The Lime Tree Cafe's internet wasn't working when Mr Messy and Drama Teen walked over there, so they didn't get to send the blog I wanted them to, so now lots will be arriving at once!! We ate at the Guest House on Sunday evening, Mr Messy loved the injera and vegetarian sauces, I wasn't as adventurous (I've tried injera and I'm not keen) and had a cheeseburger and fries, Little Prince had a cheese spread sandwich and Drama Teen didn't eat much of anything as she is still pining for her Boyfriend. We spent time chatting to the Russian lady who is staying here for three months, while on an observing job for the UN. Then we tried to get an early night, as our driver was picking us up at 8am to take us to the orphanage tomorrow.
We woke up at 7am on Monday morning. A morning that, as you already know, changed our lives forever :-) We had breakfast, got everyone shoehorned into their smart-ish clothes and were ready when our driver arrived. We drove over to the orphanage and went straight in to meet our future daughter. The staff asked me to guess which baby was ours our of two lying in a cot, and in the dimly lit room, and with both of them wearing hats - guess what?? I chose the wrong one!!! I don't think they were pleased!! The staff member handed our baby to me and I took her to the day room, where I sat Little Prince down and let him be the first one to hold her (we'd promised him this when explaining what would happen in Ethiopia) he was overwhelmed and thought she was the cutest baby in the world, and later declared her "awesome." We have friends from the UK travelling next week to adopt and their children were playing on a mat in the day room, so Mr Messy took the opportunity to take some photos and both he and Drama Teen played with them. I don't think that our baby remembered me at all from my last visit, which is totally unsurprising given her age, but still a teensy bit disappointing. We had to be pretty strict with Little Prince and not let him play in an attempt to keep him clean until after Court, so he was getting more and more hyped up!! Luckily the orphanage director announced it was time for us to go, Mr Messy left his camera in the director's office as none are allowed in Court. It was about half an hours drive to Court, with Mr Messy wincing in the front seat at all the apparent near misses. It was the same driver we had used last time I was in Ethiopia. so I had complete confidence in his driving abilities and knew he would get us there safely. That was helped by the fact that I was sat in the back seat with Little Prince on my knee and couldn't see much out of the front window lol. When we arrived we parked right outside the Court gates. We all had our bags checked and had a pat down body search on entering the Court grounds. It was like a large university campus with lots of different buildings and even roads passing through the grounds. It was also very very busy and crowded, with people milling around everywhere. We followed the orphanage director to the correct building and when we got there she checked the Court schedule posted outside the waiting room and said we would have to wait until about 10.30am, and that we had to hang around outside and keep Little Prince quiet the whole time!!! Fun NOT!!! Luckily I'd packed his DS in my bag and he played quietly on that for ages while we waited. We were introduced to the man who had official custody of our new daughter, a lovely very smartly dressed white haired old man, he didn't speak English but we all shook hands and smiled and nodded at each other. While we were waiting we saw lots of handcuffed prisoners escorted by guards with Kalishnikov rifles going in the door directly opposite ours!! Eventually we were ushered into the waiting room and sat down on pew like wooden chairs. The orphanage director went and chatted with the Court official, probably sorting out her other case today which had a file missing. The next time I turned round she had disappeared and Mr Messy saw her sauntering down the path outside!!! He got quite agitated about this, worrying that our case would be called and a) we wouldn't know it was us!! and b) we would fail as we wouldn't be able to answer any of the questions!! Luckily after about half an hour the orphanage director returned and sat with us. The Court officials finally called our case, although it wasn't any name I recognised! We, along with the orphanage director, the man with official custody of our daughter and another lady. The actual Court Room was like an office with two women judges behind office desks. We stood by the wall in front of one of the desks, desperately trying to keep Little Prince still and quiet! The lady judge sat in front of us read through a file in front of her and then questioned the lady that had come in with us for a while, then the lady judge behind the other desk also questioned the lady. Then the first judge started looking at the next file and said our baby's Ethiopian name, all our heads shot up and we all started grinning like loonies!!! What on earth she must have thought I don't know!! She spoke a little to the orphanage director and the man with official custody and then we were all ushered out. We were all confused and looking at each and wondering if it went well or not!!! We were part way down the path outside when we caught up with the orphanage director and I asked the man who had custody if the judge had said yes. He laughted and nodded and I presume said congratulations, we did the Ethiopian three kisses/hug thing and I kept repeating "thank you" in Ethiopian. He then seemed to tell the orphanage director off for not telling us what had just happened lol!! He held Little Prince's hand as we walked out of the Court compound, although Little Prince insisted I held his other hand as he is still a bit nervous about all the attention little kids get here. And he is disgusted that most Ethiopians call him "baby" lol. At the entrance to the Court we said goodbye to the man who had had custody of our daughter and to the other lady, and fought our way across the road to where our driver was parked. On the way back to the orphanage the director explained who the lady was, she was the aunt of a child in the director's custody. The child's mother had died, the father was unknown and the aunt was still a student and couldn't look after the child. The judges had explained to the aunt that if she agreed to the proceedings that she would have no further connection or claim on the child, and from what we saw (although we understood nothing) they really did try to make sure she knew what she was doing and questioned her quite vigorously.
