Hippos, Pterodactyl and Football...

Last weekend we went to Awassa to see the last few days of the Inter-University Sports Festival. My line manager was on the organisation committee and invited us to see the final but also mostly so that we could enjoy the beautiful lake-side town of Awassa. He is very thoughtful like that! We arrived on Friday just in time to watch the semi-finals of the football competition alongside the last of the athletics. They were both pretty amazing and I was impressed with the speed that they ran (some in the athletics even doing it without shoes), however, I couldn’t help but be distracted by the gigantic birds flying over head. From a distance these birds resemble storks and you can imagine them quite happily carrying a basket with a baby in... on closer inspection though they are one of the ugliest things I’ve ever seen and along with their size look more suited to carrying away adult sized humans! My VSO friends in Awassa affectionately referred to them as Pterodactyls and there definitely is something prehistoric looking about them!

We stayed in Awassa until Monday morning and it felt like a perfect holiday. It made me realise how much I miss living by open water and I felt quite envious of the other volunteers who live here! We spent most of the weekend with the Awassa Volunteers but met up with the Ambo contingency at least once each day. It was a perfect weekend of sun, walks, great food (they have some lovely Italian restaurants in Awassa), great entertainment (the football final and the closing ceremony of the festival being highlights) and great company. On Saturday we took a boat ride out to see the hippos and I enjoyed using the big zoom on my SLR to photograph a baby hippo. So cute!! We spent the rest of the day lazing around various, restaurants, cafes, bars (did I ever tell you it is a hard life being a volunteer?!).

On Sunday we got up really early to climb a local hill overlooking the lake with some other volunteers (any later and it just gets too hot) followed by a rather indulgent pancake brunch in one volunteer’s home. This volunteer was a retired Geography teacher and it was great being able to share Geography teaching stories (yes I know... Geek)! We then all joined our Ambo Colleagues for the football final...Wollega University vs Addis Ababa University. I’m not normally a great football fan but this was a fantastic game to watch... Wollega were 2 goals up until the last 10 minutes...then finally Addis won in a penalty shootout! Just before the match the festival had its closing ceremony which resembled that of the Olympics and even came with a 20 minute synchronised display involving about 200 local children. All very colourful and energetic... the atmosphere all afternoon was very festive!

On Monday we headed back to Ambo with the University Sports Teams. Maggie and I were placed on a bus with most of the female athletes. What should have been an 7 hour journey back turned into 12 as we stopped for an hour or so at a hot spring resort (a final treat) then had regular stops for coffee and food...and to let the engine on the bus cool! It was a very hot and uncomfortable journey and Maggie and I were thinking we should have just made our own way back on public transport (would at least have been faster) until the last 3km of our journey. This last bit made up for the previous 12 hours! Just outside of Ambo all the vehicles carrying athletes from the even met the Vice President to travel in convey to the university. For 3km we travelled at snail’s pace with the drivers honking their horns and all the passengers singing or chanting at the top of their voices. Maggie and I had no idea what we were singing but it was such a fantastic atmosphere as we sang and clapped our way onto campus and were greeted by cheering crowds! You’d of thought we had won the event... everyone was so ecstatic!

 

 

'Road Safety is No Accident'

‘Road Safety is No Accident’ is the slogan found at the bottom of every weekly update from VSO Ethiopia. Along with it comes a ‘top tip’ for the week about staying safe on the roads. Things like... ‘walk facing the traffic’... ‘wear white at night’ and ...‘cross at designated crossings’. It seems there is a major campaign to reduce road traffic accidents at the moment...and no wonder. 1996 statistics show that Ethiopia has the second highest (next to Central African Republic) rate of road fatalities in relation to the number of vehicles  globally (about 195 per every 10,000 vehicles). Over half of these being pedestrians. Every time I have taken a journey that has lasted over an hour I have passed at least one overturned lorry or minibus on the side of the road.

On the way back from Awassa on Monday we had plenty of near misses as our bus overtook the slow lorries on the road. We often had situations where we were overtaking a lorry only to find that ahead of us was a similar situation with a bus overtaking a lorry. So... four vehicles facing each other in a crazy game of chicken.. lots of honking, swerving and miraculously everyone back on their correct sides of the road just in time! The last 45 minutes of our journey was in the dark. Unlike some vehicles ours did at least have headlights and so herdsmen walking their cattle along the road had plenty of warning of our presence. They in turn warned us of their presence by flashing bright torches in our direction. Our driver quickly slowed the vehicle down... just in time! As we waited at a complete standstill for the cattle to pass, thinking we had narrowly escaped another collision, another bus came hurtling around the corner... its breaks didn’t seem so effective and it went ploughing into the cows (not us luckily). The cows in turn went ploughing into our vehicle with quite a thud and a couple ended up under the other bus. Amazingly, when the other bus backed up a bit the cows that had looked quite dead underneath quickly got to their feet and hobbled off. Our door had been quite badly knocked by the cows needed some considerable kicking before it was able to open again but otherwise everyone was fine.

