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!