Destination Unknown

Sometimes, it’s easy to forget how lucky I am. This weekend, though, the wedding of my...

Tue, 14 May 2013 06:36:00 -0400

Sometimes, it’s easy to forget how lucky I am. This weekend, though, the wedding of my counterpart to my favorite health extension worker reminded me how incredibly fortunate I am - to be in Peace Corps, to have amazing friends, and, yes, to be in Ethiopia.

When I found out that Brihan (my counterpart, who is intelligent, motivated, and has a great sense of humor) was going to marry his long-time girlfriend Aster (a self-assured, incredibly bright young woman), I was stoked. Even though I don’t understand most of what they say to each other (Amharic is their primary language of communication), you can tell just by watching them how much love and mutual respect underlies their relationship.

Then, Aster told me I’d be part of the mize, the bridal party. I thought she was joking, at first. She wasn’t. As has become the norm for me, I didn’t really know what I was getting into, but decided to go along with it anyway. (Is this a habit that will help me when I’m back in America, or is it a recipe for disaster?)

I’ve written before about the extensive preparation that goes into a wedding. I joined a bunch of the couple’s female friends and neighbors on Friday, primarily chopping onions and washing out old glass soda bottles that looked like they’d been in circulation since the reign of Haile Selassie (Has anyone in Ethiopia seen a Fanta bottle with a blue label?), which were then filled with a non-alcoholic honey drink called brrz. (Maybe there are vowel sounds in there, but it doesn’t feel like it.) On Satuday, I arrived a little late to help make the wat (that is, the meat stew), but the one Muslim woman who was helping had left by the time they added the salt, so they needed me to taste the Muslim stew to make sure they put enough in.

Then, it was round one of the wedding. People started showing up at noon for lunch. After I ate, I went home to change out of jeans and into a dress, then came back to hang out and help where I could. I spent time with some coworkers who were boiling buna, then was happy to help them drink it. I poured water for people to wash their hands, and cleared and washed some dishes. Mostly, though, I got to hang out with friends and neighbors.

The rain had loomed ominously around Mettu for most of Saturday afternoon, but it waited until the evening to hit. When I showed up at the couple’s house on Sunday morning, it was incredibly muddy. After eating a little breakfast (leftovers from the day before), I went with Aster to the beauty shop. I chatted with the hairdressers while they pinned fake curls onto her pulled-back hair. Aster said I was going to have my hair done to match the other bridesmaids, but the hairdressers decided that it looked fine as it was. I tried not to show my relief.

We went back to the house and got dressed, but we were running late. I quickly donned my bridesmaid dress, which was a modern take on a traditional Ethiopian style. Of course, 30 seconds before we were leaving, one of the very kind women who had been feeding guests as they arrived shoved a plate into my hands and insisted I have some food before the long journey. I had barely begun eating when the bridal party started leaving the house. I licked my fingers, threw on my hiking boots, and ran after them.

Of course, when we got to the nearest main road, the bus that was going to take us to the rural area hadn’t arrived yet, so we stood around waiting for it for a while. I had time to run home, use the bathroom, and wash the rest of the wat off of my hands. While we waited for the bus, we clapped and sang spiritual songs (well, I clapped, anyway, and joined in with the chorus when I could). Protestants in Ethiopia are forbidden from singing and dancing except in praise of God, so while we were with the couple, everyone refrained. On the bus, though, while Aster and Brihan were riding in a separate vehicle, their friends of different religions let loose a bit. We sang some Ethiopian wedding songs and even danced in the aisles.

About 10km outside of Suphee, we caught up to the car Brihan and Aster were riding in, which had pulled over to the side. We all got out, a little confused — was this our destination? I asked Aster. “The road disappeared, but there’s another car waiting for us on the other side,” she said. Disappeared? I thought. I turned around, and, sure enough, there was a huge hole where the road apparently used to be. It was as if Carmen Sandiego had come and just snatched it right out of the ground.

We trekked through about a kilometer of woods, then met a pickup truck on the other side. It took the bridal party, the soda, the mosoob, and the sheep Brihan brought. (The groom brings the bride’s family a white sheep as a sign of respect. Brihan informed me that because it’s wedding season, now that Ethiopian Lent is over, white sheep fetch a premium at the market.) The plan was for the other guests to start walking, and the pickup would return to drive them the rest of the way.

We’d nearly arrived at the turnoff to Aster’s house, after which we’d have to go by foot, when the truck came to a stop. Not one, but both of its back tires blew. We waited around for a bit, but when the remaining guests started arriving, we decided to walk the rest of the way. Some loitering kids were recruited to carry the heavy stuff, and we continued down the muddy road, across a soccer field, and between farms to Aster’s family’s home.

When we arrived, singing songs that thanked God for bringing us together, the first order of business was to kill the sheep so that it could be eaten that day. It was pretty gruesome. One of the groomsmen was splattered with a lot of blood (though as it turns out, he’s a doctor specializing in emergency medicine, so I’m sure he’s used to it). Then we entered the house and greeted Aster’s parents and the other elder friends and relatives. We ate our first lunch of doro wat (chicken), k’ai wat (spicy meat), and alicha wat (mild meat). As I was finishing up my food, a friend from Mettu asked me when I was going to go make the t’ibs from the sheep, because that’s the job of the bridal party. I laughed, and said to her husband, “She’s joking, right?”
“No, it’s our culture!”
I turned to the other bridesmaids. “Really?”
They nodded.
Then Brihan chimed in. “Traditionally, it is the mize’s job to make the t’ibs.”
“Are you all in on this joke?”
They weren’t, and we started talking about whether I could do it if I needed to. T’ibs is really just meat sauteed with onions, hot peppers, oil, butter, and sometimes some rosemary. One of the women vouched for my onion chopping abilities, and we decided I could at least help the other two. We headed back to the kitchen, but the women in Aster’s family assured us that they had it under control. So we hung out for a bit, then returned to our seats.

One of the groomsmen read the marriage certificate aloud, and the couple exchanged rings. Once that was all taken care of, everyone seemed to relax a little bit. We took some pictures, and the bride’s family and friends presented gifts to the couple. The gifts were cash and household items, including an electric stove, a wide assortment of cooking pots, drinking glasses, plates, and various injera holders. One of Aster’s brothers bought them a refrigerator!

Next, it was time for round two of food. This time, though, the food was served on communal platters and the atmosphere was much more relaxed. Everyone was encouraging each other to eat, and feeding each other bites of food by hand (a tradition called gursha; it shows love and respect). I had a little 11-year-old sitting next to me who fed me progressively larger bites until I caught onto her game; everyone at the table was laughing about it as I struggled to swallow the final one.

As we finished the t’ibs, one of Aster’s relatives laid a new piece of injera and scooped some more wat on our plate, and one of the elders gave a blessing. He fed the couple, then her parents, then the friends who were representing Brihan’s family. Each in turn fed the groom and the bride. Then the same thing happened for the mize; the elder fed each of us, then we fed the couple. “It is a way of sharing the blessing,” Brihan explained.

It was about 5:30 by the time we left, carrying gifts (including the refrigerator) and empty soda bottles. This time, we were in a vehicle that took the long way around, through a town called Algee, on a road that still existed. Driving with a group of people in good spirits as the sun and a sliver of the moon both set in the west, I felt a sense of belonging that’s hard to find in a country where you stick out like a sore thumb. I felt like I was a part of something. And I am.

(Pictures to follow, once I figure out how to get them off of Kim’s camera!)

Snapshot: Breakfast

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 10:00:31 -0400

Most days after aerobics class I go to Samson and Meskerem’s little cafe for breakfast. The couple has been operating the restaurant for a little under a year now, and they serve my favorite breakfast food in Ethiopia, fuul.

