Ethiopia

Ethiopia


Click on the above "Ethiopia" to view a slide show, make sure your sound is on for the music!"

UP

Have you seen the movie UP? It is pretty cute and a little sad and it makes your heart feel all good inside... But I bring it up in the blog for a different reason. There is a dog in the movie named "Dug" and Dug has a collar that allows him to talk. Dug is a bit of a doofas, and one thing he says in the movie is "I have just met you and I LOVE YOU!"

I was Dug in Ethiopia. I had learned the word for thank you and for I love you and I tended to get them mixed up. Often. Daily, I would tell people, complete strangers, other professionals, store owners... that "I loved them". In the airport before we left I bumped my luggage into something and the attendant started laughing. Jill came up behind me and saw the laughter and said to the man: "Did she just tell you she loved you?" Which I did NOT, but of course this sparked lots of I love you's all around. Finally as we were walking in the "hallway" from the aiport to the airplane the attended passed us one more time and yelled "Oh-de sha-lu!" for the entire (Amharic speaking) plane to hear. Of course I had to yell "Oh-de-ha-lu" back.

So again back to Dug and UP. I found went to YouTube to find a clip of Dug saying "I have only just met you and I love you" and in finding this clip I realized there is a lot more of Dug in me that just that one line. If you are inlined click on the link and decide for yourself:

Dug the Dog

Samuel

This blog is from a guest blogger, Jill VanderBent about our time in Ethiopia

The first day we arrive in Ethiopia we were shown the town and did some shopping at the Post Office shopping place. We shopped for very affordable souvenirs. While we were shopping we met some young boys who were there selling gum, and begging. They were very cute and Sarah and I enjoyed talking with them and teasing them. When they first spotted us they yelled “Mother”. Sarah and I found this very humorous and began our banter with them. One boy was drawn to me because he liked my shoes. He had some old beat up, worn down tennis shoes on and said he needed my black shoes with white stripes to play soccer. I joked with him and informed him that if I gave him my shoes I would have nothing to wear. I joked with him that I enjoyed soccer as well. He found this humorous but still attempted to gain my shoes by softly begging and puppy dog eyes. I ended up giving him some money and some candy.
About 5 days later we returned to our favorite shopping place and yet again the boys were there. They yelled “Sarah” from across the street, which was much better than the “mother” we had previously been called. Again my friend wanted my shoes but I joked with him again. I told him that I loved the cross necklace he was wearing and showed him mine. I attempted to tell him this was good in Amharic. He allowed me to take his picture and I informed him that he was “Con Jo”, which means cute. He loved this and blushed! I indicated that we were due to leave in 1 more day back to the US. He wanted to know if I would ever return and the only response I had was “God willing”. He replied, “me too”. This was very sweet. So I gave him a little money, and we said our goodbyes.
As we pulled away in our cab, Samuel came running after us. This was so sweet, but little did I know he was running after us to throw his cross into the window at me. I lipped thank you and he was smiling so big. I was so touched by this gesture and could not believe he wanted me to have his cross. I was smiling ear to ear and also trying not to cry at the same time.
The next day was our last day and still could not believe that Samuel wanted me to have his cross. To me this little boy had very little to his possession, begged often for money, yet gave me his necklace. I knew that before I left Ethiopia I had to find him and give him my shoes. Luckily he was there again and I waved him over to our car. As I handed him my shoes, he smiled at me with great excitement and immediately sat down to put them on. He loosed the laces and stretched them out wide in attempt to squeeze his feet into them. We were both very bummed when they didn’t fit but he asked me so sweetly, “may I give them to my sister”. Absolutely I say and I give him a pad of paper, and tell him “God bless you”. He writes down his name and said, “don’t forget”.

Pictures

I want to thank all of you faithful and new readers who followed my journey to Africa. Since I was not able to post pictures while I was there I did go back and add them to the blogs if you are interested. I will put a few here of some of my favorite people, events and places that did not fit with any blog "themes" but that I love anyways.

Home again, home again, jiggity Jig.

Well I have arrived home safe and sound. The trip was easier than I thought. The hardest part was working on expense reports! Josh said he would pick us up which made me happy, but he surprised me by taking the girls out of school. I hugged and hugged all of them. When I travel abroad, I find I have to tuck my home and family it to a tiny spot in my mind so I do not miss them so much. There is also so much to experience and learn that I do not have much time to be homesick. It always sinks in during the quiet of the night when I long for their hugs, sweet voices and laughter and the simplistic of being a family.

I wanted to stay up as late as I could so I can try to get back into the right time zone. I made it until 7:30 and asked my kids to put ME to bed for a change. It was so sweet. They read me a book, sang me a song and gave me kisses and hugs. I was asleep before they left the room. I slept like a rock for 12 hours and woke up to the smell of "buna" and the sound of NPR. It may not be mango juice and crepes, but I love my mornings at home. Josh and I often get up before the girls, drink our buna and talk. It is a luxury I hope I never lose.