This isn’t an exceptional story of travel in Ethiopia but really a case of the norm. I don’t want to scare you however... the drivers all seem to be well adapted to the requirements of driving in such crazy circumstances and all the vehicles I have been on have had good breaks and relatively sensible drivers. I try to avoid travelling at night (when most accidents occur) and in the rain (although this may be harder in the rainy season) and am normally so sandwiched into my seat by my bags that the lack of seatbelt does not seem so relevant!

On a more positive note Ambo town itself seems to one of the most road safety conscious places I have ever been! We are lucky enough to have nice pavements lining the main street and even still EVERYONE walks facing the traffic. The roads are busiest between 5pm and 6pm (although mostly with pedestrians) and during this time the ‘one way walking’ is most evident! I also enjoy watching the road at around midday when the two shifts of school swap over. The morning students walk home on the left and the afternoon students walk to school on the right (as you face down town from the university). Two long lines of green uniform snaking their way along the high street. Anyone visiting Ambo will quickly feel out of place if they find themselves walking on the wrong side of the road, such is the culture here. It is really quite impressive!

With various road safety campaigns and mandatory seatbelts for drivers in Addis I think the road mortality statistics must have improved since 1996 but it is still has a way to go. Apparently the seatbelt law in Addis caught seatbelt suppliers off guard and there are not actually enough seatbelts for every driver’s seat. However, due to hefty fines put in place for those not wearing a seatbelt some have taken to placing the straps of a bag over themselves to fool the traffic police. Although the bag straps are unlikely to save their lives at least all these efforts are making people much more aware of the need for road safety in Ethiopia.

Giant Moles

Today I came back from work to be greeted by what looked like about 30 giant mole hills on the dirt road leading to my house. Each ‘hill’ was about as tall as me. As I meandered through the piles of mud and contemplated what a ‘Giant Mole’ would actually look like I bumped into my friend Getachew. I asked him what was going on. He says that it is to get the road prepared for Tarmac (on closer inspection I did notice that there were also a large number of rocks scattered amongst the mud piles). Wow! No way! A tarmac road! Recently my friend Nancy was hugely excited by the tarmacing of her road (and I have to admit that when I went to visit this weekend I was rather awestruck) but she lives in Addis... I never thought such an event would happen in my neighbourhood! In Ambo, at the moment, it is only the main road running through the town that has tarmac...the other roads are an uncomfortable mixture of mud and rocks. I have seen no evidence of any other roads in Ambo being covered in huge mud piles in preparation for eventual tarmac so amazingly they seem to be starting with mine! It’ll probably take several months for them to work their way through all the stages that will eventually lead to a paved road but I am really excited none-the-less! No doubt tonight my dreams will be filled with beautiful smooth roads (and the occasional giant mole!).

Homes Sweet Homes

Living as a volunteer you expect to be living in fairly basic accommodation, although our accommodation is often considerably better than those of our colleagues. When visiting other volunteers we normally have to ask if there is any special trick to flushing the toilet as it is rarely straightforward. The houses often come with holes in the ceiling, strange and often uncomfortable furniture, basic kitchens with no ovens or fridges and sometimes not even electrical points, as well as a number of other quirky things unique to each individual home. You very quickly get used to this and indeed it seems normal. In fact as I said earlier we often feel very lucky compared to other people we know. Certainly nothing worth moaning about or writing home about. So instead I would like to tell you the story of one VSO friend and the extraordinarily bad luck she had with both her house in Ethiopia and her house in the UK (while she was volunteering in Ethiopia).

 Valerie and the Criminal Masterminds...

·         In Ethiopia she found out that some local people were siphoning off her water supply and selling it when she received her quarterly water bill which more resembled a large hotel’s bill than that of a small house.

·         When she went home for Christmas she wanted to check up on her house that she had rented out. She tried ringing loads times to get an appointment with the tenants but in the end she had to give up and let herself in. When she opened the door she found her house had been converted into a cannabis factory. Fluorescent lights had been attached everywhere and she even found that had removed her fitted wardrobe to make more floor space for growing the plants!

Can you believe her bad luck!? And she is not the only one to have problems. Another VSO couple who I am particularly close to have had a nightmare with housing this year... not only did they arrive in country to find no house ready for them and were then shifted from one temporary accommodation to the next but last month they had a monumental disaster with their cottage in England. A cold water pipe in the attic of burst. The force of the water brought down the ceiling into their bedroom. The weight of that then led to further collapse as their bedroom fell into their living room. Obviously with all that water the house became flooded and many of their possessions were ruined. David has had to head home for 2 months to sort out the damage. I guess the only saving grace was that they were in fact in Ethiopia at the time and not in their bed when it happened!

 It makes me feel very glad that I don’t have a house to worry about back home and that I seem to have landed on my feet somewhat with housing here. Although obviously quite depressing, I hope the first story at least amused you a little and that neither story put any of you off volunteering and leaving a house behind!

