This is the Bole Cathedral. It's one of the larger Orthodox churches in town. They had calls to worship early on most mornings. It actually sounded just like a mosque. And each time someone passed by, they would make the cross sign on their chests. And on Sundays, tons of people would crowd onto the church square all clad in their white head coverings to have communal prayer time.
About an hour before we picked up Makaria, we decided to grab a little coffee from a great place called Kaldi's coffee. Rumor has it that the goat herder, Kaldi, discovered coffee after his goats ate the beans and started acting crazy. Whatever the history, this coffee was incredible. These little frappicino dealies were made with coffee, ice cream, whipped cream, carmel. You pretty much can't go wrong with that combination.
Here she comes. This is from our window on the 3rd floor. They called us and said "your daughter is here, congratulations!" We threw on our shoes and ran downstairs. It's strange to get a phone call letting you know that you are a parent again.
Brad got the first look and Makaria screamed in complete terror. She's with her main nanny that took great care of her. The nanny, Tgise, took wonderful care of her and was crying when she left. It was about a 90 second exchange. Makaria cried and cried for about 15 minutes. I can't imagine how traumatic that would be. And she's been in an orphange in Northern Ethiopia her entire life. About 1 month ago, she was flown down to the care center in Addis. And then we popped into her life. That's a lot of transition for a one year old. We finalized the adoption on July 6th-also her first birthday!
Makaria's totally not feelin' the love at this point. But we got her some milk and walked around with her and eventually got this:
After we hung out in the room for a bit, we headed out for some Ethiopian food. It's this sourdough bread, injera, with different sauces and stews on it. This particular one was injera dipped in a sauce and put on more injera. For those of you who have eaten injera, you know that's too much to take. Brad gave up and ordered lasagna. The injera we had later on in the week was much better. And besides, what meal isn't good when eaten with your hands?!
She's a great snuggler and sleeper. That about does it for day 2. I feel like I'm leaving out so much, but this will have to do for now.
