Meet AVA

There has been a new arrival on our compound. My landlady's daughter, Genet, is settling into her role as a new mom and Aselef is enjoying being a first-time grandma. I had been invited to attend the birth (how interesting would that have been?), but this little one decided to arrive while I was in Addis. I returned home to find a beautiful little girl with a mop of curly black hair and was given the honor of naming her! Can you believe that?!? At first I thought I misunderstood (which is pretty much a given for me), but I hadn't. Genet wanted her daughter to have an American name and Amber and I were more than happy to oblige her. We hemmed and hawed, argued and debated, and ultimately realized that we were grossly unprepared to name a human. Neither one of us have named anything other than creatures belonging to the genus I like to call "furry and four-legged" with the exception of one chicken and 2 hermit crabs. We have always been great "namers", but this was different. The pressure was intense. It's one thing for a daughter to be upset with a mom for saddling her with an atrocious moniker, but this little one could hold a grudge against "farenjis" that may have rippling effects for years to come. Ok….perhaps I'm being a bit dramatic…but this was serious business. After mulling it over for the evening, trialing a host of names and taking into consideration the level of difficulty with pronunciation and spelling using the Amharic script, we both came up with the same idea at the same time. AVA! We love the name as well as the fabulous little girl (our 2nd cousin) that is our "original" Ava.