May 15, 2010 - Arriving in Ethiopia

At some point we switched from the 14th to 15th of May. I honestly have no idea when...I'm pretty sure we were over the Atlantic Ocean. After we left DC we were on the plane for somewhere between 10 and 12 hours. I slept off and on, but Lincoln couldn't sleep. Let me just say...those planes are NOT made for someone over 6 foot! We arrived in Frankfort Germany and went through customs again (another country!). We didn't have too long of a layover (maybe 2 hours) because our flight took longer than scheduled. We stopped at a shop and bought a bag of M&M's for the boys for the flight home (we were afraid that we wouldn't find any in Ethiopia). Then we found our gate and took turns using the rest room to change clothes, wash our faces, and brush our teeth. Lincoln laid down and tried to sleep a bit, but I'm pretty sure he never really fell asleep. We knew that there was supposed to be another adoptive AAI Mom on our flight to Addis, and finally met Sheryl and her sister Joanna (now very good friends!) as we were boarding the plane.

Lincoln and I somewhere between Frankfort and Addis.

Our first view of Ethiopia!

After we landed in Addis we had to go through customs and get our visas. It went much smoother than I expected. I also exchanged some money at the airport. After we got our luggage (Lincoln and I had ours inspected, but they didn't take anything) we found our driver waiting for us! Things could not have gone any smoother! As we walked out into the airport we took our first smell of Ethiopia. There was a large incense burner going and all the spices filled my lungs. I was immediately in love!

Loading up our luggage into the van outside of Bole Airport in Addis.

The drive to the guest house was quite the experience. Actually, it ended up being one of the smoothest drives we took that week, but I was scared out of my mind! It was dark when we arrived and there are no street lights in (most of) Addis. There were people out on the streets (like I would soon realize happened 24 hours a day) and I was so afraid we would hit someone! Of course the rest of the crew put me in the front seat!

Everyone in the van ready to head to the guesthouse!

We arrived at the guest house and one of the workers unlocked our rooms. We unloaded our luggage into our rooms. The roads to the guest house are dirt and rock. The guest house is surrounded by barbed (prison) wire around the top of tall brick walls. Arriving at night, I was kind of nervous.

Sheryl, Joanna, Lincoln, and I were all starving, so our driver took us to The Carabu, a resturaunt we would eat at almost every night the rest of our trip. He joined us for dinner, which was nice. After dinner we headed back to the Guest House and started to unpack. It was pretty surreal laying the boys clothes out on their bunk beds knowing that we would meet them in less than 12 hours! We couldn't fall asleep, so we took some pills (ha ha) and finally slept.

I sent this email home our first night in Addis.