Thursday the 1st of July here...uhhhhh...3:20 p.m.. Thought I would try and get a few pics online from yesterday. Today we picked up Emebet and hit the Merkato again in search of a sewing machine, which is proving to be more difficult that we originally thought. Well, at least to get a good one that should last. As with yesterday, Tina and I didn't venture out into the market. We don't want to pay the "Face Tax"...so Mia and Berhanu (one of our drivers) did the shopping. The rest of us went to a little place that I can only describe as a Starbucks knock off. Good stuff though and Tina finally got her Sambusas. Still no sewing machine though...the search continues.After the Merkato we went to the Kidane Meheret orphanage and talked with Sister Lutgarda quite a bit. She's a great lady and a funny sense of humor to boot. She's very short and when we left she said "You have to come way down here to hug me". Apparently we'd been wrong all these years about where her and Sister Camilla were from. They're not from Austria, but Malta. Sister Lutgarda is leaving back to Malta for 6 weeks the same day we are heading for Italy. It's her annual "vacation"...6 weeks of rest and prayer she says. Much deserved we're thinking. So at Kidane Meheret, the boys and I stayed outside playing basketball and soccer (there are 2 high school aged boys volunteering there for a few months from New Jersey and Washington D.C.). Tina and the girls helped gather all the older girls at the orphanage, gave them their feminine hygiene kits and discussed how to use everything. Sister Lutgarda had told us our timing was perfect. She said just a week ago a group of the older girls approached her about using something besides cut up t-shirts as pads, but she sadly had to tell them it wasn't in the budget. Needless to say the girls were over joyed to get their hygiene kits. Mia said they thanked her over and over. We left Kidane Meheret after being there a few hours and went to the Brothers of Charity home, where Rafe's brother Musay lives. It was a really good visit. We were able to sit down and watch some of his football DVDs...a little from the Seahawks and a little from the Wolfpack. Lots of cheering from everyone when Rafe was on screen. We went up to a more private area after that and gave Musay the gifts we had brought him, then switched on the video camera and basically interviewed him about Rafe's family history and past. With the help of our amazing translator (Mia), we got a lot of great information, including names of all his family members (mom, dad, sister and 4 other brothers). It was a little hard for Musay to talk about some of it, but he did a great job. I think he knew it was really important to Rafe.So now we're at the Hilton business center again using the internet. I'll try and up load a few pictures from yesterday. They'll probably be from when we were at the Lem Lem School taking pictures of the COEEF students and helping them fill out postcards to their sponsors. Hope all is well back home!Love,The Hale Clan
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