the most wonderful time of the year

it's almost christmas and the pinna hotel across the street draped tinsel all over their flowering trees and set up a cardboard nativity on the sidewalk. they even erected a christmas tree in their restaurant where people sit and sip fresh fruit juices with lime and where the mosquitos feast on us when we decide to eat our injera and shiro outside. every day is flip-flop weather, people sell pineapples, mangoes, bananas and papayas on the street, and colobus monkeys eye our lunch and occasionally make a grab for it. it's much too warm for a log fire and instead of wassail we're drinking macciatos and eating homemade trailmix instead of sugar cookies.

this is definitely the most unique christmas i've ever experienced. even though ethiopia follows its own calendar, and christmas isn't until january 7, i still doubt that even then there will be mobs of shoppers or stand-in santas on street corners or carols on the radio.

we just finished a seven-day trek from dodola to adaba through the western corner of the bale mountains in southeast ethiopia. we stayed at a different "public use hut" every night--beautiful, amazing, fully equipped cabins with dishes, pots and pans, kerosene cookstoves, a table and chairs, and bunk beds that the hutkeepers would make up with piles of warm blankets and sleeping bags for the chilly mountain nights. the outhouses even had sinks and sit-down toilets...luxury. after hiking around 18 km each morning, mandy and i would spend the rest of the day lounging in the sun, reading, writing, playing cards and enjoying the quiet. no one shouted "you!" "ferenji!" or "where do you go!" at us for seven whole days, we cooked our own meals instead of eating out, and used our own legs to get around. it was paradise. now we're back in awasa for the third time and we head to addis in the morning to meet up with mandy's parents, who are flying here for christmas.

ethiopia. at first glance i was overwhelmed by this country--i thought it was crowded, uncomfortable, strange. now i think about having less than a month left here and i wish we could stay longer. i'm still overwhelmed, but now i'm overwhelmed by ethiopia's beauty, by its diverse and stunning scenery, by the kind and generous people we've met, by the interesting and amazing experiences we have every single day. we've discovered ethiopian food that we love (and that we plan on cooking at home), we've learned a bit of amharic, and we've found comfortable and compatible ways of traveling together.

christmas in ethiopia. i love it.

Volunteer in Ethiopia

The volunteer program is up and running:

http://www.volunteer.org.nz/ethiopia

Check out the photo of Lori at the bottom...

Ethiopian Time

In my family we have an inside joke: anytime someone is late we say they were running on “Africa time.” Our experience in Africa so far has been that time is something completely different from what we know it to be at home. In Ghana if a tro-tro (bus) is supposed to come at 8am you will most likely be waiting until 9:30 or 10am…if you’re lucky. In my experience there is a two hour to two day window. One time I booked a tro-tro for a youth group field trip and it came two days late! Patty and Allen (the folks) have had the same frustrating, ahem, I mean, patience-teaching experience in Sierra Leone. My first time to Africa I became an expert at standing in line, under the hot sun, for hours on end, waiting for my tro-tro to arrive. Often the line would stretch over a mile and we would inch up person by person as each tro-tro filled up and the sun went down.

Time, and the concept of it, became so irrelevant that the word itself seemed absurd. The word “time” in Ghana seemed to have nothing to do with the time/space continuum, rather more to do with fancy, a working tro-tro, enough drivers, and a road that wasn’t blocked by mud. The word “time” in Ghana, Sierra Leone, West Africa, and for all I knew, all of Africa, did not mean “time” as I knew it, and to continually conceive of time in this fashion made me crazy. So, in order to work on my patience and get through each day, I had to think of something else, instead of time. I could not think about how long I had been waiting, or whether or not it was time for dinner, or time to wake up; I had to zone out while in the queue for the tro-tro, amusing myself with daydreams and hissing at the ice-cream sellers to come my way. I had to wake up when my sweat soaked my sheets signifying the sun was up, and eat the evening meal when the laundry was done, the water had boiled, and the rice was cooked. Sunrise and sunset signified a new beginning and a time to reflect.

Coming to Ethiopia I had “Africa Time” on my mind. I knew it would be another exercise in patience; maybe another three months would do me good. Yet again, I was surprised. Unlike like West Africa, Ethiopians seem to actually value punctuality! Here when we are told that we need to be at the bus station at 5:30 am, they are serious: the gates open, people trample each other, pushing and shoving to be the first to the bus, and madly press as many bodies through the small bus door as humanly possible in order to get the best seat. If someone tells us that they will meet us for coffee at 10am, they are there at 9:45am…so much for “Africa Time.” I think I will have to travel throughout all of Africa to find out where the “time” line is, dividing West from East, and late or whenever, to on-time and now!