I walk up to the front of the restaurant and start to wash my hands; as I do, Samson spots me and says good morning (Akkam bulte? Fayya dha?). Is there fuul? I ask. Nowadays, the answer is always yes; at 7:15 I’m one of the first customers of the morning. By 9:00, when most people have gone to school or work, they’re almost always sold out.

Samson conveys my order to Meskerem, whom I rarely see. While he works the front, she’s in the narrow kitchen at the side of the shop, scrambling eggs, mixing beans and sauce, or chopping up and frying injera to make fir fir. It’s basically a lean-to attached to the corrugated metal building; the total space is about the size of my house, which is 3x4 meters. “One special fuul for Joanna.” The identity of the customer is important here; if it’s Kim, she prefers her fuul without raw peppers and onions on top.

I take a seat at one of the stools in the front of the shop; chairs, two tables, and some tarp make an improvised veranda on the dirt. It can get crowded inside, and I’m usually still sweating from the aerobics, so outside is better.

The fuul arrives in a few minutes, steaming hot. Meskerem’s fuul is some of the spiciest (and most delicious) I’ve had, so I almost always get “special fuul,” which means that the beans in a tomato and berbere sauce are topped with a few scrambled eggs. The eggs help to neutralize some of the spice.

I devour my fuul, using pieces of bread to scoop up bites. Fuul is always served in a shallow metal dish that has been placed directly on the fire, typically atop a saucer-like metal plate. You can tilt the metal plate to keep from spilling your fuul as you scoop, but the bowl will most certainly burn your fingers. The bowl goes directly on the fire because the two main components of the dish, beans and sauce, are usually prepared separately in advance; when someone orders fuul, they’re fried up together so it comes out fresh and hot. Often, the bottom of the fuul will get a little bit crusty because of the heat. This is almost always the most delicious part.

When there’s nothing left to scoop, I pay the bill - 10 birr, or 11 if I’ve had tea - and head home. What a delicious way to start the day.

The Whirlwind Tour: Ethiopia in Six Days

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 10:00:47 -0400

My brother, Tom, and sister-in-law, Emily, came to visit last month. It was great timing - while the end of my service is approaching rapidly (only 16 weeks to go!), I was in a place in my service where things felt stagnant. Our whirlwind tour of Ethiopia was not only a ton of fun, but also really wore me out - which made coming back to site a welcome rest. Now it feels good to be back, and I really have a handle on the things I want to accomplish before I go home.

The two intrepid travelers arrived on a Thursday. Unfortunately, I was doing a training all day, but they explored Addis Ababa on their own. They drove past the various palaces that are currently in use, and got to see the interior of the one on the campus of Addis Ababa University that is currently serving as an ethnographic museum. They also checked out the National Museum, which will be the home of Lucy when she returns to Ethiopia this summer. I got to meet them for a drink later at their hotel, Bole Rock, which is a lovely and relatively inexpensive option near the airport. We went out for dinner to a restaurant that serves primarily food, so their first real meal in Ethiopia was Mexican food.

The next day, we took a morning flight to Bahir Dar, a resort city in Amhara. There we explored the Martyrs’ Memorial, where the grounds, museum, and art gallery are dedicated to those who died fighting the Derg, the military junta that overthrew the imperial government in 1974 and stayed in power until the 1991. In the afternoon, we stopped for a fresh juice before heading out onto the waters of Lake Tana for a boat tour. The boat - a rickety old thing with a too-small motor - took us to the monastery of Ura Kidane Mihret, which has a lovely little 16th-century church, the interior of which is covered with vivid paintings of biblical scenes and saintly deeds. One of my favorite paintings shows Mary and Joseph fleeing from Herod with the newborn baby Jesus — and of course, they bring along their traditional injera holder.

Our next stop was the source of the Nile, where we cruised around a bit looking for hippos (no luck) before stopping for tea and coffee in the cutest little tea house you’ve ever seen. It was covered in papyrus and the grassy smell combined with the burning incense was lovely. A clap of thunder and gusting winds hurried us back to the boat, but our driver didn’t seem to concerned, so we took a little detour to see some pelicans before heading back to shore. He seemed to want to make up for the lack of hippos.

That evening, we enjoyed some misur wot, asa dulet (a kind of sauteed fish), and fish gulash (little bits of deep-fried fish with a tomato sauce and peppers). Unfortunately, this appears to have been a mistake.

The next day we headed to the rock-hewn churches of Lalibela, but Tom was looking greener and greener. He powered through an afternoon of sightseeing before he resorted to lying on the bed of our hotel room, moaning quietly to himself. The following 48 hours were a gastrointestinal journey for all of us. We survived the plane ride to Addis, but decided that making the trip to visit my host family, our original plan, just wasn’t in the cards. Instead, the driver we’d hired picked us up at the airport and we spent the night in Debre Zeit, a little getaway spot with some crater lakes just about an hour south of Addis.

The next day, we drove through the incredibly diverse landscape of the Rift Valley, stopping for lunch in Hawassa. There, we saw gigantic, incredibly scary birds that either deliver or steal babies — it’s unclear. That afternoon, we went to Wando Ganet, a town that boasts holy hot springs and some hiking. We hiked, we soaked, and we drank a lot at the crappy but only hotel near the springs.

The next day, we made our way back to Addis, stopping at a resort on Lake Langano for a soda. We got a little driving tour of Addis, going around Mexico Square, through Piazza, and past St. George’s. Our last meal was a cultural extravaganza at Yod Abyssinia, a restaurant that features different styles of dancing and music from around the country.

Overall, despite our little illness-caused delay, we had a really lovely time and saw some amazing birds and landscapes. I’m so lucky that my entire immediate family made the trek out here! They’re the biggest part of what I miss in America — although cheese comes in a close second.

No Leotard, No Problem

Mon, 25 Feb 2013 08:59:19 -0500

Mettu is quiet at 6:30am. The sun is still just below the horizon, starting to give the sky a pink glow. The people who are awake are mostly women, cooking injera in smoky kitchens. A few people are out delivering bread to tiny shops well off the main road or heading to the bus station.

Down one narrow alleyway, though, the lights are on and the music is turned up. In the martial arts studio of Abubakar, a spacious, mostly empty building with a cement floor elevated into a stage at one end, about ten people are bouncing around to the frantic beat as Abubakar calls out moves. It’s part kickboxing, part step aerobics, and part dancing - but entertaining through and through.

I was never big on exercise when I lived in America except in ways that seemed incidental - playing rugby was fun, and exercise was just a necessary side effect. Biking to work was just the fastest way. Since living in Ethiopia, though, my opportunities for accidental exercise have decreased, and so I’ve had to make a conscious effort to move my body. For a while, I was running and lifting filled water bottles that substituted for weights on alternating days and feeling pretty good about my fitness.

When my sitemate Kim asked me to join her for Abubakar’s class, I was a little wary. Aerobics? Me? I had a mental image, and it was not good. Kim gave me that look that means, “But we need to stick together!” and I caved. I’m glad I did.

As it turns out, my skill level in the class is average, and I’m far from the most interesting character in the class. Let me break it down for you:

Michael Jackson: There’s a guy who comes every day and parks himself front and center. He gets every move right away, and when I’ve missed a step or skipped a beat I look to him to get back on track — as does everyone else in the class. Oh, and he does the whole thing looking graceful and upbeat, while the rest of us look like we’re climbing Ras Dashen blindfolded.

The Three Stooges: One man, enough blundering for three. He’s always enthusiastic — to the point where he’s bumping into the people on either side of him. If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was faking just for the laughs.

Dhalsim: Remember that character in Street Fighter who could stretch his arms and legs forever in any direction? He’s in the class. Just take away the head paint and jewelry and add a beard. Our Dhalism practices his martial arts moves after class - just make sure you give him a wide berth.

The rest (all men, except Kim and I) come and go, but these three, along with the constantly-rotating lineup of techno songs and Abubakar’s encouragement keep it lively.