 

Addicted to Soup

I don’t know why I never made soup before –crazy! I guess in England it is easier to just buy it readymade but really... making soup is so simple! My Mom put me on the idea when she came to visit. It was an attempt to help me lose some of the weight I have gained since being in Ethiopia. With weightwatchers, vegetable soup is 0 points and so you can eat as much as you like of it. I think telling me ‘I can eat as much as I like’ of something is a dangerous game (I am quite confident I will lose no weight by doing that!) but it did at least spur me on to try making some soup. And now I am addicted! The bonus here is that vegetables are so cheap. I can buy half a kilo of carrots, half a kilo of tomatoes, one small cabbage and some onions for less than 50p. In theory that should feed me most of the week but it really is too tasty and apparently I can eat as much as I like! Some days I find myself eating it breakfast, lunch and dinner! I have of course been varying the soup I make and having lots of fun experimenting with different combinations and spices...it seems with soup it is impossible to go wrong.

It has been really nice to get back to basics this year and make lots of things from scratch that I wouldn’t think of doing in the UK. It has also been surprisingly easy and I now find making pitta bread, yoghurt and freshly squeezed orange juice actually less effort than popping to the shops (not that they sell any of them there anyway). However... of all the new things I’ve made this year I think soup tops them all!

Fair Ferenge Fare?!!

Recently I went to Gondor, with my family, to visit a VSO volunteer friend working as a Physiotherapist at Gondor Hospital. Gondor is a beautiful city that feels more like a small town. It has amazing features that attract tourists such as the 'Royal Enclosure', the Fasilidas Baths and the Debre Behan Selassie Church. It also has a lot of Italian influences as it was one of the main Italian bases during the occupation. The combination of tree lined piazzas and medieval castles is quite surprising in Ethiopia and also very beautiful. As a result many tourists visit the area. Whether it is the left over bitterness towards the Italian occupation or the large influx of tourists, the Ethiopian's in Gondor on the whole seem to behave quite differently to other areas I have visited. They say those from Gondor are quite proud of their heritage and do not welcome outside influences. As a result they can sometimes have quite a negative attitude towards foreigners (Ferenge). In her first few months of living there my friend had rocks thrown at her, her house broken into and told on a number of occasions that she should leave, that she wasn't wanted here. (Thankfully this behaviour was from people on the street who didn't know her and the valuable work she is doing rather than her colleagues!).    Whereas some people from Gondor appear to resent foreign influence, others see huge economic opportunity from the tourists. More than any other place I have been to there seems to be an attitude of 'get what you can' from tourists/ foreigners rather than 'being fair'. Unlike in my town where there is a clear set price for taxis up and down the main street, every journey in Gondor requires negotiation. In many restaurants they have two separate menus... both with identical food on but one with a 'Ferenge Fare' and another with a local price. I think the experience of this for us was particularly heightened by the fact we were there for Timkat (Ethiopia's most important religious festival) but my friend says in the 11 months since she arrived she has always had to fight for a 'fair fare'. Although she is now a familiar face around town there are also lots of other NGOs workers in Gondor (many of whom earn considerably more than the average wage) and so even foreigners who live in Gondor have a reputation for being 'rich'. On a VSO salary my friend has the double wammy financial issue that she earns less than most of her colleagues but is often charged nearly double for many things around town. This low wage is still more than many of the people 'ripping her off', so you can understand why they try... but it does make me feel very fortunate to be in a small town where, although I am looked at differently, I am at least treated the same as the locals in most aspects of life. Although I sometimes get frustrated about being the only Ferenge in Ambo, as I get so much attention on a daily basis...at least the attention is generally positive. Last weekend I met a guy from South Africa who will be staying in Ambo for the next 5 months and next week my new housemate arrives from Australia so we will be 'three'. Hopefully with a two extra Ferenge in town we will become less of a novelty and therefore begin to get a little less attention but at the same time be nothing like places like Gondor where Foreigners are seen as either a threat or an economic opportunity. Sounds to me like we may just be heading for the 'best of both worlds'...here's hoping anyway!

Things people have said that have made me laugh today...

I love the way that many Ethiopian’s miss out important words in sentences or rearrange words in a sentence so that they have a completely different meaning to what they intended! Here are just a few examples of things people have said to me today...

·         ‘Fine you are’ and also ‘you are fine’ (instead of ‘How are you?). I wanted to reply ‘Thank you’ because it does seem a bit big-headed to agree with them that I am ‘fine’ but I think that would really confuse them.

·         Where are you? (when I pass someone in the street- I think they meant to ask, ‘where are you going?’) I always want to reply ‘here’. I also had today ‘Where you are’ phrased as a question to me... I really didn’t know how to respond to that one!

·         Are you here? ... Really? (When I bumped into a colleague I hadn’t seen for a while)....ummm... yes?!

·         ‘How was your picnic?’ (Instead of ‘how was your visit [to the north of Ethiopia]’)

I know I really shouldn’t laugh, especially as my Amharic is a million times worse than the above sentences, but sometimes it is little things like this that make your day!