June 24, 2010

Heather, Lucy and I spent the morning exploring an area of town called

“Bole” (Bow-lay) – a long stretch of road leading to the airport.

Supposedly this is a wealthier, newer area of town. We have heard lots

of people talk about Bole, so we decided to check it out for

ourselves.

We met and had a macchiato at Kaldi’s and then walked and walked and

walked. Most impressive, was a public trash can! I can’t say there was

any trash IN it, but it was the first public trash can I’ve seen!

Three children were our shadows for about six blocks, even waiting for

us while we went inside a shop.

Begging is fine with me – being pushy is another thing.

We had given them biscuits as well as coins, and they continued to

follow us…and then one of the boys unzipped the front pocket of my

backpack and that was enough.

We asked an adult to ask them to stop following us. It made me sad,

but it was the only way. I hated it though.

After our adventures on Bole Road, we went to the Deborah House, which

is an SIM run home for a handful of homeless girls to grow up in.

It’s located “near” (a relative term here) the guesthouse.

It was a very simple house, with a housemother and 12 teenage girls

making it their home. Iron bunk beds, two picnic tables, outside

toilets and “showers”, no decorations, one tv and a corner designated

for the traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremony.

The girls loved my two girls and through broken English they had a blast.

It could be very detrimental how nuts everyone here is over Josie.

They go nuts over Lucy too, but she’s a little young for it to make

too much of an impact. ☺

I wasn’t paying close attention to the time, so we left a little later

than I had planned. And since we were gone all day, we had to figure

something out fast for dinner. Darn. Where’s Chick Fil A when you need

it? We walked awhile and the sun was starting to go downwards so we

quickly made our way into Loyal, the grocery store/restaurant we

shopped at while living at the guesthouse, and ordered two Fantas to

sip while we waited for our pizza “take away”…hmm…”pizza” should be in

quotes too!

As Josie downed her Fanta and the power went out, I looked outside and

saw the rain POUND down on the pavement. Hmmm, getting dark, two small

pizza boxes, two small children no cell phone, husband in class and

pouring rain.

After a quick pep talk trying to hype myself up for what was sure to

be a lovely walk to find a taxi, we did just that. And we found a taxi

that drove us all the way to our house gate.

Ahhh….long, good day. Glad to be home, glad to have the girls in bed,

glad Jeremiah will be home soon to eat “pizza” and very glad to be in

dry clothes.