Then I drove to work and realized I was feeling very overwhelmed and confused. I could not take in all the order around me. Where are the donkeys and goats? Where is the traffic? The smell of Diesel? The people? This was the first time I was alone in a car in 2 weeks. I was lonely.

I was met at the office by lots of smiling faces. My coworkers are so wonderful. I hugged and kissed them and told them to get used to the new, affectionate me. They graciously listed to our stories and laughed and cried with us. Then on to client work. I figured emails and phone messages were first. 10 messages on voice mail...not too bad. 266 emails... really not bad at all! I arrived home to a lot of good news for a lot of my clients. The best was one of the older boys I had met in Awassa was matched while I was gone! I got to talk to his parents and let them know what an amazing boy they are adopting. I LOVE MY JOB!

So tonight I will snuggle with my kids, put away laundry, try to get pictures on the blog and facebook,write some reports for the grant, finish my expense reports and maybe read some of my book. Who am I kidding, I am going to be at 8 with my kids.

Leaving, on a jet plane

We are not leaving until midnight so about 8 p.m we start packing our bags. We had committed to bring over 50lbs of coffee back as well of tons of gifts and our regular stuff. Coffee beans are stuffed everywhere! Souvenirs are crammed into corners wrapped in clothes to stay safe. Jill and I were ready to go with our stuff, but not in our hearts. We were worried about an emotional breakdown and felt anxious about saying goodbye and leaving the country we love. But all emotions had to be set aside once we entered the Ethiopian airport. First we go through security. Shoes off, 4 50lbs bags on the belt, through the metal detector, beeeeeep, watch off, back through the metal detector. Then my bag gets picked to be examined. Next line is the ticket line. Bags weighed, all of mine and Jill’s passed except Jill’s carry on. So transfer coffee beans to already full suitcase and we are cleared to go. Except they can not print tickets for us. There is a problem, the ticket people say go to the gate and they will print you tickets from Amsterdam to Detroit to G.R. O.K. Then we are on to the next immigration line. After about 20 minutes we get to the front and they ask for our exit paperwork. “what exit paperwork?!?” Off we go to find the exit paperwork and back in line. After waiting in this line for about 5 minutes they let us cut to the front. Why we were in a hurry? I have not idea cause you guessed it, another line. Another security check. Shoes off, luggage up, watch off…. Then on to the next line where tickets are check. I asked her to print me her tickets. She said she can not and to wait for the KLM person to come. So we wait for the KLM person to come. He says he can not print tickets, there is no printer up here. So he walkie talkies down to the desk, who now has to print us tickets and bring them up. So here we sit. With tickets only to Amsterdam waiting in a very crowed terminal feeling very tired and stressed and wishing the next day away so we can be home.

Oxymoron

The Ethiopians are very progressive with some of their laws. For instance it is illegal to talk on the phone while driving. So you see a lot of people pulled over on the side of the road to answer a call. In the States, we have been trying to pass this law for a long time. Way to go Ethiopia.

Here is the thing though, while you cannot talk on your cell phone while driving you can do the following: Stand in the back of a pick up truck, cling to the back of a full truck, Stick half your body out of the window to tell pedestrians where the bus/taxi is going, take your cows/goats/sheep for a walk down the busiest street in Addis Ababa, cram 70 people in a bus built for 20, drive 4 cars side by side in a 2 lane road, stand up on a small rickety cart pulled by a donkey down the major 2 lane highway, sit on top of a 6 foot high pile of hay/sticks/grass on the same rickety car on the same busy highway, (you may also sleep on this hay or stand on the back of the cart holding on to the hay for support). I think you can probably guess that I have yet to see a car seat.

But, do not worry, not one of these people is talking on his/her cell phone!

Danny

I think tonight is the night I will tell you about Danny. He is our taxi driver. How simple is that right? Why would I need to blog about a taxi driver. You will hopefully understand by the end. All Jill and I knew is that we would have a driver for our time in Ethiopia and his name was Danny. He would pick us up from the airport.

Now, If you have ever traveled for over 24 hours, arrived in a completely and total foreign land, survived customs and felt complete and total exhaustion, then you know how important it is to be met and reassured by a friendly face. We saw Danny in the crowd holding up a Bethany Christian Services sign. We saw his smiling face, we heard our names, we heard ENGLISH! At this moment, Jill and I knew that Danny was our lifeline. He carried our luggage and delivered us safely to our guest house.


