Getting Into the Holiday Spirit

My personal rule is that once Thanksgiving passes it’s fair game for Christmas music. So once we entered the holiday season my itunes has been blasting Christmas cheer to make it feel more like home. Considering that the weather is between 65-85 degrees most days, Ethiopian Christmas isn’t until January 7, and Ethiopian Christmas doesn’t typically involve trees, lights or decorations, I needed a lot of music to try to make up for the differences! A couple weeks ago while Kate, Emily and I were on our way to the pool in Bahir Dar and decided to play Christmas music on a speaker in the minibus for all to enjoy. Playing your personal music without earphones is quite normal, even expected, but I was surprised that no one turned to look at the foreigners as we sang our way to the pool. It helped us get a little more into the spirit of the season.

Last week the missionary family in Emily’s town invited us over for an early Christmas dinner at their house. Not sure what to expect for dinner, we were overjoyed by the smell of freshly baking bread and a very all-American meal laid out for us. Chicken, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, cranberry jelly and freshly baked cookies! We all reminisced about Christmas pasts and enjoyed each other’s company in their comfortable home. After a while we sat around as their friend Sheryl played the guitar and we all sang Christmas carols. We were even able to hear a few traditional Christmas carols sung in Japanese by the jica volunteers!

Saturday I headed south to Addis Ababa where I was anxiously awaiting my boyfriend’s arrival from Europe. After the mess of winter weather had the final word, canceling his flight and rescheduling for three days later, I was blessed to have an offer to stay with friends Jess and Brian in Addis.  Moreover, their friend was having a Mexican Christmas dinner and they invited me to join the festivities! I was also very grateful that other volunteers were in town to hang out with during the past couple days in Addis, trying to take my mind off of snow delays in Europe.  As sad as I was to not have my boyfriend, Dominik, in town yet, it was wonderful to have gracious friends around helping me pass the time until his arrival.

When I arrived in Ethiopia in December 2008 I spent Christmas with my training group on a day trip to a nearby lake. Then Christmas 2009 I was in Bahir Dar with my family on vacation, and several Peace Corps volunteers. Finally I’m wrapping up service with one more Christmas, and the plan is for Dominik and me to meet up with other Peace Corps volunteers in Bahir Dar to celebrate together.  It’s amazing how fast things are finishing up here, but I am trying to enjoy every moment I have left.

Merry Christmas to all!!

A Day in the Life

The most-asked question from friends and family back home is “what is your average day like?” Well, average days don’t exist here. Every day is so unique, that trying to summarize what a day looks like is nearly an impossible task.  Located in small towns in north western Ethiopia live three difference Peace Corps volunteers who are all fairly similar.  Kate, Emily and I all happen to be mid-twenties, red-haired (to varying degrees) and recent college graduates from relatively similar backgrounds. 

We’ve started a Wednesday lunch get-together in our towns since we live so close together (furthest north to furthest south is only a one-hour bus) to help with sanity levels – necessary when none of us have people who really understand us around our towns.  At one such lunch gathering we were discussing our troubles and frustrations, which always seem to be similar, and we decided to each write about one particular day to see if there were many similarities or differences.  Not to say this particular day was “normal,” and not to say anything the three of us do is “normal” but nevertheless, here is a day in the lives of three Ethiopia PCVs:

Me and Kate.

Kate, Durbete
5:45am – The alarm goes off.  It takes 10 minutes to wake up and prepare myself for my 40 minute am run.
6:30am – Home and sweaty.  Stretch while the water heats for my shower. 
7am – A quick breakfast of fruit and tea followed by a topical clean of the house- dusting away cricket carcasses and dirt accumulated in the previous 24 hours.  Listen to itunes on random while I prepare for the day ahead.
9:00am – Go to the HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control Office (HAPCO) via the post office where I work on my Amharic homework and participate in conversation and daily activity within the office.
12:00pm – Am given lunch from a very pregnant friend in town.  We watch TV and discuss my upcoming travel plans to Addis Ababa and her very pregnant state.
1pm – Head back to my house.  It is hot and I am in the middle of Steig Larson’s, The Girl Who Played with Fire. 
2pm – Contemplate going back into town and visiting friends but my book and an episode of season five of The Wire hinders my motivation
4pm – Head to the Durbete High School where I discuss potential ways to obtain high school level books for the library aided by my teacher counterpart.
5pm – Amharic tutoring- learned how to describe my house and prepositions.
6:30pm – Peanut Butter Cabbage Stir Fry is what’s for dinner.  Eat in front of the computer TV- THE WIRE.
7pm –Clean up after dinner and do some lunar flow pod cast yoga. 
8pm – Coffee ceremony with the landlord’s family.  Only one cup or else I can’t sleep!
9pm – Snuggle up in bed with my computer Watch and episode of BBC Planet Earth, Caves, and drift to bed.