Work without much Work: Sustainability in Action with Club GLOW

Tue, 05 Feb 2013 10:00:46 -0500

I wrote a few months ago about our amazing summer camp in Nekemte. Since the school year began, the girls we took to camp have been running a club here in town for their peers. Although Kim, Ashley, and I show up each week, our role is simple: make sure they have the materials they need, review the lesson plans, and watch while we beam with pride.

This past week, during the school break, the girls had a two-day program to close out the semester. When we got together to plan it, I was expecting to help them make a schedule and assign roles, suggesting other activities along the way. To my pleasant surprise, they showed up with a schedule already in hand, including who would run each session on leadership, communication, HIV and STIs, and planning for the future. As a group, we added some games to spice things up and made a list of the supplies they’d need.

The mini camp was really, really fun. Twelve girls came for all four sessions, and a few others flitted in and out. The girls let me help out with the HIV activity, and I did a condom demonstration using, to everyone’s entertainment, a broom handle as my model. At the end of the second day, 7 of the girls said they’d learned something new about HIV; 12 had increased their knowledge of STIs. Nine learned new things about leadership and ten said they had new goal-setting skills.

I do have a little work to do now: in addition to writing up the report (we got some financial assistance from Peace Corps [855 birr, or a little under $50, for those of you who are interested], so gotta submit those receipts!) I’m going to write up lesson plans for all of the sessions the girls did this semester and try to secure the club a locker at the school where they can keep their supplies so that this thing can keep going.

Looking around the room during the mini camp, I knew that if I did nothing else in my Peace Corps service, here was something I’d done well. By bringing these girls to camp and encouraging them to keep it going in their community, I’d made a little mark on my town. Luckily, though, this isn’t it! Six more months, and several more projects to wrap up. And…go!

Gexee, my first Afaan Oromo teacher, was my second, self-proclaimed Ethiopian mom. During my first...

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 09:03:53 -0500

Gexee, my first Afaan Oromo teacher, was my second, self-proclaimed Ethiopian mom. During my first few months here, we spent six and a half hours a day together, plowing through the language one-on-one. It was exhausting and intense, and when the training staff switched our teachers on us, I nearly cried.

Sometimes we’d get so exhausted in class that she’d decided we needed a break, and we’d stroll around town. Ethiopians walk pretty slowly, but even so, Gexee was exceptional; you’d need a stop-motion shot to even tell that she was moving forward. I’d do my best to keep pace. We’d get some fresh air, try to find Afaan Oromo speakers with whom I could practice, and then head back to the classroom. Gexee always encouraged me to keep going, praised my progress, and helped mitigate my frustrations. She was like that one teacher everyone seemed to have in high school who was notoriously tough, but years later everyone talked about how amazing that class was and how it shaped their lives. Luckily, being an adult, I was able to recognize her at the time for what she was: just an awesome teacher.

Since that summer, she’d moved up in the Peace Corps world, getting a job as a program assistant for the education program. I’d thought many times that I should call her to say hi, but was looking forward to going to Addis in March, when I knew I’d see her and be able to show what the amazing base she’d given me in learning Afaan Oromo had allowed me to achieve.

It wasn’t meant to be, though. Gexee died suddenly last week. I never took the chance to really thank her for being such an amazing teacher and friend, but I hope that somewhere out there, she knows how grateful I am that I had the chance to know and learn from her.

I guess 18 months of spicy food and coffee finally caught up with me...

Sat, 29 Dec 2012 03:42:18 -0500

In the past, I’ve poo-pooed my Ethiopian friends’ and neighbors’ insinuations that foreigners can’t handle their spicy food. A recent illness made me realize that maybe I do have to take it easy on the spice…but I’m getting ahead of myself.

A few weeks ago, I woke up with a weird pain in my side. It felt like a side stitch, and I didn’t think much of it. It persisted throughout the day, though, and radiated to my shoulder, and so that evening a friend and I did what any person with internet access does when they’re feeling ill: googled it. The Mayo Clinic’s symptom checker came up with a scary list of possibilities, including infections of various expendable organs. I called the Peace Corps medical duty phone and explained my symptoms. The doctor told me to take some ibuprofen for the pain, get some sleep, and go to the hospital in the morning.

I waited in the hot, urine-scented hospital waiting room for an hour before a staff member noticed me and, against my protests, ushered me to the front of the line. This kind of thing is a common occurrence in Ethiopia, where guest culture means that a foreigner waiting, standing, or unfed is unacceptable. I always feel guilty, but my objections have rarely been successful. I was in a lot of pain and tired of being told to tabadhuu, so I was even less vehement than usual. I paid my five birr registration fee and I moved on to the next (outdoor) waiting area. Another hour went by before my name was called.

The doctor, shadowed by two medical students, asked me what was wrong, and I told him it hurt my side and shoulder when I breathed in, and it was worse when I coughed or laughed. “Why are you laughing? You should be more serious,” he tried to joke. I smiled feebly. He showed me to the examining table and poked around at my abdomen. “Do you have a fever?” he asked. I expressed my uncertainty, since I didn’t have a thermometer. We went back to his desk, where he wrote in my chart:

Hurts when smiling
Anorexic
Intermittent fever

I need to get my hands on that chart before I leave Ethiopia. For the record, I’m the same weight I was when I got here, give or take a kilo. Not sure where bullet point #2 came from.

He told me he suspected a gallbladder infection, and sent me for blood work and an x-ray. These services cost 15 and 20 birr, respectively. I paid at the cashier, had my blood drawn at the lab, then moved on to radiology area. A grumpy old man took my name and receipt, then showed me into the room that housed the machine. It looked like something out of Lost. At his instruction, I removed my top and my bra and stood against the panel while he aimed what looked like an overhead projector with crosshairs at my chest. It was cold and embarrassing. I got dressed and went out to wait for the slide to develop. He told me it would be 20 minutes, but called me in after only a few. As it turns out, he aimed wrong, and needed to take another x-ray, this time of my abdomen. We repeated the whole chilly, embarrassing procedure, this time without pants, too. Luckily I was able to keep on my undies, or I probably would have cried.

When my x-rays were developed, I collected my lab results on the way back to the doctor. He glanced at the chemical and visual depictions of my body’s state and pronounced them normal, but said I should come back after lunch to get an ultrasound. I was surprised — both that it was lunch time already (a whole morning gone!) and that they even have an ultrasound machine — but agreed to return soon.

I met up with two of my sitemates for lunch and buna, and they accompanied me to the hospital. We waited. The doctor appeared at one point to tell me he was waiting for the surgeon to be available so we could all chat. I thanked him; when he walked away, my friends and I looked at each other, aghast. “Surgeon?” There was no way anyone at this hospital was going to see my insides without an x-ray machine.

After another hour of waiting, the doctor reappeared. The ultrasound machine was broken (no way!), but the surgeon had one at the private clinic where he works nights. I should go there in the evening.

I went home and watched some mindless television for a bit before it was time to visit the clinic. There, Dr. Makkonen gelled up my belly and pushed and prodded at my internal organs — gallbladder, stomach, spleen, appendix, liver, and kidneys. He pointed them out as they came up on the monitor, and pronounced them all normal. He said i probably had accute gastritis, which is an inflammation of the stomach lining. He prescribed antacid and told me to avoid buna, shay, and spicy foods until I felt better, which could take over a week. And did.

I did some more research on the ever-enlightening internet and found that there were more foods I should avoid: refined grains, peanuts, palm oil, cabbage, potatoes, tomatoes, fatty meats, garlic, onions, chocolate and milk. So I spent the next week trying to behave myself, eating only whole grains, legumes, and bananas. I wasn’t perfect, but it did the trick, and my stomach was back to normal in time for me to splurge a little with Christmas treats. Lesson learned: no more 5-buna days for this PCV.

