Sightseeing in Addis...

On one of our very last days in Ethiopia, I think just two days before we left, the group decided that it would be fun to do a bit more sightseeing in and around Addis. We wanted to go up a nearby mountain, I think Mount Moret (could be wrong) because we had been told of the spectacular views.

We set off in the two vans and it soon became apparent that our van was not going to make it through the city, let alone up a mountainside. As our family was leaving before the rest of the group, we switched vans, got into the healthy van with a few others from the group and everyone else got into the ailing van and limped back to the guesthouse. They would have another chance to see the sights.
Joshua of course hopped up in the front beside the driver and I took this picture of the street over his shoulder. This is typical of anywhere you go, people throng all over the road and vehicles kind of weave in and out! Usually there are a few goats and donkeys to add into the mix.

We started the climb up a winding, beautiful road in order to get our touristy shots and passed so many people struggling up the road that I thought it must be a festival or something. It wasn't a festival but the driver told me that people make their way up to the churches at the top of the mountain as a kind of pilgrimage. Some people ran up to the van and waved money to try and get on, and I have to say I felt a bit colonial as the driver waved them away with a sweep of his hand as we sailed past.


As we neared the top, I thought that the countryside looked familiar. Then it struck me that it actually looked exactly like the views of my home county, Cheshire in England. I took this photo because it reminded me of my home...how ironic is that? I was in the middle of Ethiopia looking at a landscape very similar to England and feeling homesick!
Very beautiful and pastoral, green, (I mentioned about the rains in another post) rolling hills, cattle grazing....

We got out of the van at the top and similarities to England faded as we were immediately approached by a group of young boys, wanting to talk, wanting money.
These boys were fascinated with Joshua (very typical, not many young white boys around!) and so began to tell him all about their lives. I have to say, their English was pretty good and I became captivated by their stories. (The African people I have met are the BEST story tellers, I find myself mesmorised by their tales of life and family.)
The boys told us that they lived nearby and they were shepherds. School was a magical dream...they would love to go but it was too expensive to pay the fees, get the uniforms, and get down the mountainside in order to join in. I asked how much it would be for them to get someone to take them down the mountain every day in order to go to school.
"Many monies " was their sad little reply. "How many monies?" I persisted. They looked at each other and shrugged.
"Maybe two dollars " (equivalent) I thought that was a bit much too until they added, "a month for all of us."
Two dollars a month for all these boys to get down the mountain to go to school??
"It is impossible" they added.
Impossible? I always start to swallow hard and try to tell myself that this is normal, but everything in me screams that it shouldn't be. How much is a coffee for me? How much did I spend, even in Addis, on my precious little presents to take home?
I asked these boys what their dreams were....I knew what the answer would be.
"To go to school" they replied immediately.
Ah, life isn't fair.







They then told us that it was their job to collect the bark from Eucalyptus trees and weave it into whips to scare the hyenas away from their livestock. A boy ran to get his whip and gave us an awesome display of...I guess it would be called whipcracking.
The whip literally cracked like a gunshot and it was LOUD! Easy to understand why the hyenas would take off if they heard that in the dead of night. I took some video and pictures of it and he was so proud.


I got a bit nervous as he danced around cracking the whip pretty close to us, but luckily nobody was hurt. Very cool though.






You will notice that the ground is full of piles of...crap... and we all checked our shoes pretty carefully before we got back into the van, As we left, the boys directly asked us for money and so we gave them a little. It's always so hard to know what to do, but sometimes I just don't care about what is correct and what is not.
Of course, as SOON as we gave them a tiny bit of money there was a group of ragged, children all in a row....
Looking at us with huge, beautiful eyes, bulging tummies, thin faces and white fungus all over their little heads. Pleading.

I recently read Steven Lewis's brilliant book, "Race Against Time" and he writes of meeting a similar little ragged group of children in Africa.
"Time stopped. I looked at these lovely kids...faces shining through the greys of malnutrition, every one of them seeking an adult touch or hug, and I thought about the often unbearable lottery of life. Has there ever been greater injustice in this world"
I can so relate to this.. My mind goes back to all the hundreds of children that I have met both in Uganda and Ethiopia and I ask myself the same question.

Mountains and pilgrims, shepherd boys and Eucalyptus whips....another interesting and fascinating day in Ethiopia.

I went to the Mercato and I bought...gum...




Toward the end of our visit we had the chance to visit the Mercato. This is the largest open air market in Africa and sprawls over many miles. Narrow paths wind in and out of crooked little stalls and take you from blankets to baskets, from pottery to spices and shoes.
Anything that you want, you can find here and we had all been very excited about a chance to visit this famous shopping area in Addis.
Incidentally, we were informed that the Government is wanting to tear down the whole thing and make more formal shopping areas...which sounds sad to me...but then I do not live there and I know that it has a huge crime problem.
Selemnah took our backpack and carried it himself, turning it around and putting it on his chest, with all the pockets tied shut. He told us to empty our pockets and lock everything in the van and he also told me to ask him when it was OK to take pictures. Even though this sounds a bit scary, it really was a great experience and we loved wandering around looking at all the different sections of the market. We saw hundreds of baskets, mounds of rubber boots, spice stalls with piles of gorgeous coloured spices and blankets piled up in wobbly towers.

Of course, the people were friendly and called out to us the whole time to come and buy stuff, joking with Selemnah and grabbing Ayana and Moses to kiss them. This custom of holding out their arms for your children and kissing them was a little different at first, even sometimes a little daunting. At one stall, an old lady held out her arms to hug Moses. I looked over at Selemnah and he nodded and said it was OK. The woman held Moses, kissing him, cuddling and crooning to him and then she said something that made Selemnah shake his head and laugh, then he told her to give him back! Finally she handed him over to me.
Selemnah told me that she said she wanted to keep Moses and that he was beautiful.
At one point a man asked if he could have his picture taken with Joshua and he told Selemnah that he thought Joshua was so cute!
The sights and smells, the array of colour and the sounds of hundreds of people shouting out their bargains and yelling at each other was wonderful, we really enjoyed the whole time there.

In Addis however, as I have mentioned before, there is always something to remind you of the ever present poverty and this market day was no exception. We noticed after walking through the stalls for about ten minutes that we were being followed by a tiny, ragged girl selling gum.
As you walk around, you are often followed by children begging or selling something, but what made this little one stand out was that she never lost sight of us. If we lingered around a stall, we would turn around and she was there. If we went into one of the covered areas, we would emerge to catch a glimpse of her peeping out from behind a stack of blankets. If we were on one side of the road, she would inevitably be trailing along the opposite side of the road, keeping an eye on us. I noticed that sometimes she would suddenly turn and run as fast as she could and I would look around and sure enough, there would be a policeman waving his stick at her....but she would then appear a few minutes later. Over the morning, I saw several people reach out and cuff her on the head as she waited by their stalls and my heart went out to this little child. Finally, Selemnah called to her and she crept over to us and he told her that when we were finished, we would buy some of her gum.
Sure enough, as we walked back to the van, she ran alongside us down the street and we of course all made a big deal of choosing lots of gum. In fact, we bought all the gum that this little girl was carrying and watched her carefully tuck the pittance of money inside her shirt.


Here she is showing us the different flavours.
This was her daily job.
She had to "work" the dangerous market selling gum, getting cuffed by stall owners and threatened by police officers.

















I asked Selemnah if she had parents and she told him she had a mommy and sisters that begged in the market.
I asked him to ask her how old she was....
...she was only four years old.

I almost couldn't take these pictures because I was trying not to cry.
Oh Ethiopia, so beautiful and so tragic.