Fun Facts from the First Days in Addis Ababa

After a couple of days visiting relatives in Frankfurt, I arrived in Addis Ababa last Monday the 24th after a sleepless flight on Ethiopian Airlines. Having gotten my visa previously, the line was short, but I waited for my bag for forever.  Customs was a breeze and I was quickly met by Menachem, one of the other JSC Fellows here.  I live with him and another guy, Sam, in a great 2 story house.  There's a dog named Toby who likes to jump on me a lot, and we are lucky to have electricity most of the time, and a water holder so that we can use water whenever we want. Most people only get water for a few hours during the day.

The JDC office is close by, which is convenient, and Menachem introduced me to a great Sudanese restaurant as well as a smoothie place in the neighborhood.  Foul is what to get at the first place, and a mix of everything turns out to probably be the best smoothie. :)

Unfortunately Sam has been out of town this past week but Menachem has been THE best tour guide and has done an incredible job introducing me to people, places, and foods.  Since the main doctor has been out of town I am still not 100% sure of what my job will entail here, so for now I was able to go around town a bit with Menachem, helped by our taxi driver Fanta. We went to Mercato, the main market which had an incredible array of goods, spices, and chickens, and saw the main square, the university, as well as hiked a bit up one of the mountains, Entoto, to a church and village on top.  I've been having a fantastic time just checking things out.  There's a lot of info being thrown at me, and I really want to try to pick up some of the language as quickly as I can. It's not super easy, but I've got a few words down so far.

For now I guess I'll throw some fun facts out, until I have some more concrete stories about what my days are like, and can better explain exactly how things work here after experiencing it for a little bit.

The local language is Amharic and the country used to be called Abyssinia. The city reminds me a bit of what I think Cairo would be like.  Religions co-exist here in a beautiful way. Despite most people being devout Christian, Muslim or Jew, there is relatively little violent animosity.  The Christian population however definitely holds the most clout.  Ethiopia never switched to the Julian calendar, so right now the year is 2005, and the "local" time in Addis is 6 hours behind what officially is according to our system.  Walking is possible from where we are, but taxi's are pretty easy to take as long as you don't mind bargaining. Apparently the key to eating Ethiopian food (with your right hand only) is using all five fingers, but it's super hard to do so in a "lady-like" fashion.  They eat everything here with enjera, a pancake type thing. The food is mostly some sort of a stew on top of that.  So far my favorite has been Shiro, chickpea stew I think, although I couldn't really be sure what anything is.  Every Wed. and Friday is a fasting day here, meaning that people don't eat until later in the afternoon, and then it's only vegan.  Coffee here is amazing, and comes from the south.  A great thing Menachem introduced me to is called shaispress, tea and coffee mixed with sugar. Awesome.The altitude is incredibly high here, and I try to drink as much water as possible to keep from being dehydrated - usually about 2 liters!

This is all I can say for now! So many new things, places, and people! Everyone has been incredibly nice so far, and I'm excited to start working with them and getting to really know this city and the country.  (Although internet is slightly tricky for me, I will try to still blog about once a week!)

Slight Changes and Some Solid Plans

The grad school applications are done and sent, and as promised, I have finally, I hope, figured out more details of my next few months. At least for now. I have learned recently that you can never really count on things going according to plan, and that the NGO world is never 100% stable. Also, I learned that I should listen to my jinx rule that I outlined earlier in the blog and not tell the "public" what I have planned in the farther future.

The good news and the bad news: let's start with the bad.  Obviously after saying that I have a position in Thailand from which I will be returning from in May, I asked the organization about my visa, to which they replied that they were in fact closing exactly when I was supposed to arrive.  Thanks for letting me know. After a week of scurrying, worrying, and way too much planning and thinking I seemed to have resolved the problem of finding a volunteer opportunity in the region. I hope, fingers crossed, that this remains stable, but I will not tell you about it until tickets are purchased and the date gets closer haha.

The good news though is new detailed news about Ethiopia! I will be leaving the US on the 20th and am getting really excited to see how things will be in the capital, Addis Ababa, where I will be living and working. For living it seems that I will be in a house with the 2 other JDC JSC year-long fellows there, and have already been in contact with one who seems really fun and nice.  Work wise things will be very interesting and different from what I was doing in BA. I think, at least I am told for now, that I will be helping out with administrative type tasks at a medical clinic in Addis Ababa.  I will of course elaborate when I see first hand what I do.  Although my work in BsAs was very valuable, I have always felt that the health sector is most likely where I will wind up when I am eventually working with an NGO in the future.  Of course, I feel the need to see and experience all things and places hence this year of slight craziness, but deep down I think this sort of thing is what I will wind up being involved with so I am very very excited to see what this type of work is really like on the ground.  From my understanding this clinic helps Jews and non-Jews of all ages, so that should be an interesting change as well.

In other news, I have purchased my ticket to Addis, gotten my Ethiopian visa, and have become a Star Alliance Dividend Miles member.  After leaving later this month, I will be gone until probably early May, so, I plan to acquire a large amount of miles by doing some around the world flying, traveling for pleasure a bit, and hopefully seeing some friends along the way.

Not sure when the next post will be but you can be sure there will be one after Xmas when I will have already begun work in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia!