Ethiopia!!

Well I’m back from Ethiopia! It was a great time, of course not without challenges, but over all I can say it was awesome. The majority of the time was spent working with the 13 young girls from Garbage City who are now making t-shirts instead of working in the dump. It was cool to just spend time with people and just live life with them for a while!

Everyday after school the girls come to for two hours to work. They sew t-shirts, we listen to music and just have fun times together, and then sometimes have a short English lesson! On Saturdays they come earlier in the afternoon and take showers wash clothes and we just hang out play games and have lunch together! Then On Sundays we take some of the Girls to church. It was so fun to get to know them all over the time I spent there and they are all amazing! We were extremely limited in our communication with each other because they speak very little English and we speak very little Amharic! But it forced me to learn a lot more Amharic words than I knew before so we were able to communicate on a basic level, which was great! They are just like normal teenage girls so it was really fun to hang out with them. Most of the girls I had met before while they were still working in the dump and so it was amazing to see the transformation from then to now and it was a privilege be a part of that and to see that now they have to opportunities for a better life! They can have hope again and that’s awesome and inspiring! We plenty of brainstorming times and came up with new t-shirt designs and worked on improving the quality of the shirts being made! Yea I really really enjoyed the time there and I was really sad to have to leave! I can’t wait to go back again hopefully for a longer time than 1 ½ months although I’m not sure when exactly that will be!

Traveling back was quite the adventure and I still haven’t quite made it to Germany! With the volcano and everything all the airports in Germany were closed! So I got to Istanbul and then waited for 9 hours to get through the line for people waiting to rebook their flights! Had some Turkish delight samples and ate some left over French Fries in Burger King. Then I finally ended up catching a flight to Vienna, Austria. On the flight I met a couple from Australia who are currently living in Vienna they invited me to stay for a few nights at their place until I can get the train up to Germany on Saturday! So I’m very happy to have a good rest after traveling and thankful that I didn’t have to sleep in the train station! The city is absolutely beautiful so I feel super blessed. But I’m still a little sad and missing the girls and friends back in Ethiopia! And I could really go for some Injera and Shiro Wat (the cultural food that we ate almost everyday!).

I’m very excited an anxious to get back to Germany and see all my lovely friends again! And also to finally see the book printed and finished WOOHOO! Thanks to all the people who supported us! I’m so excited to finally have the book in hand! And also for tour! I’ll be coming to the states around the middle to end of may and then be there until the middle of July for tour and spending time with my family!

I post some more info on tour dates later but we will be coming to PA everyone in the area should come out and see it will be super fun yes! And yes more information will come for that in a few days. When I find out all the details!

Yes so that’s all I have for now I’m going to enjoy Austria!

Love
Melody.