Biyya Bartani: They came; they saw; they reflected.

Mon, 03 Dec 2012 10:00:42 -0500

One of the most common questions people asked about my parents while they were here was biyya bartani? (“they learned the country?”) — meaning, have they gotten to know it a bit? As evidenced by this beautiful reflection on their visit, my mom certainly did:

The countryside and the mountains are beautiful in Ethiopia. If Van Gogh had painted “Starry night” in Ethiopia, the stars would have jumped off the canvas. We had the opportunity to see historic wonders: churches and castles from the beginning of time; we crossed the Nile River; saw the blue Nile falls and crossed Lake Tana in a tumultuous boat ride to see an historic monastery and museum located on an island and on the way back searched for hippos. We saw monkeys (up close), the most beautiful landscapes, but the best site of all was seeing our lovely daughter. More about this later.

Buna!! What an experience! It raised coffee drinking to a whole new level and reminded me that coffee is meant to be shared. Observing the effort that goes into making it (with pride and love; the special cups; the incense and the green branches and usually served in a very humble setting) all made for a memorable experience.

I enjoyed the food a lot. I did not overeat but yet felt full, I especially liked misur wot, fuul, popcorn, injera, all the other delicious breads, and avocado juice. Having some of this food prepared and served by people who are an important part of Joanna’s life made it taste even better. I appreciated that many times eating Ethiopian food really resulted in sharing a meal.

I had no idea how much the Peace Corps volunteers work to become part of their community. The challenges they face everyday just to travel or accomplish various projects and to deal with environmental issues is truly incredible. But when they do this work, or talk about their work, they never seem to focus on what challenges they face or what they are giving up to be there. I have so much respect for all of them and the work they do. They inspired me to try to do good in my own little corner of the world and to try harder to see the good in others.

Most of the Ethiopian people have very little in the way of material goods, but yet they are very willing to share what they have. Many of the people we met seem very happy. Being welcomed into the homes of Joanna’s host family and the homes of her friends and neighbors was such an absolutely wonderful feeling and one I will never forget. All these people seemed so loving and caring. Many shouted “congratulations Joanna!” because her parents were visiting. It was great to meet the people we had heard stories about and it was a good experience to see the health center.

Some of the sadder images were those that involved women. We saw women walking with heavy sticks on their backs and other women carrying pallets of stones. Those images were startling. Before the trip, I did not understand that this was a male-dominated society nor did I understand what poverty looks like. But there are things in Ethiopia that I didn’t expect to see such as satellite dishes and a place where you could get photos developed and a store where you could purchase nail polish. The children and animals do run freely. It was difficult to understand the children running around unsupervised and being expected to sell goods outside of the bus station.

While I was waiting for Jim to pay the hotel bill, a little boy of 3 showed me his treasures: a bottle cap; the plastic from around a sealed water bottle; a pen and a stone. That image has stayed with me and I know I will be thinking about him over the holidays.

I was impressed because even though the roads are dirt roads and the terrain often rocky and uneven, people who have government jobs and those who are teachers, take pride in their appearance and dressed in professional clothes for work. They also seemed proud of their work, even though the teachers make hardly anything in terms of wages. People do not own irons but their clothes look crisp and wrinkle free.

There is an absence of quiet in Ethiopia: The call to prayer, every animal and his comrade conversing for hours.

Joanna has changed so much. Her knowledge of the language is incredible and her ability to deal with difficult situations is remarkable. She is a strong, resourceful woman.
I know she values her alone time but she gives that up to interact more with the people of her community. A definite role reversal took place during this trip as Joanna was the parent and we followed her instructions and asked an infinite number of questions like children. It was a surprise to me that the PVCs do not stay out after dark but with the lack of lighting, and the male dominated society, this makes sense.

Something that has not changed about Joanna is her exterior and interior beauty. At one point I said to her “I forgot how beautiful you are.” Hearing the locals call out to her by name made us think that we had given her the perfect name for the melodic way it flows from the Ethiopian tongue. She gave me the best birthday ever by encouraging me to read to school aged kids and making me a chocolate cake and a surprise party. Joanna’s comfort level peaked when we arrived in Metu. She takes pride in Metu.
She is loved and protected by the people there — PVCs and Ethiopians alike — and that brought us such relief and joy. We are so impressed by all the good work she performs.

The CBC doctor who administered our inoculations had warned, “Stay healthy, so you can easily deal with the conditions your daughter is living in.” Joanna’s place is small but lovely. Seeing the place she lives in reminded me that with love and care you can make a house a home.

Then there were all the other lessons learned:

The outstanding work of the Peace Corps and how it leads to better global understanding.

What it is like to watch the United States presidential results in a third world country.

How little I take an interest in what is going on in other countries and how that needs to change.

The importance of the love of family and friends

What it feels like to be stared at because you look different.

Patience and it is fine not to always be in control.

Americans can survive the goat bus.

The kindness of strangers.

Everyone wants to learn and to be of value to society. Acknowledging people makes them feel special.

Water is a valuable resource that should never be taken for granted.

The conveniences we have and how we take them for granted. I complain when I have laundry to do, but I very rarely need to hand wash anything or use a stick as an agitator. We have good roads; good infrastructure; running, clean water, reliable access to health care, the internet, many life choices, outstanding libraries and wonderful homes.

Banana man does exist.

My admiration for my daughter has multiplied.

What to expect when you're expecting...to visit Ethiopia!

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 11:57:36 -0500

It’s been a busy two weeks! My parents arrived in Ethiopia on November 4, and we’ve been jet-setting around the country ever since. As their visit approached, I asked them to reflect on their expectations for visiting Ethioipia. Here’s what mom had to say, in response to some questions I posed:

Hi. I am looking forward to seeing you and I am very excited to learn more about your everyday life. I hope that I will not stare at you too much or smother you with my hugs but I miss you terribly and can’t wait to spend time with you. I picture Addis to be very crowded and busy. I imagine that Addis and some of the other tourist sites will give me a clearer idea about the beginning of civilization. I think Mettu will be less busy than the tourist areas and will feel very rural. Seeing the medical center and your home will help me to understand your life better. I think Ethiopia will look very mountainous with dirt roads and the housing will be very modest. I picture children and animals running around freely. I am very concerned about the poverty that we will see. I am worried that I will want to try to fix things or want to adopt a child and that I will feel very sad and frustrated. Besides seeing you and spending time as a family, I hope that my time in Ethiopia will clarify what is important in life. I love injera and most dips. I cannot wait to try Buna. I am dreading the latrine and hope I don’t behave in a culturally incorrect way about anything. Walking and visiting the people you care about will make me happy.

Over the next few weeks, I’ll write about our adventures, which took us to to seven cities and towns in just under two weeks. Double spoiler alert: there was staring, but not too much from mom; no Peace Corps volunteers were smothered in the course of this adventure.

Girls Leading Our World: Empowering young women with interactive, educational programming

Tue, 30 Oct 2012 10:00:18 -0400

Club GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) kicked off in Mettu last week. Thanks to the incredible experience and training campers received at Camp GLOW in Nekemte, our club is entirely student-run, with the other Peace Corps volunteers and I playing only an advisory role. They’ve all developed such poise and leadership, I was sitting in the back of the classroom getting a little choked up as they ran the meeting.

The club is going to follow a program focused mainly on life skills (self-esteem, assertive communication, decision-making, setting goals, etc), but one of my favorite sessions at camp that I’m looking forward to helping the girls replicate with their club was an HIV program. Ethiopian students get a lot of information about HIV in school, but sometimes their understanding of that information is a little superficial. For example, on a pre-test of their knowledge, we asked campers to list three ways to prevent the spread of HIV. They’re taught the ABCs: Abstain, Be faithful, use Condoms. But a few of the girls wrote “be faithful” and “live one-to-one” — another, synonymous phrasing they’re taught — as two separate answers.