As the week continued we quickly learned that Danny is a very wise, faithful and thoughtful man. He loves his work first because it helps support him and his extended family (he is not married), secondly, because he loves to meet new people and learn from them. We asked why he was not married (he is 29) and he replied it was very important for him to have a good job, in which he is not working every day for 12 to 16 hours and that he has money saved up to buy a home. He stated it is very important to meet a woman who has his same beliefs about learning, contentment and family.

Danny lives in his mother’s home with his brother, his sister-in-law and their 2 children. But Danny does not stay there, he sleeps in a back room of his brother’s pharmacy so that his brother and family can have privacy. He often gets calls in the middle of the night for work and does not want to disturb the family. He loves his little room, he washes his own clothes by hand and he cooks for himself. He smiles when he talks about his work, his family, his life, because he is so happy and content.

Danny has been our Amharic teacher. He will not let us use English if we have learned the Amharic word. Every day he teaches us new words, we have to repeat them over and over and write them down. When we write them down he looks to make sure it is correct. If we do not remember he makes us try before he gives us the word. It is amazing how much I have learned driving through the city with Danny.

Danny also wants to learn everything about English. EVERYTHING. We teach him new words as well, mostly slang. For example we taught him a lot of abbreviations which he thinks are hilarious! For example he now knows: FYI, ASAP, GDK (good to know), OOC (out of control) OMG (oh my goodness!) and a few others. When we teach him a new word he writes it on his hand and then looks it up in the dictionary later. He never forgets. You can see in quiet times in the car that he is whispering to himself. We also practicing saying “hello” in all the languages we all know together. Jill, Danny and I now can say hello in; English, Amharic, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Japanese and Chinese. We think we are pretty cool. We finally gave Danny a small spiral notebook for him to write in when he is driving. He loves it!

Danny knows so much about the city and about the people. He has so much patience, laughter and contentment. He is observant and has a very good sense of humor. We laugh so much with Danny and he loves to tease others. Jill and I both decided that Danny is our Ethiopian brother. We want to see him reach his dreams, find a wonderful, caring and humble woman and raise a family. Danny has a huge heart for children and I think, if he was given the chance at an education, he would make an excellent social worker.

Danny says he would like to go to the States. I would honestly hate to see him here. He would have such a hard life and would be treated poorly as a black, foreign taxi driver. He would miss the connection that the Ethiopian people have. He would miss the slower pace of life, the overwhelming acceptance of all people living, and Addis Ababa.

Ohdahalo Danny!

Seinfeld in Addis Ababa

I am thinking if you are an avid Seinfeld fan like myself, it really helps for cultural adaptation… for example… this is what I have noticed in Addis…

Low Talkers: they are everywhere, they barely whisper when they talk.
Close Talkers: this is a result of the low talkers. You have to be close to hear
Cat fight: every single night. Real cats though…☺
Luxury lanes: Remember when Kramer painted the lanes on the highway so they could be wider and more luxurious? Here are there are no lines painted to separate lanes, but instead of luxury…. They fit about 5 cars wide in what should be a 2 lane road…

That you, Jerry, for bringing a little of my culture to the other side of the world.

Bananas and Mangos

On the way to Awassa we stopped to give children our leftovers. We were mobbed by kids coming out of nowhere to beg us for food. We could not take it. So on the way home we bought bags and bags and bags of mangos and bananas to feed children. We told our driver to look out for small children and after a while he pulled over. Blen (of the of Bethany social workers) told the children they would get 2 pieces of fruit and not to beg. They all lined up nicely and took their banana and mango. I have never seen such happiness. The parents stood in the back at watched, so happy for their children. Blen and Helina said the children we so happy and totally surprised. Nothing like this had ever happened to them before. We did the same thing with 2 more groups of children. I have never seen children so grateful for fruit. They were in shock. They came to the van and smiled! I took pictures of them and then showed it to them. They had never seen a camera before and I realized when I showed them the picture, many of them had never seen themselves before. It was astounding. Most of the children were half naked. All of them were filthy with brown teeth. I am not sure what to think of this experience. I am sad for them that they have so little and will spend there life doing hard labor for little money, but I am also wondering if this is my dream I am projecting on them and maybe they are very content in their huts, with their family, their clan. They do not know the world outside of the country. It is not my place to judge, but my heart still hurts.

The Ride Home From Awassa

We spent 6 hours in the van today back to Awassa, I spent most of it looking out the window. It is amazing what you see on the road. I saw three dead dogs and a dying donkey. There are many small wooden carts piled high with straw going down the road. They are mostly children driving the carts and pushing them from behind. Some are standing on the back clinging for dear life. Others are sleeping on top of the straw. If the cart is empty, the driver is standing on top of it driving the donkey. We saw a cart full of straw tipped over on the side of the road, still attached to the donkey. It was horrible.

