 |
Road from Gonder to Lalibela, Ethiopia. January 2011.
|
Ten years ago, I published this post from my two-month, solo trip to Ethiopia.
Revisiting the post evokes mixed feelings.
Sadness. Confusion. About the violence and terror that some Ethiopians have been suffering since November 2020, with the Ethiopian president's military actions against certain Tigray groups.
Is the kind university student from the Tigray city, Aksum (a site of recent violence), with whom I shared a bus ride, safe? Ten years later, he's likely married with children. Are they safe? What about his sister, also a university student, who he told me about with so much affection? Is she safe?
How do I process the reaction from an Oromo friend (the Oromo are the largest ethnic group in Ethiopia), who expressed to me his satisfaction about the Tigray getting their comeuppance after the Oromo having suffered for so long under their thumb? He is a survivor of the Red Terror. An older brother was a political prisoner for many years, separated from his wife and children. Another brother, the baby of the family, almost died from starvation in prison after being captured as a soldier in an Eritrean-Ethiopian conflict.
[This 2018 NPR article, How an Exiled Activist in Minnesota Helped Spur Big Political Changes In Ethiopia, gives some background on the Oromo experience in Ethiopia. Jawar Mohammed, the center of the story, is now imprisoned in Ethiopia and has been on a hunger strike since January 27, 2021.]
Discomfort about my ignorance, my detachment. I acknowledged this discomfort - this embarrassment - in my original post, and chose back then to leave it unedited, as I do today. So many young adults, so few opportunities. For me it was an observation; for them, a painful reality. Or as one Ethiopian told me: "We are in the prison of our country; we cannot escape. You, you can visit us, and you can leave whenever you wish."
Pleasure. Awassa was one of my favorite places to be in Ethiopia. It was pretty. There were those fairy tale storks. The flying-ear bajaj. The lake. The resorts. That transcendent moment on the rooftop cafe, listening to a tizita, watching storks swooping gracefully in the sky, and the bajaj streaming down the leafy boulevard.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Ethiopia: Awassa, Day 1, Monday
I am in Awassa and I
think I am in heaven. After a dismal look-see at three rooms at the
Beshu Hotel, I walked down the street to the Blue Nile Hotel. A shower
that works! Water comes out! The toilet flushes! A TV! And God-in-heaven
-- an in-room mini-refrigerator, in which I immediately popped my
bottled water. What luxury. For 150 birr (about $10).
And there is purportedly an ATM in Awassa!
After kicking off my shoes, stretching out on the bed, and watching a
little television, I went down to the hotel restaurant for a late lunch.
Pretty courtyard. Many round tables, most shaded by palms or other
trees or a woven hut roof. A sweet breeze. The fragrant smoke of
frankincense wafted nearby. A cold Ambo.
The menu was pricey, but for the moment, I didn't care. A little yellow
bird even landed on one of the chairs at my table and tweeted at me. The
waitress welcomed me to Awassa.
So let me move back to the beginning of the day, at the Bale Mountain Hotel in Dodola.
Got up a little before 7:00 a.m. Did the usual things. "Soft" paper a
bit of an issue - the hotel doled out a small, nicely-folded ration, and
I had used the last of the roll I'd purchased before going on the Bale
Trek, and I had only a couple of kleenexes from my last little packet of
soft. Three days of shiro, albeit delicious, had had an effect on
things.
Got packed up and went out to the restaurant patio for a good cup of
black coffee. My plan was to take a bus from Dodola to Shashamene;
numerous buses work this route in the morning, so there was no urgency
to leave super-early.
I was almost finished with my coffee when three faranji men passed
through the patio area. They were all from Belgium; they had flown in to
Addis with their bicycles, and were on a bike trek through Ethiopia. On
average, only one to two faranji come to Dodola in a day. Indeed, one
of the Belgians said I was the first tourist they'd seen since they left
Addis on their trek. One asked what to expect next on the road through
the Bale Mountains. Easy --> rocks and dust until you get out of
town. Get a bandana. The Belgians assured me they'd already eaten a lot
of dust and covered a lot of rocks.
At Lake Ziway, they took a boat across the lake to a "road" that was so
deep in dust they couldn't ride on (in) it. They had to push their bikes
through.
I mentioned my stay in Gorgora (can't remember why) and about the
British couple who fell into the hole. One of the Belgians exclaimed
immediately: "An Ethiopian tourist trap!" I loved this.
 |
| Example of a typical Ethiopian tourist trap |
Finished my coffee, collected a small ration of soft
from the manager, and returned to my room for that final trip to the
bathroom before a bus trip.
One of the restaurant men offered to escort me (and lug my bag) to the
bus station, which I accepted. He got me directly to the right bus,
pushed my bag up into same, and saw me on my way. A gratuity was
graciously offered and accepted.
Pleasant ride to Shashamene, where I got off to pick up a connecting bus to Awassa.
Shashemene really drives home how many Ethiopian boys and men there are
without enough to do. The girls and women are, generally, behind the
scenes. At homes, I guess. (In the rural areas of Oromia, at least,
married women do not even go to a restaurant unless accompanied by their
husbands.)
Over and over I hear about students who graduate from university, but there are no jobs for them.
So there are all of these boys and men who are un- or under-employed.
I got off the bus at Shashamene and there was young man after young man
after young man who hoped for money from me in exchange for carrying my
bag or getting me to the bus I seek. Nobody got anything this round. One
guy mentioned to me he needed money for school, but it seemed mostly
out of habit that he said this and not out of any belief he'd get
anything. It must be so demoralizing. All of this pent-up talent and
energy, with no place to go. A bleak future of one day after another,
each the same. A dangerous situation for any regime.
It ended up that some women helped me find the bus I wanted. This was
one of those bus boarding situations where it was every man for himself,
and I tried to get myself in front of the johnny-come-latelys, giving
them the evil eye, while making way for those who were before me. I was
lucky -- a friend of the bus driver saved me a seat. A completely
undeserved break, merely because I was faranji (I assume). The yin and
yang of faranjidom in Ethiopia.
Back to the Blue Nile Hotel, a few hours later. OK, the refrigerator
light came on, but that was all the work it was able to accomplish. The
electricity went off a couple of times in my room, but resumed.
 |
| Bajaj in Awassa. Photo credit: Jirenna |
I took a blue bajaj (tuktuk) to the Dashen Bank in the
piazza. Flush with cash from the ATM, I started walking back to the
hotel and went by a supermarket. Wow! Grapefruit juice! Nescafe coffee!
Cheese! (Alas, this was before I knew the refrigerator really didn't
refridge
I brushed off some aggressive beggars (who grabbed my arm, a first for me in Ethiopia) on my way back to the hotel. [Given
the paragraph preceding and following, I'd like to just delete this
statement, as the contrast between my life and theirs is galactic. But
it is the reality, so I let it stand in its discomfort. Life just plain
isn't fair.]
Upon my return, I relaxed the rest of the day and evening in my hotel
room. Had dinner from the hotel restaurant. As with the earlier lunch,
only very ordinary.
