Hi again from Lalibela!
I have been quite sick lately and unable to update this blog, sorry about that! Alot has been happening here meanwhile!!
We finally found a house we were able to rent, there was some difficulty locating an appropriate place as alot of places were reluctant to give out long leases as it is coming up to christmas and Lalibela is a bit of a mecca, so the owners know that they will make more money if they rent there buildings short term over christmas in the peak season. finally we found the perfect place- it's known as 'the palace' as it was built for king Haile Selassie's daughter. It's really just a lovely ramshackle old wooden house, but with the most glorious view i've ever seen! The house is perched right above the town on it's own little hill. There are actually two houses- the wooden main house and next to it; a two storey traditional stone tukul which is going to house our guard upstairs and a traditional kitchen downstairs since our cook- habtum prefers her charcoal stove to the electric one we bought with us from addis!
we spent the first day or two cleaning up and getting beds organised, buying more blankets etc and then the next day we spent walking around the villages meeting families who were housing orphans and it seemed that every person we talked to knew of another poor little waif who needed care and it got to the point where we took in 10 kids rather than our original planned 6. after that we had to say no and even now 5 days later, word is still going around the villages that there is a new orphanage opening in lalibela and we are getting approached by people multiple times a day asking us to take children. it's hard to say no to them but even if i wanted to take them in, i cannot. We sat down with the administrator (mayor) of lalibela yesterday and he said that whilst we can continue as we are until we get an official license, we can't take in any more kids. The kebele will like to have a hand in assigning the kids in the future, which i expected. so for now, our little family shall remain 10.
As for the kids themselves, they are:
Terut- 15 a boy who was living on the street and who has no family here. he's the sweetest 15 year old i've ever met, very much the protector of the family!
Abraham- 13 an orphan who was also homeless, he was staying with different friends before we took him in
Temesgen- 13 not an orphan but from a very poor family and was spending most of his time on the streets also
Gashaw- 11 an orphan, was living with his deaf sister who was very very poor
Bereket- 8 an orphan who was emaciated and living with his elderly grandmother. his family begged us to take him as they could not afford to feed him
Aesrasa and Gabayew -10 and 8 are sisters that are orphans and who were living with their very poor uncle. i met them last time i was in lalibela and was very happy to take them in as i knew their situation beforehand
wenisnet- 11 a homeless orphan. a local restaurant owner begges us to take her as she had noone and the local restaurants had been feeding her. she is very very sweet but quiet, very much a survivor
the babies are ytinet and hilary- 17months and 2 years today. daughters of local prostitutes, they are not orphans, but were very neglected so their mothers very happily placed them in our care. prior to living with us, the babies were left every night to cry alone in their rooms while their mothers worked. Ytinet is quite sickly, hilary is in better health. both have flu and chronic diarrohea and ytinet fits 00 clothes or 6-9 month old clothes while hilary is more the size of an 18month old. they are both walking and talking a little bit, but are very small for their age.
so far they all get along very well, they all walk to school together and come home together and play nicely and it is just amazing to see them smiling and laughing as they were a very solemn bunch the first day i met them!
I'm learning alot here in lalibela- the kids are very much habesha and reject alot of my western ways, especially my food haha. the first night before our cook started, i made them pasta with bolognaise sauce and they all ran to the bathroom and washed off the sauce in the sink! they didn't eat the pasta either! i also tried to give them peanut butter to eat on their bread for breakfast but they rejected that too telling me it was 'kaka' or yukky, instead they prefer to tear chunks of bread and dip it into black tea, which i find very strange. so i eat my bread with peanut butter and drink my tea with milk and they have their plain bread dipped in black tea and we agree that never the twain shall meet!
i've also never met cleaner ethiopians, they would happily bathe 5 times a day if i let them! to begin with i was a little more lax, but now i am getting tired of cleaning the bathroom a million times a day so we have set restrictions on bath time, much to their dismay :)
ok well i must go, ive tied the internet up too long!
x
--
Here's a sigh to those who love me, and a smile to those who hate, and whatever sky's above me, here's a heart for every fate.
- Lord Byron
No comments:
Post a Comment