Some Memorable Moments...

I am not a world traveler. I had never been to Africa prior to two months ago. I can still count on one hand the amount of countries I have visited. As a result, I tend to experience things with a bright-eyed optimism that has long since left more veteran volunteers. And to be honest, it is solely because I don’t know any better. Everything is still so new and exciting. Everyday I experience something I never imagined possible a few years ago. It is what gets me through the day and makes other struggles manageable.  It also leads to moments that make me think these exact words: “Oh, Ethiopia. You’re so silly!” It is such a hilarious, wonderfully foreign place. In honor of these moments (hereby called Ethioopppses) I thought I would post about the top 5 (shareable) silliest moments so far. Here they are in no particular order:

1.   As previously mentioned, the main staple in this country is called injerra. Think of a very thin sponge. Now make it sour and cold. There you go, you have injerra! During a meal, you lay this on the bottom of your plate and put all the other food on top. To eat, you tear off pieces of injerra and use it to scoop up the food piled on top. There are no utensils or napkins. You only use your right hand and the messier you get, the better you are doing. If your hand has chunks of food and is dripping by the end of the meal, you’re practically Ethiopian (someday I’ll get there). There is also a practiced called “gorsha”. It is a very sweet gesture that show the recipient he or she is deeply care for. During my site visit, I went out to lunch with my counterpart- the head of the English department at my school and someone who will be instrumental in the work I do. We spent a lot of time together during the week and sure enough, this day at lunch, she wanted to gorsha me. This all sounds great, right? Co-worker showing affection! Integration! Woohoo! Let me explain to you what gorsha is. It is, simply put, being feed. So there I was, 24 years old, being hand feed by someone I had known for 5 days. Remember how messy a proper Ethiopian’s hand should be while eat? Yeah, that only made it better. And this is not someone tossing popcorn in your mouth or a neat tidy bite sized sample. We are talking about an injerra envelope with saucy lentils dripping out. There was finger/mouth penetration. If that isn’t a special lifelong memory, I don’t know what is.

2. Recently, the Peace Corps was kind enough to give our group a “mental health day” that included peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, CHEESE, and a trip to a near by hot spring. There was a naturally heated pool where most people spent their day. I was feeling slightly adventurous and walked about 10 minutes to a smaller pool (I use the term pool loosely) that was much hotter and usually only frequented by Ethiopians. I was told the water was not the cleanest and that scared many people off. As I walked up, I knew that things might get a little strange because the hot spring pools were segregated by gender. Never a good sign. But I trudged on, with two friends by my side. As we turn the corner and saw the hot springs pool, my laughter started. One of my friends turned to us, said “peace out”, and left. The hot spring was being used as a communal bathtub. Women were totally sudded up and scrubbing each other. I suddenly became aware that my friend and I were two of only a handful of people wearing bathing suit tops. We waded in the scalding hot pool despite the situation because we had not had hot water in weeks and knew it would be another 3 until we got it again. We went directly to a corner and surveyed the situation. There were women, from teenagers to 70 year olds shampooing and washing. It was the group of older ladies that made me think of the song, “Do your ears hang low? Do they wobble to a fro? Can you tie them in a knot? Can you tie them in a bow? Can you throw them over your soldier like a continental soldier? Do your ears hang low?” Tried as I might, I could not help but starting singing the song aloud with one key word change. Maybe you can figure it out… As we were getting out, two teenage girls grabbed their camera and grabbed us to take a picture with them, as if their friends would never believe they saw two white girls in the hot springs pool without official documentation. So somewhere out there, there is perhaps the most awkward photo that has been taken in the history of the world, and I am smiling and laughing uncontrollably in it.