The session I led was taken from a few activities in the Peace Corps Life Skills manual, and designed to help them think a little more critically about the information they’re taught. First, we played Lions and Elephants. One camper stood in the middle. She represented a baby elephant. Seven other campers, the adult elephants, stood around her. Their job was to protect her from four other campers, representing lions, who tried to touch the baby elephant. It was simple enough - the seven elephants could easily fend off the lions’ attack. The metaphor was pretty straightforward: the baby elephant is the human body, the adult elephants are the immune system, and the lions are diseases like malaria, tuberculosis, influenza, and pneumonia. A strong immune system can effectively fend off these diseases.

Then I entered the mix, representing HIV. I pulled all but two of the adult elephants away — basically, I destroyed the immune system. With the immune system compromised, the lions were easily able to touch the baby elephant; that is, diseases can do much more damage to the human body. One overly-enthusiastic lion poked our baby elephant in the eye…but they got the point.

Then we moved to a classroom setting, where I’d made two columns on the blackboard: one for fluids by which HIV is transmitted, the other for portals by which it could enter the human body. I explained that for HIV to be transmitted, it must be carried by one of four fluids through one of the seven portals of entry. I asked campers to guess first the fluids, then the portals — they did so in no time at all. (Can you? I’ll write them at the bottom of this post.) As they identified fluids or portals correctly, I flipped over a paper with the correct answer written on it. Soon we had a complete table on the blackboard.

Unbeknownst to them, I’d taped scenarios to the bottom of many of the desks in the classroom. I asked the campers to reach under and, if they had a paper, take turns sharing it with the rest of the group. Then we asked, together, “Is there a fluid? Is there a portal of entry?” If they answered yes to both questions, we put the scenarios on one wall, labeled “Transmission is possible.” If they answered no to either question, we put them on the opposite wall, labeled “Transmission is not possible.”

Overall, I think the session did a great job at reinforcing their existing knowledge and making them think about it more critically. We got to dispel some myths (one girl tried to put “kissing” on the “Transmission is possible” wall, but we set her straight), and conclude by talking about ways to mitigate the risk of potential modes of transmission.

And for those of you who want to test your HIV knowledge…

Main fluids that can transmit HIV:
Blood
Semen
Vaginal Fluid
Breast Milk

Portals through which HIV can enter the body:
Penis
Vagina
Anus
Mouth
Eyes
Nose
Wounds or Sores

Club

Ethiopia Never Fails to Suprise Me

Fri, 26 Oct 2012 10:00:16 -0400

Last Monday, one of the guards at the Health Center approached me early in the morning, speaking in rapid Afaan Oromo. I hadn’t had my buna yet (excuses, excuses), so all I got was he was inviting me to lunch. He and I often eat the same tiny cafe, and so I thought we were just going to purposely show up at the same time. I gladly agreed.

I knew I was wrong when just about everyone on the health center staff congregated in the waiting area at noon: Kassechi, my normal lunchlady, would never have enough food to feed all of us. So, as I’ve learned to do like a pro over the past year, I just went with it as we started walking together. I got teased for walking too slowly, but since I had no idea where we were headed, I was just trying to stay follow the crowd.

We ducked into a nicely landscaped compound with a big tent erected outside. “Not another accidental funeral…” I thought. As I took in the scene, though, I realized no one was wearing black. Phew.

I sat down next to the pharmacist, Ismael, who luckily speaks pretty good English and was able to clear things up.The Ethiopian Orthodox calendar has a saint assigned to every day of the month, and this was St. Michael’s day. Our hosts, serving up misur wot, were part of a church association that hosts this kind of thing.

Ismael and I chatted about different religious traditions, comparing Orthodox, Catholic, and Muslim holidays. He’s Muslim, and so his presence represents one of the things I like most about Ethiopia: people to know about and share religious holidays with friends and coworkers, regardless of which religion they ascribe to — even if it’s just for a free lunch.

The woman who was serving the wot kept coming back to refill my plate, giving me the non-spicy version of misur, called allicha (white). “This is better for you,” she kept saying, despite my attempts to reassure her that both were delicious. Ethiopians think foreigners can’t handle their spice. Pshaw.

When I go back to America, it will be great to know what’s going on most of the time, but the world will be a little less surprising.

Guyya Harka Dhiqaana Addunyaa: World Handwashing Day

Thu, 25 Oct 2012 09:00:38 -0400

Today is one of those days that I’m feeling so great about my Peace Corps service that I thought I should write about it before something happens to chase the euphoria away.

Today is World Handwashing Day. Washing your hands seems like a pretty basic task, but it’s so important: with proper handwashing technique using soap, half of all diarrheal disease and a third of pneumonia cases can be prevented.

I took some of the resources from Peace Corps and the Google to write a short but (I hope) effective training for primary school students. I drafted it in (horrendous) Afaan Oromo, and the IT guy at the health center was patient and kind enough to help me make it comprehensible. I arranged with the school to talk to the older kids in the morning, and the younger ones in the afternoon.

The format was question and answer, designed to remind the kids of what they already know: handwashing is important, and should be done, either with soap or ash, after using the toilet, before preparing or eating food, and after touching animals. It included a simple demonstration of the effectiveness of soap: two students rubbed tumeric into their hands, and one washed with soap, the other with water only. After, we compared the results, and it’s easy to tell that the soap is more effective than water alone.

More than telling them what they already know, I wanted to get the kids excited about the possibility of having a place to wash their hands on the school campus: although there’s a water pipe, it’s broken right now, and so every day students fetch water to sustain the crops grown on school grounds. My plan going forward is to work with one of the existing school clubs to construct handwashing stations by the latrines. The challenge will be to make it sustainable, but by going through one of the stronger school groups, I think it’s possible. The school administration also seems excited to help out.

My plan was to do the training alongside the Health Extension Workers, and so I showed them the plan yesterday and they agreed to help out. Unfortunately, the time for the first training rolled around and they were nowhere to be found. I took a breath, and, with the help and encouragement of the teachers and an administrator, just did the damn thing. It was scary, and the kids were laughing when I stumbled with my language, but ultimately it was thrilling, and I think it went over really well.

When it was all over, I went to the Health Center to say hi, and ran into the missing Health Extension Workers. They’d gotten confused: the morning training was at 2:00 (that’d be 8:00 a.m. by our reckoning), but they thought it was at 2:30; the afternoon training was at 8:30 (or what we’d call 2:30 pm). Honestly, I think it’s more confusing for me, but whatever.

I took advantage of bumping into them to join in their day’s door to door visits, looking at people’s latrines, trash pits, and kitchens. The main purpose of these visits was for the HEWs to advise families on ways to make the environment around them healthier, but they still look out for the other basic health needs that come up. For example, when we entered the compound of a very, very pregnant woman, one of the HEWs said, gesturing to the woman’s belly, “We’re here to look at your latrine and trash pit — and to talk about what’s in there.” The woman assured us that she’d gotten antenatal care at the health center, and planned to give birth there. I learned how to wish a pregnant woman well in Afaan Oromo, and we moved on.

We finished our morning with a cup of buna, and they assured me they’ll be there for this afternoon’s program. I’m kind of glad they didn’t show up, to be honest - now I know that, in a pinch, I can do a pre-scripted training in Afaan Oromo, and it can turn out ok. What a day!

...and we're back.

Wed, 24 Oct 2012 09:00:41 -0400

It’s been a while since I’ve updated this blog — sorry, loyal fans. In my second year, I’m really learning what it means to persist in projects that seem valuable: ask for help, ask again, take charge, remind, nag, cede control, express your gratitude. Repeat. Tomorrow, I’ll write about how those lessons paid off for the training I’m doing alongside health extension workers to mark World Handwashing Day.

