Travel Journal: Days 7 & 8 - Taking Custody

You make known to me the path of life; in your presence is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore. - Psalm 16:11

While leaving Durame was hard in some ways, we were so excited to return to the luxury of our hotel (yes, at this point, the Union Hotel may as well have been a luxury resort - funny how perspectives can change so quickly), and best of all, we were to take custody of Abraham a day earlier than scheduled!  We had been away from him for 2 days and we couldn't wait to get our arms around him again.

We got to the care center after naptime and held our son.  We hung around until dinnertime, and then got our exit instructions from Sister Martha. 

In a way we felt like new parents...like, are they really going let me just walk out here with this baby?!

It was a great feeling to carry our little bundle "home" to the hotel.

(photo courtesy of the Schells)

And it hit me that 7 children were leaving the walls of this orphanage forever, going into the loving arms of a family.  Orphans yesterday, sons and daughters today.  Just a drop in the bucket in light of the millions who need parents, but the world just changed for 7 children.

I was anxious to check Abraham out.  Take off his layers of clothing, give him a bath, make him smell like one of my babies.   When we undressed him he cried and cried.  Instead of bathing, which seemed more traumatic at that point, Adam took him in the shower.  He hated it.  The noise, the cold air on his skin, the new environment -- it was all too much for him.  He fell into an exhausted asleep as soon as he was wrapped in the towel.

We ate dinner with him asleep in our laps, then put him down for the night in the Moses basket the hotel had supplied.  We woke him at 10 pm for his medicine, a bronchiodialator that he'd been given after his release from the hospital.  He woke once after that for a bottle, and he was up for the day at 6 a.m.  We ate breakfast with the other families downstairs.  Abraham's schedule said he was being given a wheat cereal for breakfast, but we skipped it for a bottle because we hadn't decided what to do about his food yet, and our other kids had done well on a delayed-solids feeding schedule. 

We got dressed and ready for our Embassy appointment.  We waited a long time for our appointments, longer than I expected.  One family in our group hit a big snafu with their paperwork and had to race to get it figured out before the embassy closed.  We were all nervous about their situation, and that was a shadow hanging over the room until it resolved at the last minute.  We were so thankful when they got their exit documents.

Our Visa appointment at the embassy felt very solemn.  Even though we knew all the right answers, we also knew that saying the wrong thing would invalidate Abraham's adoption and saying the right thing would make it official.  We raised our right hands and swore to tell the truth, then answered questions about the birth family, whether or not we exchanged $ or support, and if we'd seen any fraud or extortion in our adoption process.  At the end, the embassy official told us that we were now his parents, that his Ethiopian citizenship had been revoked, and that at this point it would be very difficult to reverse.  When we set foot on American soil, Abraham would be a U.S. citizen.   The whole conversation took about 5 minutes.

The next morning we had our farewell ceremony at the care center, then went shopping.  It was so sweet to see the children all dressed up and singing their farewell songs. They swept the babies away for several minutes and returned them dressed in traditional Ethiopian clothing.  We ate cake (even some of the babies!) and had another coffee ceremony. 

(this picture refuses to flip)

At this point my dad had eaten something that didn't sit well, so he spent the day recooperating in his room. 

Adam and I talked about how Abraham's personality seemed so calm and peaceful, just like his birth father's.  Adam took notes in our journal about all the things we'd noticed about Abraham so far, his likes and dislikes.  We dreamed together about seeing our kids at home again.  Those 3 faces had never looked sweeter in my mind. 

We were tired.  So many emotional highs and lows, so little sleep.  I was reluctant to leave Ethiopia, but  eager to leave the next day and back to our family.  Abraham seemed to have trouble staying awake for more than an hour or so.  He reminded us so much of a newborn in many ways, and in a way, he was newly born into our family as a Zimel.

The song for today is Soldier of Love, because I listened to it on my ipod on the trip back from Durame, and the African feel as well as the lyrics about survival seemed very appropriate driving along those dusty roads.