3. In my lovely town of Eteya, there is a big market every Monday and Thursday. Whenever a forengi decided to go, it is a big deal. There are at least 25 kids following us at all time. At least 100 people staring. At least 60,000 (okay, that one might be exaggerated) trying to peddle their goods. To summarize, we become the main attraction of the market. One this particular day, I was walking with two girls: Amanda and Sarah. We were on the ever so important hunt for guacamole fixin’s. With our trail of kids and 100 onlookers, we went throughout the stalls looking for avocadoes. It turned out to be a fruitless (pun intended) venture and we started to leave. As I walked by a giant steer, it looked at me, took two steps and threw its head into my shoulder. I was launched into my friend Sarah who bumps into Amanda. Thankfully the steer had no horns and we were all fine. Once I regain my composure and stop laughing, I notice that what felt like 200 people just watched this all happen and were laughing hysterically. In there minds, nothing funnier could have just happened. I know for a fact that I was the topic of conversation in hundreds of Eteya homes that night. If I ever tell you this story in person, don’t be surprised if it becomes “that one time I had to enter an underground bull fight competition as ransom payment to save two fellow PCVs”.

4. I went to the market another time with my good friend Sarah. Again, we could not find what we were looking for in the chaos of the market. I know there is organization to it; I just have not idea what it is. We were getting frustrated and swarmed by kids every time we stopped. The kids were getting under our skin that day. The shouts of “money, money, money, you, you, you, China, China, Korea” were getting to us. Instead of getting mad and yelling, I turned to my friend and said, “Do you want to scare them?” We hatched a plan and on three… two… one… we jumped around to face them and yelled, “boo!” The kids did not see this coming. They all turned away in terror and ran. Some kids literally fell over. One little kid started crying. I could not have envisioned a greater success. And wonderfully, the 100 onlookers saw the whole thing and starting laughing at all the kids and making fun of them. The two Chinas finally got some revenge!

5. Going potty here is a delicate process. I have danced around fully explaining what a shint bet it for a while now. The time has come. The shint bet is a room with a hole in the ground that is housed outside, a small walk from the house/restaurant/bar etc. You squat over the hole and do your business. Some of these holes are very deep. For example, the shint bet at my house is like a cavern. It probably goes down like 15 feet, which is exactly what you want. Others are shallow and I don’t think I need to explain why that is awful. Some have concrete floor, others have mud floors and others you tell yourself is a mud floor. If you want to use toilet paper, you need to remember to bring some with you because there is none in the shint bet. In fact, many Ethiopians don’t use toilet paper. Remember how I mentioned you only eat with you right hand? It is for a reason. But don’t worry; they wipe their left hand off on the shint bet walls. So the key to this process is to stay in there as short amount of time possible and to not touch anything. To give you an idea of how serious this is, I have special shoes that I only wear in the shint bet because anything that makes contact with any part of a shint bet is contaminated (seriously, who wants to come visit?). I should also mention that my diet is lacking potassium and electrolytes. Why do I mention this? Because a lack of potassium and electrolytes cause muscle cramps. Why do I mention this? Because a calf cramp while using the shint bet was the single most intense experience of my life. It took everything I had not to fall over in pain. And recall my pervious description and think of the consequences of falling over. Like baby Jeffery, I would have been “FOREVER UNCLEAN!” I grimaced through the pain. I tried to stay strong and upright but every bit of weigh I put on my leg was agony. I managed to get out of there as quickly as I could and then collapsed into a fence outside. I felt like I had just dodged the biggest bullet of my life. Colors were a little brighter that day. Food tasted a little better. These are the experience you are missing out on with your fancy western toilets!

Honorable mentions:

-We created a mixed drink in Eteya. Gin, Sprite and a little strawberry lemonade crystal light powder. It was dubbed gummy bear pee. Try it and thank me. But being warned, it tastes like candy and may result in you having a 12-minute conversation with your brother, sister and brother-in-law of which the content you cannot remember. Or so I’ve been told.

-A mode of transportation here is horse carts. It is a wood bench, placed on an old car axel drawn by a horse. Think Cinderella’s pumpkin carriage minus the pumpkin, regal looking horse, and feeling of safety. Then add a driver who is more interested in looking at the foriengis than the road. Like a fairly tale! But anytime we go on one of these, I like to pretend I am in a parade. As if I do not already attract enough attention, going down the street in a carriage propped up five feet above people walking waving like a princess because I cannot resist, fun times!

