Ethiopia, day 6

Thursday, February 3

We had our last visit with B today. It took us a little while to find her because she had switched houses, from #1 to #4. She is in a room now with 5 other babies, all pretty close to her age. I guess they tried to feed her solid food for the first time too, some kind of mashed up bean, and she was not too sure about that. We both held her again, and I was just trying to memorize everything about her. She has that sweet baby smell, soft curly hair, and such smooth beautiful skin. She has some rolls on her legs, and just about the cutest feet you have ever seen. I did get to give her the last of her bottle and then laid her back in her bed and she fell asleep pretty quickly. I am really not thinking about the fact that we will be leaving, just pushing it away, because if I do it's just too hard. It has been such an amazing blessing to see her and hold her, and learn about Ethiopia. Reality is just not something I want to deal with right now.

After our visit a group of us went to Addis Ababa University where they have the palace of Haile Salisse. He gave it to the university, and now it is a museum. He was a very loved and respected emperor, and he believed he could trace his genealogy to the Queen of Sheba. After that we ate lunch, and then met our entire group to tour the Holy Trinity Church. Orthodox Christianity is the main religion here, and Salisse and his wife both have their remains in the church in these huge marble memorials. They also still have the thrones that they would sit on during church there, and there are murals painted on the walls of them. Our guide was Belay and his father was a general for Salisse. When the communists took over, they executed 60 government officials and generals in one day, and Belay's father was one of them.

For dinner we ate at a restaurant called Top View, which was on a mountain, and did have a beautiful view of the city. The food again was amazing, and I loved talking with the two other families we went with. That has been such a blessing to me this week, just getting to know and talk with the other adoptive families.