Ethiopia Day 1 - Addis Ababa

After an overnight layover in Dubai, where Mark slept like a baby and I hardly slept a wink because I was so excited, we finally boarded the plane that would take us to Ethiopia. We had been thinking and reading and dreaming about this country for two long years and it was hard to believe that we were about to see it with our own eyes!

Yes, I was THAT excited. I took pictures of just about everything, even our visa form!

Travis from Gladney and our driver, Solomon (above), met us at the airport. Side note: the title "driver" does not reveal a fraction of what this man did for us, or the friend that he became over the next two weeks. We miss you, Solomon!

If you are a Gladney family, take note that you will want to have all your immigration forms and paperwork in your carry-on bags, ready to hand over to Travis along with your humanitarian aid.

Since we were only staying in Addis for one night before heading down to the Sidama region where our boys were born, we splurged and spent that first night at the Sheraton. The people of Addis Ababa are very proud of this hotel, and I agree that it is quite a nice place. The cost is steep, even by US standards, but after such a long trip we were glad for a little luxury.

 We didn't spend much time in the hotel before Solomon launched into the perfect first day tour of Addis Ababa. First stop, Tomoca! The air in this place is thick with smoke from freshly roasted coffee beans and the coffee is unbelievably good.

We then took a tour of the Merkato, Africa's largest open air market.

Men buying chat, a legal form of speed. This stuff was everywhere, but surprisingly I didn't see or smell cigarette smoke the entire time we were in country.

It was a couple days before the General Election so we saw lots of demonstrations, fortunately all peaceful.

Then we took a tour of the National History museum, the home of Lucy and other Ethiopian treasures. This is a replica of Lucy, who was out of town on a museum tour.

I loved all the paintings on the top floor.

We ended our day by driving up Entoto Mountain, where we got our first glimpse at how hard people work in this country. These women are firewood gatherers. They collect firewood all day and carry these incredibly large bundles down the mountain to sell in the market. We saw women with huge smiles as well as women in tears.

We also saw young boys either collecting water, like these boys, or tending to livestock. For some reason I did not get a picture of the livestock on our first day even though we saw many herd of goat and cattle throughout the streets of Addis. I guess I had heard about it from so many people that it didn't feel like a novelty!

We also got our first glimpse at some of the many churches throughout the country.

And because it is all about the boys and a post wouldn't be complete without them, here is a glimpse at how hard we have been working around here...

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com