If this was too long and you just scrolled down to the bottom without reading, let me summarize: this country and I are getting along swimmingly!

I’ve had guacamole 3 times since my last entry, so yeah, I’m doing pretty well

Over the course of the last week, I traveled to the far and distant land that will become my home for two years: Assela. Not really. It is a 25-minute bus ride from my host family. It is where I am currently using the Internet. But I decided that far and distant land sounds way more romantic!

                                                 

The town of Assela is actually quite large. There are anywhere between 60,000 to 120,000 people living here depending on who you ask. After spending a week here, I am confident it is closer to the ladder. Interestingly, the population is fairly split in several ways. About half of the town is Christian while the other half is Muslim. Half of the town speaks Afan Oromo while the other half speaks Amharic. Half of the town lives in a central, urban area while the other half lives more rural as farmers.  To be quite honest, to have this level of complete diversity is really exciting. I love the idea of being in a melting pot where I will be fortunate enough to see so many different facets of Ethiopian culture. While there is little to no tension between these cultures, the diversity is evident just walking down the street. For example, as I walk past a sigabet (meathouse), I like to look to see if there is a cross or crescent moon- signifying which religious group the meat is appropriate for. But you can learn all about the town via Wikipedia (probably) so let’s get to some specifics…

I traveled to Assela with my counterpart, which made the entire trip fairly stress free. I figured it might be the last time I have someone who speaks the language telling me what bus to get on, so I may as well take full advantage. We arrived in Assela and over the course of the next few days, I saw important places and meet prominent people. I learned where the police station and hospital are located. I meet the mayor, head of the police department and head of the education office. But at one point, my counterpart was talking with my cluster supervisor (what that is later) in Amharic. I decided I needed something to keep me occupied, which lead to a fun game. Spelling in this country is… questionable. If is sounds correct, then it does not really matter if it is the proper spelling. So I keep jotting down all the different ways to spell Assela. Asela. Asallaa. Assala. Assella. Asselaa. And this is not just on small shop signs, I found 3 of these at the mayor’s office. I digress.

One of the key places I visited was the school I will be working at for two years. I did not know what to expect but had heard good things from a lot people. The school turns out to be amazing and I feel really lucky. First of all, it is gorgeous. It is on a hill and is backed up my lush green trees. You can see rolling mountains in the background, it is amazing. It is also huge. There is a giant field for students to play on and there are a ton of classrooms. There are three shint bets (one for girls, boys and teachers) so students can use a potty at school. But the pride and joy of the campus is the special education building. It is only 2-3 years old and was built for blind (if you’re reading this Mrs. Dawirs, I want to try and get my hands on some Ethiopia Braille for you), deaf and mentally handicapped students. To illustrate how significant this is, let me throw some quick, Ethiopia facts at you. The country is broken into 9 different regions, counties, states, or whatever you want to call them. Oromia, mine, is probably in the top 3 in terms of size. The special education building on my campus is the only special education building in all of Oromia. BOOM. It’s kind of a big deal because it gives children, who would normally drop out of school at a very young age, an equal chance to succeed. Back to my school: in talking with the staff, they are not interested in having me teach a class, but instead to work with teachers to improve their teaching and command of English (that may be a run on sentence and the irony is not lost on me). The way we all kind of see this playing out is through a lot of observations, feedback, and trainings ran by yours truly. While all my experience is working with students, the opportunity to work with teacher is great because it allows for the most long-term improvement at the school. Look at me all naive and optimist!!! And there are three schools in my cluster (kind of like a small district [hence a cluster supervisor {I love brackets}]) so while I am mostly at one school, there are a lot of teachers I can work with.

Another thing that I did on my site visit was look at housing. I went to the education office and they said they had a house set up for me. They made this sound very researched and official. All I needed to do was approve it and they would hammer out the price to make it happen. So with my counterpart, we looked through this house. Before I give details, let me just state that most PCVs have one, sometimes two rooms and share a shint bet (hole in the ground where nightmares are born) with at least one family. The place I saw had a real toilet! And 5 rooms plus a kitchen. And an indoor shower. And a bath tub. And crown molding. Yeah, it was a little too good to be true and was 4 times my allotted monthly rent. It was about 3,000 birr a month (keep in mind a teacher probably makes around 2,500 birr a month) So while I appreciated seeing what I believe to be the only bathtub in Ethiopia, I do not yet have housing. But it was a fun experience: like when you see a mansion for sale and pretend to be interested just to see it. 

