Day in Awassa, ET

We had a great day today! Fun breakfast buffet with interesting pancakes, but great eggs with peppers in them!

Then we stopped at a coffee farm...saw what coffee looks like when it's growing on the tree--little green berry-like things---growing in what looks kinda like a small rain forest. (Dad VH--we'll try to bring you some ET coffee home!) Coffee trees surrounded by "false-banana" trees...kinda like walking in the middle of a tall corn field! We got to go into the farmer's home--a large mud and straw hut where there's a fire pit, some benches, and where all the animals sleep next to the people. We sure are humbled---how can we complain about dirty carpet, hard beds, or our water not getting hot enough quickly enough?!? So many of these people have bare mud/dirt floors, no actual beds, cook over a fire, have no running water, and sleep next to their goats and cows.... the world is not fair... We are reminded of how materially blessed we are, but it's pretty hard to be ok in your heart when you see this... The world is not right...it's not the way it's meant to be...

Probably 40 kids clamoured and fought to be around us--I had brought a big bag of candy and they were all yelling and screaming and pushing to get some...Alemu made them sing and dance and tried to get them to stand in a line, but we still just got mobbed! I think they like candy just like the VanderKodde boys and VandenHoek girls do!

After the coffee, we visited EVADO orphanage--got to see the place where our boys stayed---met 2 of the nannies and the director. We brought a soccer ball and bubbles for them to play with us and then to keep--kids LOVED both of them! We tried to get some sense of Abraham, Yisehak, and Abenezer's personality, etc. from the nannies---it sounds like Abraham REALLY watched out for and loved on his baby brothers. That warmed our hearts! :)

Our afternoon adventure was a "hippo tour"---we road in rickety little wooden boats on pretty rough water, with a little 15 horse motor, in a thunderstorm, way across Lake Awassa (huge lake!) to get pretty close to these massive hippos. Dad Busscher, you would have LOVED having your Whaler, we said!!! To both of our moms--we all wore something that looked like a life jacket and we tried not to get hit by the lightning! :) All you could see of the hippos was their heads; they were swimming in about 10-15 feet of water, but it was still a cool experience! We tried to get a lot of pics...and someone please tell our Abby that we are all safe and nobody got hurt! :) Pretty wet and windy ride, but we laughed and said how we wished we had our boat our there!

Enjoying the macchiatos (coffee drink)--that would be Doug; and the pineapple juice--that would be Kate. Trying to eat mostly authentic food wherever we go, but trying not to get sick---Alemu just barely kept us from eating raw ground beef today (we thought it was just really finely diced tomatoes!--dumb Americans!)

Played Wizard tonight with Nathan, Amy, Joel, Doug, Kate (me)--someone, please be proud--I actually came in second place (beating Joel & Doug)!

Anyway, pray for safety tomorrow as we drive back to Addis Ababa in a very cramped van and interesting driving conditions! We're heading to take showers and wash some nasty mud and gross lake water off of ourselves! :)