One Month In

I arrived a month a go. In fairness, I’m talking about the lunar variety of month, rather than the calendar one. But it still gives me a peg to hang some reflections on my start-up time here in Ethiopia.

For starters, a bit more on the family I live with: The family consists of the mother (her name seems to be just “Mama”), her four daughters, her son, her son in law (Darwit - the Amharic teacher who set up my immersion training - married to Mata, one of the daughters), Darwit and Mata’s two children, and one other granddaughter (the daughter of another sister who doesn’t live here). These ten people live under one roof, in a large house (especially by Ethiopian standards). Despite there being only one shower and one TV, everyone seems to get on. I’m yet to experience a row.

I generally hate to say it, but the women do all the work. A few examples:

The son, every morning showers in my/the family’s shower. Somehow, he manages to get water everywhere. Now if this was me, I’d be frantically mopping up before my Mum/Margot found out. But for him, he just doesn’t notice/care. He strolls out of the bathroom, gives me a cheeky wink, and then one of the daughters comes running in, mop in hand.

Every morning, I make my bed. Every evening, I come home and the bed has been re-made. But better than I did. And by one of the daughters.

When the men want food, they simply sit on the sofa. Food is brought in within five minutes, by the women (I’m not lying, I timed it). The process works equally well for me.

If I ever try to take food back to the kitchen, there is a lot of flapping and shouts of “Ben, eye” (“Ben, No!”). Only the women can clean up. Apparently.

Now, please don’t think that I, or the men here, are chauvinistic. I don’t think it’s the case. There is a lot of respect in the family, especially of the mother. And there’s no bullying/shouting/bossing people about. My impression is that simply, at least in this family, the woman are responsible for house work, while the men work.

Everyday, I head to Addis Ababa University for my Amharic lessons. It takes a couple of mini-bus rides to get there - about an hour in total. The mini-buses are called blue donkeys (they are partly blue), and run set routes across Addis. They are the same size as VW camper vans. They have seats for 12 people, including the driver, but they regularly fill up to 18/19/20 (breath in). The cost is 2birr (10 pence), and nicely, I’m always charged the same as the locals. Some are quite decadent, with plush camouflage seats (with the plastic still on). Others less so, with shards of seat steel stabbing into your sides. Regardless of age, all seem to work - though the hills are a struggle. Every mini bus has pictures of the Virgin Mary hanging from the rear-view mirror, and when a church is passed, all the passengers cross themselves. The music is loud - either 1970s Ethiopian funk (think mono, one keyboard on continuos loop, a slow jazz sax) or Kayne West.

Addis Ababa University is very pleasant. It’s very green, and quite. Nice birds fly about the place. It has a large library which was opened by Robert Kennedy in the 1960s, but does need a lick of paint. The University also houses the Centre for Ethiopian Studies, which is well worth a visit if/when you come to Addis. However, a little more worrying is that police body search everyone entering - this is sadly, a consistent (but necessary) precaution all over Addis. My lessons are with a teacher who seems to be the Fonz (Fonzie) of Addis Ababa: He spends a lot of the lessons shaking people’s hands; when women see him they stop and sigh; he’s constantly complimenting himself on how smart he is.

Food wise, everything revolves around Injera. Injera is the local bread, made from teff, a cereal only grown in Ethiopia and Eritrea (a lot of Ethiopians, understandably, complain about the price of teff quadrupling in five years). When cooked, it’s roughly the size of a large bike wheel, and looks very much like how I imagine the lining of a cows stomach to look. Injera is eaten with a large range of different stews (wat), all very spicy and mostly very tasty. Happily, I’ve not yet come across any offal (although I went to a restaurant last week with lamb’s brain on the menu). Injera is so popular that a common breakfast dish is Firfir: injera soaked over night in wat, minced up, and eaten with (guess what) injera.

Today I ate spiced minced meat - kitfo. I’ve come home deliberately, so that I’m not too far from a toilet. But it was extremely tasty, and I’ve still got a great spicy/meaty aroma left in my mouth. You eat it with injera (no surprises there), and diced spinach and local cheese. I drank tejj, a local drink made form honey (a bit like meed), which I reckon (given my current hangover) was around 30% in volume. I went to a very traditional restaurant in Addis, which was incredibly relaxing. The best part was seeing a wedding ceremony dancing into the restaurant. The worse was almost getting into a fight with some local aggressive drunk outside who wanted money from be. On reflection, it might have been a good thing that he didn’t understand me when I said I was going to break his neck.

A few other observations:
I never leave the house without a loo roll in my bag. I have marked on my map cafes/restaurants with correct facilities.

Ethiopian TV’s weather forecast is readout over a backing true of Simple Red’s “Holding Back the Years” (instrumental version).

The altitude is noticeable. I’ve been a lot more tired than normal, I’ve had quite a few sleepless nights, and walking up hill while talking is mostly impossible.

I get looked at a lot, especially if I wear shorts. People regularly shout out “Frenji” (foreigner/white guy), and also, slightly more strangely, “China”.

At present, it rains everyday. Mostly, always in the afternoons. Very heavily, and the noise of golf ball size lumps of hail hitting the corrugated iron roofs of Addis is not that different from the marching sound heard at Oxford Street tube station during rush hour. For me, given England’s current heatwave, the rains are a bit depressing. But for Ethiopians, after two years of failed rains, the heavens opening which such consistent force is a god send, meaning a bumper food crop this year.

Overall, the first month has been harder than I thought. I don’t yet feel that I’ve found my feet. I’m very nervous about starting my job on Monday. And despite the fact that I stand out so much, I do feel slightly lonely. But there are many positives. The family have generally treated me like a king, and I’ll be sad to leave them. There are many parts of Addis that have a real charm, and the numerous restaurants and bars, coupled with the fantastic coffee and fruit juices makes things comfortable. And with the exception of the dick-head I met today, every Ethiopian I’ve met has been charming (the word really works) - keen to speak to me, always willing to help out, interested in England, friendly.

The first month was never going to be easy, and missing (wonderful) Margot, and my (great) friends and family makes things especially difficult. But if I had wanted things to be easy, I would have stayed in London and got fat on M & S croissants and afterwork boozing. I really like the fact there is a challenge in front of me, that every thing is new, and that I’m starting with a clean slate.