The best part of my day is always day care pick up. When the weather is nice my pick up time usually coincides with Little Babes’ outside time. So, if I’m lucky, I can sneak in and peak through the fence and watch him at play. I love to watch him when he doesn’t know I’m looking.
Yesterday we had an experience that topped me being able to spy on my son. As we were walking out the door, a woman and her daughter were walking out with us. Little Babes is a dwaddler when he’s walking on his own. The woman and her daughter had gotten into their car, which was parked behind us, while I was still getting the baby into his carseat. I noticed the woman waving at TK and him just watching her.
She got out of her car and came up to me and asked, “Was he born here?”
I told her, “No, he’s Ethiopian.”
She said, “Oh yes! That is why he is so beautiful!” She is also Ethiopian and her daughter, who is 5, has been going to Little Babes’ day care since she was born. She asked me, “Why have I not seen you before?” and we just started chit chatting from there.
I’ve noticed that when I have met Ethiopians while I’m with the baby they are much more forward and open about their questions regarding TK’s background versus Americans who hem and haw around the subject and hint at what they really want to ask. It can be both refreshing and anxiety inducing.
This was not any different. She asked about his family but also told me about a girl she was sponsoring back home who was like a daughter to her who passed away from malaria. We chatted a bit about how sad it is that these illnesses claim the lives of so many Ethiopians when drugs exist to save them if they were easier to access.
Her daughter came out of the car while we were talking and the woman introduced her and spoke to her in Tigrinya (language of the people who live in Northern Ethiopia, near the Eritrean border).
Before they left she told me, “We should get them together to play!”
Yes yes yes. Let’s get them together to play.
3 comments:
I know what you mean about watching your kid when they don't know you're watching them. What is that?
Awesome, about meating that Mom from Ethiopia with a daughter in the same preschool.
She Selam-ed you. That is AWESOME. Oh how I hope to be Selam-ed some day.
This is so cool! I think I have met her before. Another Ethiopian woman I met once in a store told me about a little girl she was trying to bring here from Ethiopia but who died of malaria. This has to be the same person. She is lovely.
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