Day Three

We headed north to Debre Birhan. Located in the Semien Shewa Zone of the Amhara Region, about 120 kilometers (about 74 miles) north east of Addis Ababa, it is on the paved highway to Dessie. Well, Wikipedia says it's paved but it is all under construction. The roads are gravel and full of potholes for two hours of the three hour ride. It was crazy! The only good thing was that all the cattle traffic was on the old road so we didn't have to watch out for cattle. Hmmm...74 miles should've taken a little over an hour. It took us 3 hours!

Local economy
The Debre Berhan Wool Factory, the first wool factory in Ethiopia, started production was 1 January 1965 with 120 spindles and 6 looms, having the capacity to process one metric ton of wool daily. In its first six months, the factory produced 7,065 blankets in a single-shift operation with a labor force of about 200, of whom 45% were women. The Derg government announced 3 February 1975 that the Debre Berhan Wool Factory was among 14 textile enterprises to be fully nationalised.

This is where we bought Tamirat's mother a new blanket. They said Debre Birhan had good blankets, well, now I know why!

Can you get an idea of the road and how muddy it was?


The children at the orphanage were the sweetest kids! Happy hugs for everybody, as opposed to "I have to give you a hug".







These are all the children with Pastor. I had to block their faces but they are so adorable!



Seth had so much fun with the children! Alex was sick and stayed back at the guest house.




This is the handwashing ceremony:



They made us lunch.



Mmmmm, another coffee ceremony!





This is the dishwasher:



How sad to say good-bye. I fell in love with each of these children.



We headed back to Addis, two hours of pot holes. Our destination: Covenant Church prayer service. The children and their families receive prayer before they journey to America and to their new lives. Just as Pochi was telling the story, the electricity went out. We went up on stage in the dark, they prayed over us, we were ushered out the front door, hopped in the van, and headed back to the guest house.

What an awesome day!