Kate

Jennifer, Dangila
6am – After trying to avoid my dog’s whines I get out of bed and go for a run with the neighborhood kids.
7:15am – Leisurely make a pot of coffee, feed my dog, listen to music, read my current page-turner I Didn’t Do It For You, and get dressed for the day.
9am – Leave my house to go visit the Anti-Malaria Association (AMA). After hanging out with the girls who work there, I visit counterpart Yibeltal to discuss our project of forming an association for commercial sex workers in town.
10am – Walk to HAPCO to visit my PC-assigned counterpart. Discuss my internet café project to help orphans in town, and print a new project budget.
11:15am – On my walk back to my house I stop to check my mailbox and found a letter from my mom! Then, almost home, I get called into my neighbor’s house for coffee and injera.
12:30pm – Finally back home. I realize my dog escaped the compound, likely to go play with my landlord’s kids across town. I read my book for a while and check email.
3pm – Walk back to AMA to discuss future projects with Yibeltal. Then I ran into the Japanese volunteer organization (jica) staff in town searching for a new house for their volunteer. Since I know the town best, I offer to help them search for a bit.
5pm – Internet café project committee meeting. We establish a plan for the remaining budget.
6pm – Walk home from the meeting and stop by my landlord’s compound to get my dog and walk her home.
7pm – Cook up a fresh zucchini from my garden for dinner. Yum!
8pm – Clean up dishes and read my book some more. Get online and chat with friends in America who are at work. Gotta love PC.
10pm – Finally bedtime. I get in bed and read my book until I fall asleep.

Emily

Emily, Kosober/Injibara
5:30am – Morning run time. Keep pace with kids carrying sacks of charcoal on their head.
7am – Download news articles online. Drink too many cups of coffee.
9am – Go to the Orphan Shelter. Attempt to teach English and three-legged race. Take pictures and almost pee my pants laughing so hard.
11am – Make shiro (again) for lunch. Read a few chapters in a book. Contemplate the desire to leave my house again.
2pm – Go to post office. It’s closed. Again. During working hours. Rent a bike and go to high school for meeting about English Conversation Club.
2:30pm – While waiting for meeting to start, I talk to teachers about America (No, I can’t take you back with me) and how, of course, you want to perfect your English, yeah, we will get that arranged soon.
3pm – Teacher finally shows up. Talk in circles. Convince him that my way is the best way while making it seem like it is his idea. Genius.
4pm – Get back home. Landlord calls me into her house. Hands me her kids. Serves me injera with a tongue-burning, eye-watering sauce. Run to my house to drink three glasses of powdered milk and finish a jar of peanut butter I bought yesterday.
5:30pm – Amharic lesson. My teacher has enough patience to sound out every syllable. I would have upturned the table by now. Good guy.
6:30pm – Brush teeth. Wash face. Collect pension check for getting into bed before 7:30 PM. Read book.
8pm – Landlord knocks on my door, reminding me of our fir fir (basically injera with injera) cooking lesson. Now?! She is already setting up shop in my kitchen area. Pretend to take a bite. After she leaves, I put it back in the pot. Breakfast done.
9pm – Bed time was 30 minutes ago. Ear plugs in to block sounds of the zoo in my ceiling. Sweet dreams.

Kate and Emily

Kate’s blog: does ethiopia make my dijiBOOTIE look big? 

Emily’s blog: Emily’s Ethiopian Experience 

Me, Kate, and Emily hiking outside Kosober.

Me, Emily and Kate after the Great Ethiopian Run

Japanese-American Gatherings

I don’t even know how to start this post, because I cannot remember exactly how the story began. I’ve known a few of the jica (Japanese volunteer organization) volunteers in neighboring towns since my first week at site when we ran into each other on the street one day. But knowing they existed in nearby towns meant that I could mention them by name, but I didn’t know anything about them. Then Peace Corps Group 3 arrived at sites, placed in neighboring towns with jica and sometime after that officially began the Peace Corps-jica friendship gatherings.

It began as a cultural food exchange dinner. The first month the jica members prepared an impressive spread of Japanese food, and the next month it was our turn to show them some good ol’ American food.  We’ve also climbed a nearby mountain together and continued organizing a monthly meal since the summer. We even branched out one month and met for a koica (Korean volunteer organization) member’s birthday in Bahir Dar and had over six nationalities represented!