It’s been a bitter-sweet few months. Although I feel like projects are really taking off, I’ve lost some great friends and counterparts to promising job opportunities in bigger cities. That’s the problem with making friends with intelligent and ambitious people!

Here’s what I’m working on now:
-Handwashing program in primary schools
-Improving child nutrition by promoting small-scale gardens at the household level
-“Positive Living” trainings for my local group for people living with HIV/AIDS
-Statistical analysis of the causes of Mettu’s most common health problems
-Advising a Girls’ Club with students from both high schools

I’ll do my best to post updates on all of these in the coming weeks. Stay tuned also for stories of a “sneak attack holiday,” my parents’ impending visit to Ethiopia, and lessons on time management from someone with, often, way too much time on her hands.

Texting In the New Year

Tue, 11 Sep 2012 12:45:00 -0400

Happy 2005! Today was the first day of the new Ethiopian year. While I was doing my typical holiday routine (coka, dabo, doro wat, buna; rinse and repeat), my friend Leah was keeping me updated on her own progress halfway across the country. Here’s how her day went:

10:05 am: I just got buna’ed
10:15 am: Nothing like cake for breakfast.
10:36 am: I think my landlady is drunk. Awesome.
10:59 am: I just had to kiss a cross.
11:33 am: They want me to watch the slaughter. I don’t think I can.
12:21 pm: I’m sitting in a room with a priest who’s passed out on the couch. Just the two of us.
12:33 pm: Have you ever eaten raw liver before?
1:30 pm: I’m dry heaving eating these tibs.
2:08 pm: Just prayed for the third time, this one lasting for FIFTEEN minutes. And throughout priests were wailing on the TV in the background.
2:11 pm: Also, the dude sitting next to me just asked me for the ninth time (in a row) how I find Ethiopian cultural ceremony. Must be the only English he knows.
2:21 pm: I just saw Fergie at an Aster [an Ethiopian singer] concert on ETV. WTF?
2:25 pm: And there’s Wyclef Jean. Or is it Will.I.Am? Couldn’t tell.
2:35 pm: Ah, I see now. [The rest of the Black Eyed Peas were with Fergie. I was watching the same thing.] This is really random. And awful.
2:36 pm: Why don’t they ever show the Asian dude?
2:37 pm: He’s Asian, right?
2:43 pm: Now my landlady is feeding poor people who are disabled. Sometimes I really love this country.
2:50 pm: Time for rest!

Happy New Year!

The Same, but Different: Funeral Edition

Mon, 10 Sep 2012 12:55:00 -0400

I attended a funeral today - the first in Ethiopia that I’ve attended on purpose. I knew something was up when I went to get breakfast and saw a few of my neighbors carrying a rolled up tent and a huge (like, 2’ diameter) cooking pot. At that point, I wasn’t sure if there was to be a wedding or a funeral.

In Ethiopia, just about every neighborhood has an idir, a kind of cooperative that members pay into each month and that helps out in time of need, particularly when someone dies. The idir steps up to pay for the costs of burial, and erects the tent where mourners come to grieve. Membership, at least in Mettu, is open to folks of any religion.

After breakfast, as I made my way to the health center, I saw a lot of people walking towards a side street, many of whom I recognized: the woman who owns the store across the street. A teacher from the primary school. A few nurses from the health center. All the women were draped in white nutellas, the colored band on the edge wrapped around their heads — a special way it’s worn for mourning.

I got to the entrance of the health center and met several colleagues right at the gate. I asked who’d died; it was Ato Tadessa, who worked in the town finance office. I didn’t know him, but everyone else seemed to. Two of the men were headed to the funeral, and said I could come with them.

As we approached Ato Tadessa’s house, a steady stream of women in nutellas was coming towards us. A truck followed them slowly, bearing a funeral wreath and the coffin. A crowd of men followed the truck. I saw a few of my female neighbors, and decided it was a good time to ditch the men I’d come with and join the women’s procession.

I walked with a neighbor — really, with all my neighbors and virtually every government employee — to a nearby Orthodox church. I was among the first to arrive, so got a seat on a bench outside the building, but many latecomers contented themselves with a rock or the ground. Women and men were still separated, but not as distinctly as with the procession. All three of Ethiopia’s main religions were represented in the crowd, and I saw my landlord, who is Muslim, helping to carry the coffin to the porch of the church.

Ato Tadessa’s close relatives followed, weeping and pulling at their clothes and hair. The priests surrounded the coffin, their prayers and incense burners directed at the colorful cloth that draped it. The crowd was respectful, but far from silent, murmuring in quiet conversation occasionally broken by the weeping of a newly-arrived relative: Tadessa’s parents and siblings arrived late, having come from a nearby town, crying for their Tade.

Talking to friends and neighbors in the crowd, I learned that his death had been sudden. He was seen at the market on Saturday; he’d gone to the idir meeting on Sunday. At 4:00 a.m. on Monday, he called his family to him and told them he was dying. They didn’t have time to even learn his symptoms before he’d passed away. He was only 44 years old. “At times like this, you think about the family,” my friend Rahel said. He has young children, and he was the family’s only breadwinner.

(Rahel had gone to a government office to get a form signed that morning, and found it closed. When she learned that everyone had gone to the funeral, she borrowed a nutella and joined them.)

The priests led the coffin bearers to the burial grounds, where they finished their prayers and interred the body. Ato Tadessa’s family had fallen silent during the priest’s prayers, but wept again to see him buried. One young woman was so overcome that she had to be carried back to the church.

The crowd gathered once again around the building, and Ato Demisse, a friend of the deceased, delivered a short eulogy. Demisse, who is normally one of the most animated and entertaining speakers in town, was much more subdued than usual as he summarized Tadessa’s life and career. He was followed by a priest, who delivered a short sermon, telling us to honor Tadessa by faithfully working for the good of our families and our community, as he did, in the service of God.

With those words, the service was over, and the crowd shuffled out the gates of the church grounds.

It’s rainy season again, and I forgot.I forgot what it’s like to hear the rain crashing...

Wed, 05 Sep 2012 07:46:51 -0400

It’s rainy season again, and I forgot.

I forgot what it’s like to hear the rain crashing down above you and think it’s pouring as hard as it can, then to feel the atmosphere take a deep breath before it releases a fresh torrent, harder, louder.

I forgot what it’s like to feel the thunder and lightning in your chest more than you hear or see them.

I forgot how much sense it makes that when it’s raining, you stay put. It’s not worth the muddy shoes and sodden feet, and an umbrella can’t combat this rain.

I forgot the smile hail brings to my face. It’s a reminder of what cold actually is.

I forgot how green and lush it gets in this part of the country, sprouting up from every bit of dirt.

I forgot how it can go from 90 degrees and sunny to 60 and cloudy in less than an hour, and shift back and forth a dozen times in one day — and that the weather can trick me into hanging laundry out to dry or bringing it in just as many times.

I remember now.

Wet Cold Ethiopian Summer

Thu, 30 Aug 2012 12:18:05 -0400

Like many Americans, I went to summer camp when I was a kid. I have some great memories of my time at Camp Hoover, going on hikes, singing songs, swimming in the lake, learning new crafts, and making friends from all around the area.

As you might suspect, this is not a common experience for Ethiopian children. “Camping” isn’t really a thing here (why would you sleep outside when you could sleep inside?), and “hiking” — climbing up a hill just for the fun of it — is bound to draw attention. Very few people have cars, and travel, even by bus, is pretty expensive for most Ethiopian families. Many people can count the number of times they’ve left their birthplace.

Peace Corps Volunteers in Ethiopia and all over the world have been trying to bring the summer camp experience to children in their host countries through camps centered around certain themes. The folks in my region, Western Oromia, decided to hold Camp GLOW — Girls Leading Our World — at Wellega University in Nekemte at the end of July. Working with Ethiopian counterparts, we spent a week with 35 girls (including 3 junior counselors) playing games, singing songs, doing crafts, and — oh yeah — holding sessions on gender equality, leadership, health, and environmental issues.

