went to the internet cafe to write home to let everyone know we made it safe and sound. Then we all went to get lunch. We had pizza at this little restaurant near by. By this time I think I had been up for three days not including the sleep I got on the plane, but that doesn't really count because they were short naps. After lunch we went ahead and jumped into things and went to little Ahope. It was just an introduction to the school basically. The man who introduced us to the school and showed us all around talked for a long time to all of us in his little office.... I felt a little bad because we were all so tired that it was almost impossible to keep our eyes open. It was way past the point where we could pretend to be fine and act like we weren't about to pass out.

Once, we were done hearing his whole talk about the organization he showed us around the school and where all the children sleep. None of the Children were there while we were there except the 2 year olds and under. We stopped in and played with them some. They were so cute! A lot of them were fascinated with our water bottles, screwing the lids on and off and eventually guzzling the water out of them. Haha.... it was funny to watch them. But then again it was probably sad because they are too little to say when they are thirsty... and I think i heard them say they really don't get a chance to get much water. One of the toddlers just came to me and plopped down in my lap.

I think that time with those babies was the only time that I didn't notice how tired I was. When we were done there we hopped back on the bus to head back to our guest house and had a meeting and also later the founder of Mocha Club came by to talk to us. He and His wife are here because they are in the process of adopting a second child from here, and also for work with the new addition to Mocha club called Fashionable.

We were going to all go out and get dinner but we were all too tired and decided to skip it and head straight to bed.