There is one quirky time anomaly in Ethiopia, however. Ethiopians run on a 12 hour clock, but not the way we think of it: “12:00 in the morning” is 6am and “12:00 in the evening” is 6pm. This was incredibly confusing when we first arrived. There are two forms of time here: Ethiopian time and Western time. Therefore, when you are asking someone what time to catch a bus, or what time a restaurant opens, or even what time it is at any given moment, you must clarify which time they are referring to once they have given you a response. Lori and I have gotten used to adding six hours when someone tells us the time, but it is often the most baffling when we are in an internet café. Invariably some computers are set to Ethiopian time, some are set to Western Time, and some are not set at all, and the time is completely random. So, the two of us will be engrossed in our emailing, knowing that we need to catch the minibus at a certain time, and realize well over an hour into surfing that we have different times on our computers. From here we try and decipher the time by looking outside, and when that proves fruitless, we ask someone, and then decide whether or not they have told us Ethiopian time or Western time…a vicious cycle! So, not only does Ethiopia have a 13 month calendar, it runs on its own time. I am back to my pondering on whether or not I can even use the word “time” at all…

It’s as if we have entered a different world coming to this country and I am struck by the beauty of Ethiopia’s obstinacy. I have never been somewhere that had not yet converted to the western scheme of time, in general. Ethiopia would rather just have both: when you go into an office, the desk calendar has the Western date and the Ethiopian date. They are straddling two different times and dates, rather than picking one or the other. (Did I mention they are seven years behind us? Yep, it was the Ethiopian Millennium this year! So, does that make me seven years younger? Maybe I’ll stay…) I love the pride in their voice as they tell you, “It’s 2:00” with a smile. (That’s either 8am or 8pm depending on the angle of the sun.)

Since coming to Ethiopia my concept of “African time” has changed, just as my worldview has changed. Each day we get a little better at telling time the Ethiopian way, and each day as we sink into this time and place we feel a bit younger…

More Photos - November

Photos from November...
The camels coming out of the desert on the salt caravan

Day one in the Danakil Depression: the eerie sulphuric hot springs

More of the Mars-like sulphuric structures

Solomon, our killer driver, with Lori and the Land Cruiser

Day three in the Danakil: Erta Ale, an active caldera volcano

Finally! Photos! (From October)

Photos from October...finally...The amazing ceiling mural at Debre Bihan Selassie church in Gonder

Market Spices in Gonder, used for making Bere Bere

Sunset at Gich Camp, day three of our Simien Mountains Trek

From the summit of Immet Gogo, one of the boys who came to greet us on the precipice

The summit of Rash Dashen! Tired from the altitude (4533m): Mandy, Mike, Lori and our lovely armed scouts!

Man and Beast

One of the things I have been struck by since I have been in Ethiopia is animal power. In Ghana everyone carried everything on their heads. I saw people carrying everything from a tub of coconuts weighing more than me, to an entire tree trunk, centering themselves in the middle of it for balance. Daily I was humbled by their strength. Were Ghanaians endowed with superhero strength in their necks and heads?

Anything one could possibly need could be found on another’s head. Never was I in want. I could be sitting in a tro-tro (bus) waiting for it to fill up and eat a three course meal: pineapple as an appetizer, tofu or meat on a stick as a main course, and ice cream in a bag as dessert; all from different vendors calling out their wares as they walked by. Having spent so much time there, I thought this is how they did it in Africa; not so in Ethiopia.

Here the animals easily outnumber the humans, which is hard to believe for the third largest population on the continent. But for each person walking down the road there are easily four or five donkeys using the same freeway. Horses, mules, donkeys, cattle (many different kinds), sheep, goats, camels, use the same streets and sidewalks as humans and are carrying all the weight. Each donkey that passes is laden with towers of eucalyptus bundles or large plastic jugs of water. The horses are tired from carting the humans to and fro on rickshaws up and down the hill towns. Mules are burdened with stacks of backpacks, stoves, and food for the eager trekkers in the Simien Mountains. Cattle perform gravity-defying angles on sheer cliffs, carving out the sides with tracks for the crops. Camels tower above them all caravanning the salt hundreds of kilometers. The humans walk alongside the beasts cracking the whip. Isn’t it a sign of society’s advancement when they trade human labor for bestial labor? Or is it just that the climate in West Africa is too inhospitable for animals of this quantity?

Either way you look at it, it’s better for the people here, but not so good for a lazy shopper like me. Lori was looking forward to the machete-cut pineapple and green drinking coconuts that I promised her would be at our beck and call, and I am not used to planning ahead before a 12 hour bus ride. Where are all the vendors outside my mini-bus window with everything at the perfect height for someone sitting on the bus? Now I must buy my Hip-Hop cookies, oranges, and nuts before I get on the bus at 5am. This type of lucidity is hard for me, even the day before. Supermarkets are great when walking around town and camels are pretty rad animals, but I’ll take my 5’9” super-human-powered store any day of the week!