Somehow we’ve managed to never have our meeting in Dangila though, and since we now have two jica volunteers and I have a fancy new house to entertain in, we decided to have the December (and my final) gathering at my house! Our meetings have evolved into potluck lunches or dinners where we wind up with a wonderful mix of cultural food from America and Japan. Yesterday we met at my house around noon to eat lunch, and since Taishi, who lives in my compound, still doesn’t have a stove (he is going to buy mine) I offered for the jica guys to come cook at my house.

There were four Peace Corps Volunteers, four jica members and Aregach, the Ethiopian representative. Cultural exchange with our Japanese neighbors doesn’t exactly fit into one of the Peace Corps goals, but it counts for something we figure. Nevertheless, I would never not invite Aregach to hangout when my friends come into town because she loves to try to understand our speedy English conversations, and observe our foreign antics.  It never occurred to me during that lunch just how strange this situation was for Aregach, but the next day when I went to tell my former co-teacher, Yibeltal, about the lunch, he said Aregach had already told him.  She reported the details of our party to Yibeltal first thing, surprised by how we each brought food and some even brought it to prepare at my house!

I suppose the idea of potluck or BYO… Food is normal to us, but it just doesn’t fit into the Ethiopian culture of hosting. To look at our gathering from an Ethiopian point-of-view it is bizarre that I, as host, not only expected others to bring food, but also that they, as guests, would think of coming to make food in my home! But as she sat there to take it all in, and taste the treats, Aregach didn’t mention a word about her amazement. It makes me laugh in hindsight to realize how strange our lunch was to her.   Sharing this concept of potluck with Aregach certainly does fit Peace Corps goals! And Yibeltal suggested that next time she should bring Ethiopian food! I think it is wonderful that Aregach was able to experience our international food event, but also that jica and Peace Corps volunteers were once again able to enjoy each other’s culinary talents! I will certainly miss these get-togethers, and hope to one day taste that Japanese food on its home soil.

My Bubble

I’ve realized something about time over the past couple years, as much as you want it to speed up or slow down, it’s always a constant. It’s true that an hour chatting with close friend seems to go by a lot faster than an hour of running, perhaps, but I’m starting to see less of a difference. Time barely changes for me now. I’ve spent a lot of time here in Ethiopia biding my time, waiting for the next adventure, but at some point I realized the adventure is here and I am living it every day. Pretty soon it will be my turn to pack up and leave Ethiopia, and until then I want to enjoy every moment I have left here.

It took me so long to find work at all in Dangila, and now I come up with new ideas for projects almost every day and wish I had time to start them, but I don’t. I wish I had more time to hang out with friends and neighbors, to smell the roasting coffee and eat freshly baked injera. I wish I could go back and focus on tutoring certain students who I now see are falling behind in reading and writing. I wish I could help more people. That’s the thing about Peace Corps, you never finish the work, but eventually it’s your time to go home. There is always more that could be done, but I also know that I cannot stay. 

My student, Ehetemarium, hand-feeding me a bite of injera -- a cultural sign of respect.

There have been times in this country that I’ve been flat out unhappy, and I’ll be the first to admit the number of times I’ve cried over stupid things (it’s a lot), but I love it here in Dangila. Recently I’ve been spending a lot of time on buses and I can only repeat “No, I cannot take you to America!” so many times to strangers who so impolitely ask to be my fake husband. But then I come back to Dangila and feel so at home.   I love the people so much. They are absolutely the most wonderful, giving people I’ve ever met. And I fear losing these friendships when I leave, especially since most of my favorite friendships are completely in Amharic and they don’t have access to even a post office box.

A few of the orphan boys, whom I love dearly, hanging out by the internet cafe.

A friend recently described it as a “bubble,” and when I leave I have to let it pop, even though I don’t want to. I’ve created this little world of mine over here, but it’s only a moment in time. When I come back in years to come it won’t be the same, and I won’t be the same. I’ll never likely be as “grassroots” as I am right now, never speak the language as well or know the people as well. It’s just like leaving high school or college—it’s fun to reminisce about the good ol’ college days, but you can’t actually go back, the people are gone and the place has changed. You can only really enjoy the memories (or try desperately hard to recreate it, which would only likely result in a hangover).

Needless to say, the ending is bitter sweet already. It has taken me two years to create this bubble and I only have three weeks in town left to appreciate it (since I’m traveling some around Christmas). I’m greeted by name all over town, treated as a local, and loved by many as their own daughter. One dear friend even told me that if I stayed he would build me a chicken house so I could have fresh eggs every day! I am ready to go, although it’s more a readiness for the next step, not readiness to say goodbye to this life I’ve created. But with my one-way ticket to Frankfurt purchased, ready or not, I’m leaving.