Tuesday, July 8: Embassy Appointment and Finally Finfine

Tuesday. The day of our appointment at the US Embassy, the final step to be able to bring home our son, who turned 11 months this day. Our appointment was not until 2pm, so we just spent the morning at the guest house, hanging out and playing with Juan Pablo. We were picked up by the staff from our adoption agency, and then headed to another hotel to pick up another adoptive family. The staff member who picked us up was the one who had come with us to the foster home earlier in the week, and we were very happy to hear him say that he could see that in only a few days, Juan Pablo's eye contact had greatly improved, a sign that he was doing very well. There were four other families from our agency there with us, and this was the only time we would all be together. We arrived at the US Embassy, and discovered that Jeff and I had forgotten our passports, which we needed to be let in through security. Thankfully, our guest house was not very far away, so one of the staff from our agency was able to quickly drive Jeff back to get them, while I waited at the gate with Juan Pablo. We had no idea how long the Embassy appointment would take- we were told that some interviews take 5 minutes, some take 45, and there were five families that needed to get through them. We got to the waiting room, and sat down until our names were called. I was not nervous at all. We had a positive homestudy report, we had gotten through the mountains of other paperwork necessary for the adoption, we had already received approval from the US Citizenship and Immigration Services to bring a child under the age of 1 into the United States, and we had made it through the Ethiopian courts. The adoption was already finalized in the eyes of the Ethiopian government, and we had a birth certificate for Juan Pablo, listing us as his parents and giving him our last name- was there really any way that they would deny him a visa at this point? My confidence began to wane a little as I overheard the other adoptive mothers talking, making comments like, “I am so nervous,” and “My heart is beating so fast right now.” I thought, “Oh no, should I be nervous? Maybe we’re not really well prepared or had the wrong idea about what this was going to be like.” As the first couple families started going through, I saw that I had nothing to worry about. We were the last ones to be interviewed, and after asking us three or four questions, the immigration official congratulated us, and told us that Juan Pablo’s visa would be ready on Thursday. It was over, and it was official- our son would be coming home with us at the end of the week. Juan Pablo had obviously not been nervous about the interview at all- he fell asleep in my arms while we were sitting in the waiting area, and slept peacefully through the interview, and all the way back to the guest house.

After a successful Embassy appointment, we decided to celebrate by trying once again to go to the restaurant that had eluded us earlier in the week: Finfine. By this time, we had figured out that the only requirement to be a cab driver in Addis is the ability to drive (and even that is not too strictly enforced). This wasn’t like London or New York where you could give the driver the name of a hotel, restaurant or museum, and then just sit back and relax, knowing that you would arrive at your desired location. So this time, rather than just walk out and hire the first taxi we saw, we decided to call one of the drivers that had been recommended by our guest house owners. It was clear from the phone conversation that he did not speak very much English, but he understood “Z Guest House” and said he would be there in ten minutes. In the meantime, Jeff went to find the guest house owner to ask him to serve as an interpreter when our driver arrived. With the help of our host, we were able to explain where we wanted to go, and negotiate a price. Fifteen minutes later, we were there. After being let in through the gate by the security guards out front, we walked into a beautiful courtyard. The restaurant is actually in a hotel, so there were hotel rooms lining either side of the courtyard, and the restaurant was at the end.

Outside Finfine

After taking a couple pictures in the courtyard, we went in, found a table, and began to read the menu. It soon became clear that choosing our meal would be more difficult than we had anticipated, as Finfine boasts such delicacies as “Special cut beet uangue and fripe trid in butter” and an “Everyday Buffe, available Tuesdays and Trustdays”. We were informed by our waitress that even though it was Tuesday, the “everyday buffe” was actually only available at lunch. Perhaps we would come back and check it out on “Trustday”.

the menu at Finfine

Instead, we ordered the assortment of traditional Ethiopian dishes, and Ethiopian beer. Juan Pablo, after finishing his bottle ate almost his own weight in injera while the rest of us enjoyed our meal. When we had finished, Jeff and Sebastian decided to order tej again. They asked the waitress for tej, and she returned with two more beers. They tried to explain, with hand motions, “No, not beer. Tej.” She nodded, repeated what they said, and returned with the check. One more try- “Not the check, tej. You know, to drink, the honey wine.” This time she smiled in comprehension, “Oh, tej!” We must not have been pronouncing it correctly, although we couldn’t really tell what was different between our pronunciation and hers. Once all the tej had been drunk, and Juan Pablo had smiled at and attracted the attention of every other person in the restaurant, we found a cab and headed back to the guest house.

Juan Pablo and Sebastian love Finfine!

There are power outages every few days in Addis Ababa, but we were fortunate enough to be at a guest house that had a generator that they turned on for the comfort of their guests during these times. Another adoptive family was at a guest house that did not turn on their generator until 8pm on days that there were power outages. There was a power outage on Tuesday, but for some unknown reason, the guest house owners had not turned on the generator this time. During the day, it had not been much of a problem, other than the inconvenience of not being able to turn on the water heater and having to take freezing cold showers. When we returned from Finfine, however, it was clear that thing were going to be a bit more difficult at night. We stumbled up the steps to our room, and Jeff went to find the small flashlight that we had brought for such an occasion. We also had a candle in living room of our suite, so we found the matches and lit the candle for a little extra glow. Juan Pablo had fallen asleep in the cab on the way home, so I used the flashlight to change his diaper and put his pajamas on, and then went to sit in the candlelight with Sebastian and Jeff. Sebastian had gotten pastries for us earlier in the day while we had been at the Embassy, and even though we were still full from dinner, we decided that they should be eaten before they spoiled, since the small refrigerator in our room was no longer providing any sort of refrigeration. It was kind of exciting, eating tiramisu by candlelight. Soon, however, our guest house owners sent their son to bring us a battery powered light to help get us through the rest of the power outage. We thanked him, decided not to use it because the candlelight was more exciting, and then the power came back on. It was fun while it lasted, but I’m glad that was our only experience of a power outage throughout our stay.