I was a little scared on the bus ride there. One camper was puking the whole way. The bus we’d rented was almost silent. The nine girls from my town and the two from another 40km away barely looked at each other. My dread mounted after we arrived: the dorms weren’t ready for the girls; they ate lunch in silence; a downpour, confusion about which cafeteria we were supposed to eat in, and some terrible misur wot made dinner a debacle. The campus was packed with summer students, and since we didn’t know most of the girls, we were terrified one would get lost in a sea of unfamiliar faces.

Finally, though, we were back in the dorms and the campers did a great job of brainstorming rules for themselves. We sent the girls off to bed to write in their journals (more on that later) and the counselors had time to regroup. Together we looked at the programming for the next day, and adjusted the packed schedule on the fly. Sports were a no-go, because we were in the thick of rainy season and the entire campus was just one big mud puddle. We combined some sessions that seemed to have a lot of overlap. Rhetoric was bumped to free up some space.

The next day, we gave the girls bright yellow Camp GLOW t-shirts to wear, thereby making them stand out almost as much as the farenjis. We started off the day with a self-esteem activity and a scavenger hunt to help acquaint the girls with the university. We secured a private space to eat breakfast, and arranged to have lunch and dinner at a restaurant across the street. The girls were divided into four groups — Lions, Eagles, Elephants, and Monkeys — and quickly started competing for spirit points that we gave out for enthusiasm, courage, brains, and thoughtfulness, Hogwarts style. We were in business.

I was really proud of the sessions I helped plan, especially the one I led on HIV, which I’ll write about in a separate post. We handed out journals to the campers at the beginning of the week, and I came up with two prompts for them each night. One, which doubled as a tool for monitoring what they’d learned during that day’s session, they were to answer in English. The other was intended to be a little more reflective, and could be answered in whatever language they chose. I worried that they’d view the journal writing as a chore, but the girls were consistently eager to write in their journals. One evening, we decided it was too late, and that journal time would be canceled. I’d already written out the day’s prompt on a piece of flip chart paper, though, and some girls found it. When they were supposed to be getting ready for bed, we came across them in the dorm lounge copying it down.

It was a long week. Every day, we were up with the girls by 6:30, and our nightly counselor meetings kept us up to at least 11. Despite the stress, all the counselors held it together — no one got snippy or slacked off. The Ethiopian counterparts and junior counselors were amazing, and consistently went above and beyond what we asked them to do.

Most gratifying was the girls’ eagerness to share what they’d learned — everything from gender roles to friendship bracelets — with their friends back home. We gave them time to plan girls’ clubs while still at camp, and the campers from Mettu had their first meeting a few days after they got back. They all showed up in their bright yellow t-shirts. I almost cried.

Pictures to come.

Here’s a moment I don’t ever want to forget:My neighbor Alemi...

Tue, 24 Jul 2012 09:37:56 -0400

Here’s a moment I don’t ever want to forget:

My neighbor Alemi poked her head in my doorway. “Joanna. Kotuu.” Come here.

I followed her next door to the room where Seena and Getachew live. There were three other women sitting around a table, a plate in the middle. There were five spoons jutting out of a large helping of marqaa, a traditional porridge covered with butter and berbere. They told me to sit down, and we all started eating.

I visited Seena the night she gave birth to her first child, Bethlehem. Relatives and neighbors were gathered to welcome her into the world, drinking coffee and eating marqaa. I was sitting next to an exhausted and frustrated Seena while our other neighbor coached her through breast feeding for one of the first times. I tried to not let my discomfort show too plainly on my face.

It was a week later when Alemi summoned me back, and little Betie slept peacefully while we all chatted and encouraged each other to keep eating. When we finished the porridge, the other women, one by one, put down their spoons and grabbed onto the edge of the plate.

“She doesn’t know,” one whispered to the others. I looked up, and saw they were looking at me expectantly.

“Joanna. Hold onto the plate.”

I smiled sheepishly and did as commanded. Together, we raised and lowered the plate three times, ululating as we lifted.

We got up and left Seena and Betie to nap.

Slumpin' It

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 09:58:38 -0400

During Pre-Service Training, Peace Corps trainees are introduced to a little graph called the Volunteer Life Cycle. It shows peaks of “adjustment” and valleys of “vulnerability” throughout a volunteer’s 27 months of service. Right now I’ve been in country for a little over a year, and so I’m in a place on that life cycle represented by a big valley: the One Year Slump.

The One Year Slump: it’s a time when many PCVs look at their service and think, “I’ve been here for a year. That’s a lot of time. What have I done so far?”

There’s a pause. “Do I hear…are those…crickets?”

Many of us don’t have good answers to this question. Getting things done in this cultural context is hard work. Getting things done while not really speaking the language and while longing for friends, family, and the comforts of home often feels impossible. To top it all off, you’re left thinking, “I left my family, friends, home, and job a year ago, and I feel like I’ve done nothing in the meantime. What’s the point?”

This disaffection manifests itself in a variety of ways. Some people find themselves hibernating at home for days at a time. Some try to organize the heck out of their lives, and then remember how impossible that feels. Some volunteers start asking their questions out loud to other volunteers. “What am I doing here? Should I just go home?” At that point, it’s like a contagion. Formerly secure volunteers start questioning their own service.

Anyway, point being, we’re all at the bottom of this valley right now. Spirits are not high. We’re vulnerable.

As at so many other times in the course of Peace Corps service, it’s the little things that make me rethink the growing certainty that I don’t belong here.

One recent Friday afternoon, I was waiting in my house for my parents to call when I heard a voice outside. “Hadha koo! Fayya dha? Alemiin essa jirti?” (My mother [a term of endearment]! How are you? Where’s Alemi?”) I looked out. It was an old lady. One of my landlord’s relatives had arrived in the rain, and there was no one home to let her in.

I decided to do my best to treat her with the kind of hospitality so many Ethiopians have shown me over the past year. I invited her in, asked her to sit, and offered to boil her some coffee. To my surprise, she agreed, right off — as opposed to the customary refusal of hospitality until you’re bullied into it. She told me she’d been traveling for two days.

While I struggled to light my charcoal stove, I cleared my mail off my bed and told her to lay down. I couldn’t get the charcoal to catch, even after burning two plastic bags — faulty charcoal, I swear — and since the power happened to be on, I decided to just go ahead and use my electric stove to roast the beans. I’m sure my guest was scandalized, but she let this affront to tradition slide.

I’ve learned that cultural integration is important, but that there’s some room for convenience in there, too. Why keep my guest waiting for longer than necessary when I could just use a little electricity?

After the beans were nice and dark, I remembered I didn’t have a mortar and pestle, and discovered that there was no one else at home on my compound. I went to a neighbor’s house to borrow one; they’re expensive, and I boil coffee once or twice a month at most, so I’ve never purchased one. I sat at the edge of my porch and pounded the buna into a fine powder.

I thought about the first time I did this chore, under the supervision of my host sisters. It was dark, and every few minutes they’d stop me, then reach into the mortar and feel the consistency of the grounds. Now I knew what I was aiming for: just a little coarser than espresso. I raised and lowered the big piece of pipe that served as a pestle, and didn’t catch my hand by accident, not once.

Back inside, I boiled some water in my electric kettle, then put the jabana on the hot plate. When it came to a boil again, I removed it from the heat, added the fresh buna grounds, and gave the pot a swirl. I poured out a bit into a cup, saw it wasn’t quite dark enough, and added a little more buna. I put it back on the heat.

How did I know to add more buna? I have no idea. But I was right. When it boiled again, then settled, and I poured it, I knew I’d made the right decision. It was that perfect deep brown color, like in a Folger’s commercial.