Finally, I just want to mention how awesome Assela is. Not just because in 4 days there I received 3 marriage proposals (I only contemplated one: when the post office lady, who controls packages from home, offers you her son, it is natural to think about the mail service perks it would bring, BUT, ultimately, I decided not. You’re welcome Eric!) but because in time I think it will really feel like a home. In walking the streets, people left me alone for the most part. I can buy amazing things like peanut butter and laughing cow cheese. I bought a Snickers bar. Let me repeat that, a SNICKERS bar!!! There are three other PCVs and two British volunteers living in Assela so there are people I can talk to without a language barrier and eat western food with. Overall, it was just a great atmosphere and made me really excited to start my service.

I have to go kill bugs now. Miss you all. And if there is a topic (within reason) you are ever interested in, leave a comment and I will try to write about it. I’m pretty sure I will run out of things to write about fairly soon! Also, I am writing this 7/14 so happy anniversary parents!!!

Time here is a strange thing. My last blog update was, I don’t know, 2-3 weeks ago? I was pretty shocked to see that it’s been 6 days. Oh Ethiopia! I am currently in Addis Ababa once again. It is nice to be back here. I can’t explain how much this place seems like a luxury now. I have a toilet that I only share with my roomie, not an entire family. There is a shower with HOT water. I took perhaps the greatest shower of my life yesterday. There are enough Americans that we overrun the hotel so we all get left alone… Amazing!

First things first: I cut off a ton of my hair. It is way easier and even looks goods! Double score!! I wanted to post a picture and while there were definitely betters ones, I felt a calling to post what may be one of the more fantastic photos of myself if I may say so.

As mentioned previously, my temporary site is Eteya. Now that I have spent some time here, I quite like it. There are some really fun people, lots of places to waste time and it is beautiful. Behind my compound are fields where they grow coffee (I really have no idea what they grow, that is a complete lie). I woke up early a few mornings ago and took some pictures of the trail I walk when I get coffee, which means I walk this way like three time a day. It was nice early in the morning because there were not many people. It really took my breath away. To be honest, I normally pay no attention to the landscape because I am focused on fist bombing children, staying away from crazies and not falling in mud.

And here is one of the main road of the city.

Last Saturday, we had our site announcement. It was this overly cheesy ceremony where we all found out where we will be living for the next two years. We all met in the hub town of Assela and each site was read off to the thunderous applause of us volunteers. When people’s names where called, they received an envelope with site information and a rolled up map of Ethiopia. When people in the front row had their maps, it became quite the silly walk of fame.

It was an intense experience. When a girl named Lauren was placed, I almost had a heart attack. Same with Nora. Finally, they announced my site: Assela!!! Sounds familiar right? Oh, yeah. It was the town that I was literally in. It is a town of around 70,000 people, which is on the larger size. It is three hours from Addis (all on paved roads!!!!). There are currently three other Peace Corps Volunteers serving there so I will have some American company. So even though I was hoping for a small site in the middle of nowhere, I really feel like I got lucky with my site. Plus, there is a place that has pizza. Pizza!!! That alone, I feel, is going to get me through some hard times! Once everyone received their placement, naturally a dance party broke out.

That is a-whole-nother thing. I don’t know if this is an Ethiopia thing or just Peace Corps, but there is impromptu dancing. All. The. Time. And dancing here is great. You step side to side and move your shoulders as awkwardly as possible. If there is one strength I have while dancing, it is looking awkward!

Well, I am going to go take a hot shower, purely out of desire not necessity. This upcoming week, I am going to Assela and learning the lay of the land. So while this training is crazy busy, I’ll try to post what the actual town I will be living in is like (entice you people to come visit perhaps)