Trees of Glory....Duber, Ethiopia

Today we went to the town of Duber, to visit "Trees of Glory" orphanage. This care point is different than the others we have visited in that children do live there. It is located a few hours drive from the city where they are able to have gardens, livestock and egg laying chickens. I have to tell you our north woods group was very happy to get out if the city for a bit.
The director gave us a tour of the facilities and grounds. We saw the sparse yet cheerful dorms. They had just installed a new kitchen which you will see in the pictures that they now have water! Thanks to Childrens Hope Chest.

It was a privilege to serve the children their lunch. Lunch was a "fasting" lunch meaning it did not contain meat. Many of the children are orthodox and do not eat meat at all during lent.
We enjoyed time sharing singing and performed a skit with for the kids. We then broke up into small groups. Everything took a little longer because it had to be translated into two different languages. Heather and I had a group of 18 in a room the size of a bowling lane. They were great kids and thankfully we had their teachers in the room to try and interpret for us. We made clothespin dolls, bead bracelets and coloring pages. Even the male teachers (and there are only male teachers)wanted a little pony bead bracelet.
It was time for group games when the thunder and downpour happened. Now we were stuck inside with nothing to do. Panic. The windows were closed....hot and stuffy. We started dragging things out of midair and the recesses of our brains. Gotta say, we came up with some pretty good stuff. We even had all the kids take turns jump roping for a sticker reward! We had them reach us some words ....and they found our attempts of pronunciation rather hilarious. It turned out to be really fun. Halley and Anna even had their own group and successfully handled the challenge without help!
We ended our day there with the traditional coffee and popcorn ceremony given to us personally by the director herself. She is a single woman who loves these children with her whole heart.
We returned to Addis and met the students from the Youth Development Program for dinner. These are young people from orphanages who are now to old to be there. They would now be on their own or in the streets if it not for this program. Students are selected to participate in the program and then live in a home together while they study. We were each placed at the table in between the students so we could get to know them on a deeper level. I for one was not too disappointed in missing out on bowling!
Our team is holding there own health wise. Still recovering but those suffering have been able to maintain activity but are currently not eating much. Thanks for your
prayers.