Seeking answers
Our court date is fast approaching, and I am starting to prepare my mind for traveling to Ethiopia. I’m trying to guard my heart with the knowledge that we may not pass court on our first try, but also trying to prepare myself that we could be traveling very soon to meet our son.
As I have been thinking about this trip over the last couple of days, I’ve become more and more overwhelmed. This is not just a trip to go and meet our boy and bring him home. It is so much more than that. This trip is not about us.
This is our chance to learn as much as we can about the place that has held our son since his beginning. The people, the sites, the languages, the religions, the landscape, the food, the customs, the smells, the sights, the colors, the cities, the villages, the textures, the plants, the animals, the everything – they are his, and soon they will be ours.
I am acutely aware that my knowledge right now about Ethiopia is limited to other people’s experiences. Their writings, their pictures, their stories are all that I have for now. But soon, we will have more. We will have our own writings, our own pictures, our own stories. And all that we have will be given to our son.
We have hopes and dreams for our son that include return trips to Ethiopia. But for the time being, this first trip will be the most important one for us.
What if I screw this up?
I’m trying to write down all the things that he could possibly want to know about, see pictures of, and hear stories from. My mind is mush right now, and gets mushier by the day. I don’t know how long it might be before we return to Ethiopia. For now, we have this one shot.
What would you want to know about the place you came from?
For those of you who have children from Ethiopia, is there anything you wish you would have done differently on your trip? Things you did right? Advice? Wisdom?
There is a sweet, sweet Ethiopian boy who will grow up with many questions. I want to be able to give him as many answers as possible.
As I have been thinking about this trip over the last couple of days, I’ve become more and more overwhelmed. This is not just a trip to go and meet our boy and bring him home. It is so much more than that. This trip is not about us.
This is our chance to learn as much as we can about the place that has held our son since his beginning. The people, the sites, the languages, the religions, the landscape, the food, the customs, the smells, the sights, the colors, the cities, the villages, the textures, the plants, the animals, the everything – they are his, and soon they will be ours.
I am acutely aware that my knowledge right now about Ethiopia is limited to other people’s experiences. Their writings, their pictures, their stories are all that I have for now. But soon, we will have more. We will have our own writings, our own pictures, our own stories. And all that we have will be given to our son.
We have hopes and dreams for our son that include return trips to Ethiopia. But for the time being, this first trip will be the most important one for us.
What if I screw this up?
I’m trying to write down all the things that he could possibly want to know about, see pictures of, and hear stories from. My mind is mush right now, and gets mushier by the day. I don’t know how long it might be before we return to Ethiopia. For now, we have this one shot.
What would you want to know about the place you came from?
For those of you who have children from Ethiopia, is there anything you wish you would have done differently on your trip? Things you did right? Advice? Wisdom?
There is a sweet, sweet Ethiopian boy who will grow up with many questions. I want to be able to give him as many answers as possible.
posted by More Dorrs at
10:48 AM
12 Comments:
Do you plan on traveling to your son's birth town? That was the single most amazing, best part of our trip. I would highly encourage it, regardless of the circumstances that brought your son to adoption. We also had high hopes of hearing stories from the nannies from the orphanage about Mekonen, but we were never there with anyone who could translate and they spoke little to no English. our agency let us come and go to the orphanage whenever we wanted (guest house was down the street), so therefore we weren't usually there with someone who could translate. i wish we would've gone to greater lengths to try and get someone with us to translate who could help us talk to the nannies who spent 6 months with him. although there were many of them who changed rooms every 4 weeks or so, i would've like to know his personality. he is MUCH different now than when we picked him up. his personality seems night and day and i wish i would've known exactly what he was like there. we took a lot of video too and are making a DVD of videos and pictures from our trip. we ran into a tighter financial end to our adoption than planned and could not do as many Ethiopian gifts/souvenirs as we planned. originally, we were going to buy one gift for him for the first 18years of his life, giving one Ethiopian gift to him a year on his adoption day (gotcha day). we did end up with quite a bunch,but not quite 18! my sister did this for her son from guatemala and it's been a really special thing for him (he's 5 now). just a few ideas!! :)
I'm so happy you posted this question. I have a very similar post in my head right now. Thanks!
