Yoftahe came and got us around 10 and we left to go do some shopping. He also had told us to bring him an NC sticker for his van because he loves to represent each family has has driven for. So we had the presentation of the NC sticker and application...haha.
(Josh) As a former music sales person I found Music sales here very different. Yoftahe pulled his van over to the side of the road and motioned for a young man to come over. This guy comes over and had 30 - 40 CDs stacked up the side of his arm. Each one was wrapped, I assumed they were bootleg. But the CDs we have are pressed and look legit. Yoftahe would pull one out of the stack and put it in his CD player and give it a try. After 20 minutes or so Yoftahe handed us 3 CDs and told us that it was his gift to Yosef.
We did more souvenir shopping and they even served us coffee which was nice at the shop. After we went and ate lunch at The Lime Tree and hung out with Yofathe until it was time to go to Tikuret at 3. Yosef wakes up at 3 so we wanted to wait until then. He was a little groggy at first but loved the Elmo phone we brought for him to play with in addition to the beach ball again and a balloon!! We saw a lot more personality today - some dancing, smiling, and some defiance. What 2 year old doesn't show that, right? I learned that "tay" means stop or leave it alone. haha. He told us that quite a bit when he didn't want us to take his toy. I got to help feed him snack today.
I got to go help change his diaper upstairs and I'm so glad I did. Culturally things are done there differently so it's helpful to know that for future reference. I put his diaper and clothes back on and he enjoyed trying to help. One of the nurses left after her shift and came to give Yosef hugs and ksses because she won't be there tomorrow so it's the last time she will likely see him. She started to get choked up which in term made me get that way. We took a picture of him with her and I wrote her name down so I can tell him about her when he is older. I anticipate tough moments like that more tomorrow. That one caught me off guard.
Some of you may be wondering why we didn't pick him up the moment when got to Ethiopia to come stay with us. It's highly encouraged by our agency, and we totally agree that we should do transitional visits to remind Yosef of who we are. Clearly it is still going to be super hard on him to leave the place he has always known and the caregivers he knows so we want to try to do all we can to ease that in even a small way.
We left as they were about to have dinner to get our own dinner at an Italian restaurant that was great. Josh and Yofathe both had steaks and I had gnocchi. We shared chocolate lava cake and had all kinds of interesting discussions on Ethiopian culture, government, and tribes.
We are off to bed becaaue we are 7 hours ahead and take on a two year old at full speed tomorrow! Tomorrow is a HUGE day!!! For all of us. It's GOTCHA day!!! It will be a day full of all kinds of emotions. Please pray for us, but most especially for Yosef and his loss.
(Josh) God has preformed a miracle in my mind. Please continue to pray for our bonding with Yosef. He has changed so much from our last trip in a positive way. Like Amy said tomorrow is the big day so please continue to pray for all of us.
Here are our pictures from today:
Lobby where we ate breakfast
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