All of Your Ethiopian Ties Questions Answered
Thinking about traveling to Ethiopia with Ties but have questions about the 2026-2027 trip? This blog post is for you!
Why is the trip over US Christmas time?
We chose December because we want to give the best possible experience to adoptees and their loved ones and we felt like December did that.
There are various factors that go into when we run a trip, one of them is the best time of year to travel to a country. June to September is the rainy season in Ethiopia, which can make travel challenging, especially in rural communities.
Many of our December trips run right after Christmas, departing often on the 26th. Vietnam, Cambodia, and India have all long been run in December because of similar better-time-of-year to travel reasons. However, Ethiopia is largely Christian Ethiopian Orthodox, which celebrates Christmas on a different calendar (January 7th). While traveling in Ethiopia before/during/after Orthodox Christmas (or any major holiday in a country) can be a really wonderful experience, it tends to be more expensive, crowded, and complex, so in this case fitting the trip in before Orthodox Christmas was necessary. This made traveling during December 25 the best option.
Additionally as Ties and adult adoptees grow and age, we’re offering trips at all times of year. When Ties first started, most trips ran in the summer because adoptees who were traveling were school-aged, but that’s changed. We have trips to China and Korea in the fall and our India Ties Kolkata trip is in February. Now many of our participants are required to take PTO or in some cases unpaid time off from work, and we’ve seen success in traveling over U.S. holidays as it reduces time taken off work.
How did the inaugural Ethiopian Ties trip go?
Great! Check out Inside the head of our Travel Team: Marisa reflects on our inaugural trip to Ethiopia for more information.
What’s changed from the inaugural trip to the 2026-2027 trip?
We’ve added two days to the trip! The 2025 trip had two families on the trip. One family traveled a day early and it seemed to help with their jetlag and overall experience so we decided that all Ties participants should have this time to settle in before exploring the country as a group.
We added a third day to the Uniquely Yours portion to provide additional wiggle room, should there be any issues with travel for birth family visits.
Note: there were no issues in 2025, but we foresaw that with even one more family added to the trip there could be challenges that would affect the group as a whole. This also allowed us to provide an optional excursion to Lailibela for those not having reconnection visits. Participants can also add this to the end of their trip or choose to visit Blue Nile Falls as extensions. And we switched up the hotel in Addis to reduce hotel costs and provide easier access to sights in Addis at the beginning of the trip, and to the airport at the end.
I want to search for and reconnect with birth family or other important people and places to me - is it possible?
We are happy to help you with reconnecting with birth family and other people and places that are important to your adoption story. In regards to searching, we provide you with the contact information of four searchers that adoptees have had positive experiences with (this does not mean birth family is always found). We believe adoptees should choose the searcher that works best for them as it’s a very personal process. You’ll work with the searchers directly, looping us in as the search progresses. In country we set aside several "Uniquely Yours” days, which are designed for adoptees and loved ones to have personal experiences. Those who choose to reconnect usually reconnect on these days.
What Ethiopian adoptees are on your Ethiopian Ties team?
Ties does not currently have Ethiopian adoptees on staff, and we wish we did! I think this is largely because we’ve only had one group trip to Ethiopia and haven’t had time to develop long term relationships with potential Ethiopian travel team members (many of our adjunct team members were participants in Ties trips previously). Our staff includes adoptees from Korea, China, India, Vietnam, Guatemala, Peru, Paraguay and many more! We are always looking for adoptees to join our team.
Note: After 30+ years, we’ve learned that it’s not always best to have adoptees staff in their country of birth. Staffing is an emotionally challenging and complex experience (and also so rewarding!). It’s one that can be especially challenging for adoptees, who are constantly being forced to look at their individual identity through the lens of assisting other adoptees and their loved ones navigate the experience, all while managing the logistics of a group trip. Piling on the emotional challenges of having your own birth country experience can be too much for some. Staff for each trip is discussed by a group of our core staff and tailored to the needs and experiences of the group traveling.
Are your in-country Ethiopian staff former adoption agency workers? What training on adoption issues do they have?
We vetted at least six travel agencies in Ethiopia and chose a company that is not run by former adoption agency workers. Our in-country teams across the globe are experts in travel, and not always in adoption and identity. We want the in-country team to successfully get a group from point a to point b, accounting for cultural sensitivity while our adjunct staff brings in the experience and expertise on adoption by helping adoptees and their loved ones navigate the emotional experience. We chose our in-country team in Ethiopia for their experience with taking amazing care of travelers. That being said, all the travel agencies we spoke with ended up having some sort of connection with adoption in Ethiopia. The company we chose did not have experience while adoptions were occurring in Ethiopia, but rather, has assisted adoptees and their loved ones on heritage trips in the last ten years. We felt like this was the right level of experience, given the complexities of adoption in Ethiopia when they were occurring.
This trip seems expensive for a trip to Ethiopia, why the price?
There are many factors that go into pricing trips. Our rate reflects the costs of Ties staff traveling, in-country partner costs, activity costs, in-country transportation, meal inclusions, and much more. Given the political climate in Ethiopia, we prioritized safety over cost reduction in some places (it’s far cheaper to drive from Addis to Hawassa, for example, but it isn’t as safe so we have participants flying instead). Finding places to eat where people could explore and feel safe was another, so we included more meals on this trip then trips in other countries (in Korea, for example, we almost never include hotel breakfast because it’s SO EXPENSIVE and easily accessible on your own). Lastly, having not just local guides, but experts on adoption travel with the group is expensive. If we could find a way to provide the same level of services we have found works best for adoptees and their loved ones at a lesser price, we would, but every time we’ve tried, it hasn’t worked out well and we’re not willing to compromise on the level of service we provide.
Ways to help defer the cost:
Gift of Identity gives out generous grants for Ties trips. Gift of Identity is a separate entity that has a limited number of funds and prioritizes those who are in greatest need. Questions about the application and the process can be directed to Info@GiftofIdentityFund.org. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that applications for the Ethiopia trip are due by March 31st.
Past Ties participants have seen success with GoFundMe campaigns and we’ve been pleasantly surprised over the years how many people provide support however they can.
Have more questions?
Feel free to reach out to Ben Kaanta, Ethiopian Ties Program Manager, at ben@thetiesprogram.org or by text or phone at +1 (303) 381-3041.