And the Waiting Continues

No, we didn't pass court Nov 28. Everything at court went very well and everything is taken care of expect one thing: Beamlak's dossier file. It has been lost. That's right, lost.

I was so grateful that Jessica, my social worker, called to tell me our status on Nov 28, even though she was out of the office for the holiday. I had prepared myself for another delay in bringing Beamlak home - but it's still no fun of course. When Jessica called she stated that everything is complete in court EXCEPT the review of Beamlak's dossier as MOWA (The Ministry of Women's Affairs) had forgotten to forward her file to the court. We talked about MOWA and it's offices as I have met with the Minister and other officials there - talking about where the files might be held, etc. It's particularly scary because I know that no official has a computer at the Ministry, so everything is in hard copy and nothing would be saved somewhere on a computer.

It wasn't until Tuesday that I received the news that it was officially lost and my worker informed me:

"...as of today, your file has still not been located. He said MOWA is doing everything they can to locate it. I will continue to follow up with Belay and as soon as I know more, I will let you know. He was out of town today, but will be going to MOWA to check about this during the week this week."

And so the wait continues. If/when they find the file there are two possible avenues:

1. The judge will approve the adoption without having to schedule another court date because the error was on the side of MOWA not the agency.

OR

2. I will have to be given another court date and the opinion will be given there. (Earlist is in January)

I'm hoping for OPTION 1 but Jessica says that they are becoming more strict on giving opinions without an official court date, so we'll have to wait and see. What stinks is that until they file is found/recreated I won't know which option I'm waiting for and therefore cannot get a court date.

Oh the drama continues. It doesn't look like I'll be spending the American Christmas in Ethiopia, but I'm going to be hopeful that I can celebrate Timkat and Christmas in January with Beamlak!

Thank you everyone for your thoughts and prayers!
Bettina