Sugar or salt? I asked my guest. A year ago I didn’t even know people drank coffee with salt. Today, I knew to mix a pinch with a little buna, then pour a little of the mixture into her cup.

I put sugar in mine, gave it a stir, and sipped it. It was good. This was the first time I’d ever boiled good buna. Not the best I’ve ever had, no, but it was good. I wasn’t embarrassed to serve it to my guest. She polished off the first cup in a jiffy, and I refilled it twice. There was exactly enough buna for us each to have three cups.

Her son had come home, so she took her leave. We hadn’t had much of a conversation, but I’m used to that by now.

It’s been a year, and I’m still here. Not going strong, exactly, but not quite ready to pack it up. We’ll see what year two has to offer.

The Mediocre: Ups and Downs Abound

Tue, 15 May 2012 14:25:43 -0400

Halfway through today, this blog was going to be filed as “The Good,” since things seemed to be going pretty smoothly. The hiccups of the afternoon, along with a low-level cold I’m hosting, moved it into “mediocre.” Heregoes:

I got up with my alarm at 7:30 this morning: either I slept through my neighbor’s onion chopping, or she took care of food preparation yesterday. I got ready in my newly re-decorated house (with the help of friends and neighbors, I painted last week and set down new floor covering yesterday), then headed out to meet Kim for breakfast. We ate fuul (it’s a beany, stewy thing) at the tiny cafe on my street. The guy who runs it served mine with spicy peppers and Kim’s without, just the way we like it.

We then went to the nearby Mettu Preparatory School to meet with the ten candidates they selected from grades 9 and 10 to attend our summer camp in July. Kim, Celeste, and I are working with other volunteers in our neck of the woods to plan a week-long camp for girls at Wellega University in Nekemte. The programs will focus on leadership, self-esteem, HIV/AIDS prevention, environmental issues, and, well, having fun. We’re going to interview a total of 20 students to select those who seem most motivated and able to handle a week-long program conducted mostly in English.

We explained the camp concept to the girls, signed them up for interview slots, then split up. I headed to town to meet with Frew, who runs the local association for people living with HIV and AIDS. I gave him a sample budget for constructing a millhouse to help him with a grant proposal he’s writing, and then we went for a cup of coffee.

After that, I went to the Health Center to say hi to the staff. Along the way, I was stopped by a passerby who wanted to introduce himself. He’s an English teacher at one of the private schools. We had some superficial chit-chat, which I was just getting bored of when he asked me my religion. When I told him I’m Catholic, he launched into a spiel about accepting Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, and how his dreams are pure now that he’s not Orthodox. I somewhat abruptly, but good-naturedly enough, excused myself from the conversation, claiming I was late for work.

I made it to the Health Center without further incident, and ran into one of my favorite nurses, Sister Mulu. She’d been gone for a few months, as the weather in our area was giving her awful asthma attacks. We greeted each other in the extended style that’s the norm here, and I invited her over for coffee tomorrow evening.

I headed back towards the town, and lo and behold, the evangelical was, seemingly, lying in wait. Cue more standard-issue chit-chat about our respective geographic origins. I stopped at a shop. He offered to wait for me. I told him it was not necessary, and he finally buzzed off. I really dislike people who force their presence upon you.

I knew I still had a half hour or so before I could meet with my tutor, so I stopped for another cup of coffee on my way back to the high school. I planned on studying my Afaan Oromo, but instead had a nice conversation with another the only other patron, a man who, based on his well-above-average stature and darker-than-average skin tone, is clearly of Gambellan origin. (Gambella is a region in the far west, where folks more closely resemble Sudanese than Ethiopians. If you look at a map, this makes sense: Gambella juts out of the Ethiopian border like a finger poking our western neighbor.) We discussed the importance of learning languages, and he bought my coffee (#2). Lovely.

Rahel, my tutor, met me at the high school, and I asked her about a few of Afaan Oromo’s finer points…but mostly, she and I had a cup of coffee (#3) and did a fun little personality test which, incidentally, involved introducing her to a lot of solid English.

Kim came to pick me up. She’s teaching a class at the school closest to my house, and I agreed to sub for her when she’s gone next week. Today, I just observed her go over some material for the eighth graders’ upcoming federal examination. It reminded me how awful middle schoolers are, but Kim does a great job keeping up the enthusiasm and discipline despite their shenanigans. After a girl arrived 55 minutes late for a 1-hour class, we set rules for next week: I’m not allowing anyone in who’s more than 15 minutes late. we’ll see how that goes.

On our way out, we passed a gaggle of teachers. Kim returned a borrowed eraser, and one of the teachers said “I love you” as we walked away. I stopped and turned. “Sorry, are you an English teacher?” He nodded. “In English, it’s really inappropriate to say ‘I love you’ in this context. We don’t say it to colleagues. We have the word ‘like,’ or you can say ‘I appreciate you,’ or just ‘thank you,’ but I love you is not appropriate. So please teach your students that!” A year of frustration with the overuse of the word “love” just came boiling over, but Kim assures me I was polite and friendly. To be fair, there’s only one word in Afaan Oromo that means both “like” and “love” — but still, he’s an English teacher. Someone should tell him. And today, someone did.

We met up with the Peace Corps education program guy, who was in town to talk to folks at the Teacher Training College about placing a PCV there in August, and the driver who’d been chauffeuring him around Western Ethiopia. They’re both lovely, warm men, and they were heading to a neighboring town to have lunch with another PCV. They let us tag along, and we had a pleasant car ride, lunch, and cup of coffee (#5). We each had our own seat AND seatbelt: ah, the joys of a private vehicle!

They dropped us off at Kim’s house, and came in to say hello to her landlords. As they stood around chatting, Kim’s landlady casually held on to my elbow. I realize this sounds weird and random, but here, when you’re with a friend and someone else comes up to greet you, it’s common to keep hold of that friend as if to say, “You can greet us both, but don’t forget, this person’s really mine.” Ganet was showing that she’s got our backs. It made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Or maybe that was the excessive buna.

Kim and I walked next door to the other high school to repeat our camp introduction. We met the director, and he went looking for the students, whom he’d told to meet at 3pm without, apparently, specifying a location. He finally led us to a classroom. “What do these boys thing they’re doing here?” Kim asked. He indicated they’d come for the camp meeting. “The camp is only for girls,” Kim said. He mumbled some excuse about an “information gap” — he clearly hadn’t read the materials Kim had given him.

“What should I tell them?” he asked.

“Um, to go home.” Kim said. I tried my best to conceal a smirk. We rescheduled for tomorrow.

I went back to my house for about an hour, and got to talk to a friend while I caught up on my crocheting. At 4:30, I hurried across town to help teach a computer class at a primary school. This has literally nothing to do with my official Peace Corps assignment, but the guy who teaches it is nice enough and wants the kids to practice their English a bit. Today’s topic was setting up an email account. I was worried it wouldn’t fill up the whole hour. Silly me.

A frustrating hour and a half later, Kim and I left, late for dinner at Celeste’s. Along the way, we were greeted in many ways: as “firenji!” by a loud and remarkably persistent toddler, among others; “AMERIKA!” by a seemingly unhinged old man; “YOU!” by countless children and young men; and polite, actual greetings by a handful of adorable children. When we finally arrived at Celeste’s, she and Sile were ready with some Chinese Hot Dogs (don’t question pork products, however questionable they might look), cooked greens, and a red Ethiopian wine called Gouter that becomes more palatable every time. Sile had brought over leftover nonperishable food from her kitchen for us to rifle through, and rifle we did. The rain rained, then cleared, and we headed home with our loot.

I hate going home after dark, because people are more likely to say rude things when they think they can’t be seen. But tonight, I had a nice chat with a teacher at the local technical and vocational school, and no one bothered me. I walked past one of my favorite shop owners, who was roughhousing with a buddy, and joked around with him. I got to my house, threw on my PJs, and wrote this blog post.