July 17

Talked to Mike and the kids last night before bed. So good to hear their voice but I’m totally missing them and want to be home so bad.

Denver slept really well last night. He woke up at 2:18 and had a small bottle and then slept again until 6:20 this morning. When he woke up, he was looking all around. When he looked up and saw me, he smiled and started giggling right away. We played for a while and then I gave him his bottle. We played some more and then I gave him his cereal. I got him all cleaned up and put some cords and a shirt on him. He looks so cute.

He actually fell asleep in my arms when we were looking outside the window so I laid him in his crib – this was at around 9:15 am. He slept really well for about 45 minutes and then woke up. He looked around and played and cooed in his crib for about 10 -15 minutes and then fell back sleep and slept until 10:50. So far it seems that he’s a good sleeper so I hope he keeps that up.

I slept a bit better last night. Very solid sleep for four hours until Denver woke up and needed a bottle. Then I laid around for a few hours and maybe dozed off and on until he woke up again in the morning. Not much going on today. I had hoped to get to the internet café and email Mike but that never happened.

This is the front doors at the Weygoss Guest House:

This afternoon I got the best phone call yet. Denver and I were just getting up from our afternoon nap and the phone was ringing in our room. It was Mike. He said he got an email from Nairobi (the High Commission) to inform him that a visa had been conferred for our son Baheran Michael Eugene on this day, July 17, 2009. Wow. I broke down crying I was just so relieved. The email said I needed to contact the Canadian Embassy here in Addis Ababa to make arrangements to pick it up. I tried to call this afternoon but remembered that they were closed on Friday afternoons. I can’t wait to call first thing on Monday morning to confirm that Denver’s visa is in fact there or will get there before next Friday. I am so thankful for our MP’s office in Dundas. The lady that works there has done so much for us. She has worked so hard, made so many phone calls on our behalf and just cared enough to make things happen for us.

This may even beat the "ugly cry" from the airport:

This afternoon I went out and bought a baby carrier since I forgot my Baby Bjorn at home – I guess that’s what happens when you only have a half an hour to pack. Oops. When I got back to the guest house, there was a phone call in the main lobby for me. It was the CBC Radio News Show asking if they could interview me for a segment they were doing on the news. I said yes so she took down my information and said she’d call me later. We ordered room service and just stayed in the room.

At around 8:20 pm the phone rang and it was Sarah again from CBC. She transferred me to Helen Mann who would be doing the interview. She asked me some questions about what I had for dinner and how the weather was so she could do a sound check. Then we got right into the interview. They asked me to come up with a fake name so my real name wouldn’t be given on the radio – so I was Heather. She asked me all about the situation here, my experience dealing with it, how many other families are here in the same situation, she asked about the baby home, the agency in Cambridge, asked if I had seen the director of our agency or her partner here. She asked if I knew what had happened to make the agency go bankrupt. She asked about my experience getting Denver’s referral, how I managed to organize everything to get over here in such a hurry and what it was like to hold my son for the first time. She was very grateful that I took the time to speak with her and she asked if CBC News World could also call at some point to interview me to which I said yes. I hope getting this out to the media will help those families that are in the process behind us.

Here I am multitasking:



So now it’s off to bed. Denver had a really good supper. He ate and drank more than he has yet so I’m hoping for another good night’s sleep. I went down to the computer here at the guest house and tried to send email. I couldn’t get on the right website so I called Mike. He called me back but by the time I got off the phone I didn’t feel like going back down to try his suggestion for emailing. I took a shower and went to bed.