This is a wonderful post and summarizes a lot of what I am thinking about these days. We also received a referral during the rainy season and are awaiting a court date. We don't have a blog, but thank you for sharing your lovely posts.
Oooo, I will have to think on this one. Craig and I tried to get out and see as much as we could, and I am really glad we did because I've heard other people's experiences were more limited in that regard for various reasons. Although we did not get to travel to OA's birth town, which would have been icing.
Soak it up, I know you will. Take care not to get ill, so you can be ever present while you're in ET and make the most of it.
Cindy
I would encourage you to soak it up also. If there is somewhere you can go (birthplace, etc) that connects to the beginning of his life I would go there and ask anyone you can questions and take pictures/video. If you can go 2-3 days early it will help you be adjusted before you meet your little guy and give you some time to be in the culture. We are so glad we did this(although a few days while getting over jet lag is not enough to truly soak! I found I just had to come to terms with that and we also God-willing will travel as a family and serve there as we are able in the future). Also I would brainstorm a list of questions to ask his caretakers...like how does he like to be put to sleep? What makes him happy? We video taped our son's nanny sharing her dreams and prayers for him. We found that after we had our boy, the most important thing was bonding and being with him. There were things we did that were significant (visiting his orphanage, buying him Ethiopian gifts) but the number one thing that took our focus and rightly so was being his Mama and Dada. This took so much energy and time and we realized that learning about the culture would have to take a second seat during the first couple days. Blessings on you - I will pray as you seek God He will give you inspiration for the things you need to do/ask/learn for your son's sake! Rejoicing that God's grace will also cover over the gaps and mushy brain! :-)
Same thoughts over here...
Great question. I'm sure you will do just great! I've been scrapbooking for our sweet girl, and I hope to take as many pictures and get as much info as I can about the area of Ethiopia she is from. We are also hoping to visit the region she is from to get more footage/info. I've seen a few families do this and the pics are awesome. .
I didn't read all the comments before me, but my idea would be that when you go take lots of pictures. Of everything big and small. Also, keep a journal of the things that you're seeing and experiencing. That way when he's older he can read it!
It's already Nov. 3rd in Addis!!!
Get your court date on the FBI!!!
And take lots of pictures in Addis!!!
I wish we had seen more and done more while we were in Ethiopia, but we had such a rough transition with Eli that we ended up staying in the guest house most of the time we were there. With the whole rule of not being able to take your child out in public, it really limited what we could do. We tried to leave him with a caregiver one afternoon, but our return and rest of the day with him adjusting back to us was so difficult that we couldn't even fathom doing it again. I feel like Debbie Downer here (wah wah), but I just felt really unprepared when we went to Ethiopia. It seemed like everyone else had a perfect experience in country - and I hope yours is one of those great experiences! We ultimately had to come to terms with the fact that this trip was strictly to meet our babe. We plan to go back to Ethiopia soon, and make subsequent trips, to soak up more of the culture. Hopefully you will have the opportunity to meet with your little boy's birth family and see where he came from! That has to be truly a great gift!
I wished we had taken more videos of our first days with Turo in Ethiopia - just the little stuff - of him playing or of him with the ladies at the guest house speaking to him in Amharic or with his caregivers saying good-bye at the Gladney house. I also wished I had taken pictures of him with the In-Country staff in Ethiopia.
We really loved exploring the city. This made our experience so rich. We used the Lonely Planet Ethiopia book and our driver for ideas.
My husband bought this little photo printer from Polaroid. We were able to print photos of the three of us with his Aunt and with his main caregivers. Then we were able to give these photos to these women.
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