We asked the director some questions about our daughter's background and have some answers for our daughter when she is older. She asked us if we wanted to take our daughter today?? Silly question - of course we did!!! When we returned we went to her baby room to find her, and the caregiver handed her over. I was very disappointed that our baby's usual caregivers weren't there. It was quite an underwhelming, casual handover, and we didn't really know what to do!! The orphanage director returned Mr Messy's camera and that seemed to be it. I had hoped for our daughter's sake that there would be a bit more ceremony or meaning to the handover, but it is what it is, and we will tell our daughter exactly what happened. On our way to the car Mr Messy went upstairs to the directors office and was given the office number and her assistants number, so we can ring up and check when the Court papers are ready. Although she also said she would send the driver to collect Mr Messy when the papers are ready too, but he would like to be able to go out and about and not have to wait in the guest house for the driver to arrive. So we are a tad confused, but hoping that everything will turn out ok!!! Our daughter was like a little mole when taken out into the sunshine! She blinked and turned away, they keep the baby room very dark and dim, so she must not have been used to such bright sunshine at all! She was also not too happy with the wind blowing on her face, so I covered her up with the cotton shawl she was wrapped in and she seemed a little more settled. The orphanage gave us a bottle of formula to take with us, but I presume that as the orphanage director has asked for her clothes back that we are going to take the bottle back too. When we were back at the guest house we were all vying to hold and feed her, although no one seemed to want to do the nappy changes for me!! unfortunately baby has very severe nappy rash, despite one of the last few families who came over bringing a LOT of Sudocreme for the babies. I think baby was unsettled, unsurprisingly enough, and she didn't really drink much of her bottles and seemed a little fractious in between sleeps. She was happy enough to be taken out, carried by Mr Messy in the sling, when we walked to the London Cafe for lunch. Drama Teen didn't come with us as she is STILL pining over her boyfriend (who still hasn't replied to any of her emails!!) and is feeling very self conscious about being stared at when we are out and about. The Cafe was empty apart from us, and was more like a restaurant than a simple cafe. Little Prince ordered spaghetti bolognaise, but found it too spicy and ended up eating most of my chicken and fries instead!! Mr Messy stuck to his own steak sandwich and really enjoyed it, although it was quite a balancing act to eat without dripping food on baby in the sling lol. The bill came to about 140birr, including drinks for all of us, which is probably on the expensive end for Addis but is very cheap for us!!! On the way back we called in at Kaldi's to get Little Prince an ice cream, he wants to work his way through the whole range of flavours while we are here!!
An American couple staying at the guest house had their baby delivered during the late afternoon. Mr Messy was in his element photographing the event for them. They have adopted an 8 month old little girl, who is HUGE!! Their Agency Contact (and baby deliverer) said he thought it could be because she was in a room with other babies and if one wakes up they all wake up, so they get fed if they need it or not! She certainly makes our scawny little midget look pathetic!!! Just wait till we get her home and on fish and chips lol.
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