ethiopia: tourism
what you know (not much) that it’s in eastern africa and that its southern provinces stretch toward the equator that the capital addis ababa lies at its centre that in the last few decades it’s suffered severe drought and famine that forty percent of the population is oromo (of whom you have one friend dase who twice during the 1970s escaped the torture and probable death of ethiopian prison and who now lives in canada) that the oromo people feel themselves oppressed by the smaller and more affluent ruling classes what you find on your computer that ethiopia’s twice the size of manitoba that it borders on somalia kenya eitrea sudan djibouti (you like the taste of djibouti the way it rolls off your lips but surrounded by all those countries it sounds like trouble) that ethiopia is mountainous and reaches five thousand metres into the sky and that only ten percent of its land is arable that it’s subject to earthquakes volcanoes and that once called abyssinia it’s the oldest independent country in africa that its economy is based on agriculture (say coffee please) that its population is half muslim half christian (and ten percent animist) what you don’t know but wonder about is ethiopia politically stable is it safe to travel there what is its currency and how much will it cost will you have any luck finding ethiopian endemics harwood’s francolin or abyssinian longclaw is there snow on the mountaintops will you wake in the morning to see frost on the shrubbery what is animist if not judeo/christian/muslim insult what you discover when you arrive that if you travel near the eritrean border or anywhere away from the city at night men with spotlight and machete will come and find you
ethiopia: poverty
good long sleep and without jetlag interruptions
whoopee so after an omelette breakfast in the
dining room i step through hotel front doors into
the morning sun star light star bright shade my
eyes look east look west look south find lawns
gardens paved walkways all around like two
three hours walking in a city park but that’s not
all find rolls royce bmw mercedes find mike
boom movie camera ghetto blaster find drums
dancing find celebration find people everywhere
find out it’s wedding day in addis ababa find that
rich ethiopians living in europe canada australia
fly to addis get married fly home again find
three dozen wedding parties on hotel grounds or
more find monster wedding parties bride groom
with twelve male and twelve female attendants all
lined up for photos sometimes in western white
dress and tuxedo sometimes traditional african
dress find it’s difficult to tell where one party
ends another begins find maladapted foreigner
with binoculars wandering from one party to
another searching for african paradise-flycatcher
ethiopia: dase
he says he was born the eldest of eight children eightsisters and brothers says he grew up in a village in
eastern ethiopia says his father farmed and traded in
livestock and sold vegetables at a shop in town he says
all the family grandmother grandfather uncles aunts
cousins they all lived in two neighbouring villages a
large family and each of their houses stood open to all
anyone could sleep in any home if he dase happened to
be playing near uncle’s house at nightfall he’d spend
the night in his uncle’s home he says the family enjoyed
their life together they laughed they worked they played
they made decisions and everything the family owned
they owned as one this toy belongs to our family says
he didn’t own any toys of his own and there were no
separate beds so everyone slept together he says we
were not separate people we were a family (he’s baffled
by my question) says he loved his grandparents says
they never swore at him they never gave him jobs they
let him play as much as he wanted sometimes he stayed
at his grandparents’ house for two weeks because they
didn’t send him off to school and soon enough his
mother came looking for him anyway dase says she’d
come find me and drag me back to my notebooks and
pencils she made me go to class he says and smiles
ethiopia: cradle
remember lucy or dinqineš
beautiful woman alive three
million years ago remember
where anthropologists found
her broken bones in a gully
abutting the awash river in
the afar district of ethiopia
australopithecus afarensis
remember a hot night on the
hill elalaytu with a diamond
sky overhead with thatched
reeds grass mosquito netting
home the bona fide desert
experience remember bilen
lodge best night best hotel
in ethiopia hyena breaths
laughs outside your window
in the dark yellow-throated
serin wakes to sing at dawn
some silent beetles’ lullaby
ethiopia: man
desert
no rock
no tree
no bladed grass
or stem of vegetation
no village
home
or even hovel
these empty miles
and hours we cross
sand and sky
deserted
(we drive this desert track
beside it actually
don’t like the road in ethiopia?
drive ten feet left
or right)
meet
a young man
near dusk
walking toward us
shepherd’s
crook robe hood
against the wind
coat of many colours
walking walking
walking this empty
world augur
buzzard circling
overhead