Ethiopia (Part two)

On the second day in Addis, we were picked up by the local head of Compassion Ethiopia and were taken to see our sponsor child, Masresha.
I was so excited to actually meet this little girl that we have communicated with. She has smiled at me from my fridge for so long.
The trip through town was again quite insane and we handed out loads of granola and fruit bars at each stop in traffic.
At one stop, two TINY little boys ran up to the window and sang a little song for us and then said, "hungry"...I could have grabbed them and taken them home right there and then. They seemed delighted with a granola bar each and darted off through rush hour traffic, never to be seen again.
As I looked at the hordes of children and beggars, I always had to swallow a huge lump in my throat. I would dig my nails into my palms and bite my tongue to not cry...It is so sad to see mothers lying at the side of the road with their children sat beside them, holding out their little hands for something to eat.
We arrived at the school project and as we drove in, I caught sight of a little girl standing with a shy, sweet smile and clutching a ragged bouquet of wild flowers...Masresha! We were introduced and she gave us the flowers with a beautiful smile and very quietly slipped her hand into mine.
After looking at the school, being introduced to the staff and handing out yet more granola bars to the other children, we got back into the van and headed to her "house"...A mud/dirt hut with one mattress and a couple of benches.
Her mother bowed to the ground in front of us and the worker told us that she was saying thank you, thank you....oh how easy it is to send off $30 a month and the occasional letter...but to these precious children it is life and death.
Her mother prepared a coffee ceremony (traditional in Ethiopia) roasting, grinding and brewing the coffee in front of us..I tried not to look as she swished the cups in FILTHY water before pouring the coffee in and I prayed the prayer taught to me by good missionary friends in Mexico...
"Where you lead me, I will follow,
What you feed me, I will swallow"
Well...it was delicious and an absolute honour to be served by her.
Suddenly, Masresha's 16 year old brother rushed in and also went round to each of us, bowing and saying thank you....let me tell you...if he was in Canada/U.S. he would be a great candidate for a supermodel!
He had fun showing Joshua his pet pigeons, bringing them in the hut and scattering seed for them...

Overall, it was an incredible day and I will never forget it.
The compassion worker told us that in their experience, if a sponsor family ever visited their sponsor child, the child's marks ALWAYS went up and they strived to work even harder than before. It is such an encouragement to these children to actually see their sponsors. (We were the second family to visit in the last 6 years)
It will be such a delight to write to Masresha and her family now and to send them some copies of the many pictures that we took.
If you don't sponsor a child (doesn't have to be through Compassion...although we were super impressed with their whole program and we were shown all the books etc), can I challenge you today to look into it?

(Tried to post some pictures of our visit with Masresha, but Blogger isn't letting me right now...will post some next time)