Also on the side of the road in the country there are people selling random things: stools, onions, watermelon, “firewood” (piles of sticks and straw). Our driver stopped twice to buy this to bring home. He just climbed on top of the van and the seller would throw it up there and off we would go. He would not even tie it down!

Children are always wandering alone, sometimes in groups, but always children without adults. They just walk down the road with no pants on and no one is at all concerned about this. Men are sitting and crouching along the road, in front of their houses, under trees, just doing nothing. Some are just lying there asleep. This could be in a small town or in the country along the highway. The men also just pee, doesn’t matter where they are or what is going on around them, they just stop and pee. We even saw a man doing a “#2” by a tree on the side of the road. Of course none of this is o.k. for women.


We often had to stop for donkeys, goats and cows crossing the road. We also had to stop for a policeman who randomly checks drivers license. There are many hitchhikers who are looking for rides back to Addis Ababa on Sunday. Instead of a thumbs up, they hold both palms up in the air. We saw only one person smoking. ONLY ONE! In fact I have been here for over a week and this is the 2nd person I have seen smoking with the exception of a few Western People. Amazing.

The country has many Orthodox people. Anytime they walk past a church they stop and bow and cross themselves three times out of respect. We saw people doing this a lot on the road. Orthodox people also drape themselves in white cloth. We saw Muslims praying in their fields and on the side of the road. We could hear the Orthodox and Muslim prayers through loud speakers in the little towns. The great thing is, they all live peacefully and respectfully.

I still can not get over how often I see men walking hand in hand. I see this more often than I do not. I am so touched by this and dread going back to our homophobic culture where it is horrible for men to touch beyond a hearty hand shake.

It seemed to be laundry day so any time we passed a river I saw women and children doing laundry in the river and laying it out to dry on the rocks. Others were carrying bags of wet laundry back to their “homes.” It also seemed to be water day. Children would be carrying large jugs of water to the river to fill up and bring back home. The lucky ones had donkeys to help haul the water.

As we drove, I just kept thinking, “I am in Africa.” I started thinking about what I wanted to write and looked at my pictures and realized there are no words for this experience. It is just too big. My mind can not make sense of what I am seeing and feeling. There is NOTHING like this in the States, NOTHING. There is nothing like this anywhere I have ever been. I wish you all could smell the smells, hear the words, see the people, feel the breeze…everything because there really is no way to make it real unless you are here.

“But Not the Hippopotamus”

This morning we woke up and headed straight to the Amoragedet Park. As soon as we got out of the car monkeys surrounded us. They were jumping on the car and stalking us. We got out some bread to feed them. Jill and I were a bit nervous, but after we saw Sara, Abraham and Dawit feed them with ease, I gave it a try. The little monkeys would grab it quickly and run away. Lots of these monkeys had very small babies clinging to them. As we were playing with the monkeys the largest birds of my life began approaching me. They were so ugly! We started to walk to the lake and were followed by the monkeys, some very random men with black teeth and lots of children selling gourds they carved. As we approached the lake there was a crashing noise in the trees above us. We looked up and saw tons of very pretty monkeys above us. They were black with white stomachs and big long white puffy tails. We were so excited. These monkeys slowly came down the trees and we began to feed them peanuts that had some what magically appeared. Then we were able to bribe them onto our shoulders to get them to eat. It was so cool! They are very light and would hold my hand so I could not pull it away while they ate.

When it was time to leave the monkeys, the man who had given us the peanuts to feed them began yelling in Amharic. I guess we were supposed to pay him. I have NO idea how much to pay a man who gave me peanuts with out me asking for them. I thought he was just being nice. So Abraham told me to give him 20 Birr. He was so offended by my pitiful sum that he refused it. I shoved it in his hand and walked away. He yelled after us. There are some times I think I am glad I can not speak Amharic.

We then arrived at the boats. They were pretty shabby looking, painted rainbow colors. We had to wear bright orange life jackets and climbed in. The boat was worse on the inside, but I figured, this is their job, they take these boats out every day, Chigarella! (no
problem). We push off and there are 6 of us and 2 “staff” in the boat. One was for driving and I learned later that the other was the water bailer. Yes, you read right. There was one man whose job it was to just bail water out of the boat that would leak through the bottom. Thank goodness he does his job well.

We drove across the lake with the sun shining down on us. We saw ducks and swans, we saw men fishing on tiny stick type boats that only had room for them to stand. It took amazing balance for them to fish! We finally made it to the Hippo area. I was a little afraid that one would just pop out of the water and grunt at us. Then we saw them in the distance. Just eyes, ears and noses peaking out of the water. I guess they are afraid of boats so they did not let us get close. We would see them all pop their heads in and out of the water. We watched for a while and saw about 10 hippos, one was a baby. We then went to look at birds and headed back to shore. I just kept thinking… “I had a monkey on my shoulder and I saw hippos in the wild!” How crazy is that!