Social Life

I have cooked dinner twice for my favourite VSO volunteer – Nicholas from Kenya who is based at the college as an IT worker. Two sessions trying to sort out my computer and connect me to the internet. Well worth the price!

Saturday evening, Kibab called round to see me. The daughter of local neighbours, she came to chat and invite me to come and eat with her family on Sunday.

Sunday – Kibab came at about 8:30 E time (2 o’clock – 11am GM time) working in three different time formats gets a bit tricky! Kibab said we would stay at my place for awhile and then go to her home. We sat and talked. I showed her all my family, explained (as best I could) about my religious background. We talked about families, her life and ………then we ran out of things to talk about.

Kibab took me to her home where I met her mother, sister, cousin, father, brother. The coffee ceremony was performed (must remember that I have to have three cups of coffee from three separate brews and it’s not a good idea to accept a second cup before the second brew!) Looks like I’ll be spinning tonight. I took photos of the ceremony and everyone. I also promised to deliver copies of the pictures – not sure how I’m going to achieve that.

Later dinner was served ‘do reu waut’ (phonetic interpretation) served with injera. Basically a very spicy lentil and chicken stew with lots of garlic. The injera and lentils are served first followed by the chicken. The meat is eaten from the chicken, then you chew the bone. As the guest, I was constantly having my plate replenished and no amount of remonstrating would change that. I struggled to eat my portion/s much to the hilarity of Kibab who said that her mother would be offended if I didn’t finish my plate. When her mother left the table, she quickly changed plates with me and thankfully finished my food off.

Had a long conversation with Dad (Belud). The same age as me and a high school teacher. He explained about the difficulties of teaching with over 70 in a class but acknowledged this was a great improvement on the 100+ he used to have to teach. He teaches English – we discussed the issue of why subject teachers are also expected to teach in English as I couldn’t see the reason for this. He explained, there are no text books in Amharic! But the problem was the teacher’s English was rarely up to the task of teaching in English so the text was often written on the board and then translated into Amharic. He had recently observed a class and asked the teacher why this was. The teacher was so upset, he left the class. Belud felt very bad about this. He said the teacher was afraid of making mistakes in English. Belud thinks this is leading to a deterioration in subject teaching in Ethiopia.

Mum (Adna) then came to chat – a phenomenal woman. At the age of 46 she has raised 5 children and put herself through college – she now teaches elementary children. Again 70 to a class. In addition to all this, she runs a small shop from her back garden.

Belud meanwhile plays cards with his friends in the yard.

Like last Sunday, the roads are full of decorated cars and guests celebrating weddings – it’s the wedding season in Ethiopia – squeezed in between the many fasting periods.

Think I might fast tomorrow!!!!

Daily Life

Time rushes by – I’ve been here all of three and a half weeks! But it’s already beginning to feel like home. I’ve put pictures and photos up on the wall, unpacked my bags and am back into the work routine.

So far, I work, come home, cook dinner, read, email (listened to the Archers one night!) have a bit of Amharic language practise and fall into bed usually by about 10:30 Ethiopian time. Although there are other volunteers in Gonder, I have not had much to do with them – we are quite separated geographically and I guess it’s still early days. Having spent each day meeting new people and absorbing background information, dealing with the curiosity from the people I meet on the walk to and from work, I am generally ready for a bit of quiet time in the evenings.

On Saturday, I set off for Gonder. The first part of the walk was quiet – a beautiful clear sunny day with a light breeze from the Simien Mountains that provide a backdrop for the town. When I hit an adjoining road, I suddenly found myself in a melee of people, donkeys, goats and carts – market day in Gonder and I was early enough to hit the people coming into town with all their wares and livestock.

I had a list of items that I needed to get but finding them can be difficult. Shops are often not much more than little shacks and you’re never quite sure what each one is selling. There always seems to be someone to help out. In general, Ethiopian people are extremely curious so they stare at you openly and happily respond to greetings. The difficulty for visitors is the young boys who hassle for money. At one point, I was virtually surrounded by a group of boys calling ‘you, you, money, money, ferenji’. I stopped to talk with them asking their names and where they went to school – this caused much merriment and then they explained to me in excellent English that they were very poor and I should give them money. I congratulated them on their language skills, laughed and walked on. Another man then asked if I had a problem and decided he would use the opportunity to practise his language skills. It is difficult to just wander around on your own.

On the way home, I was approached by two boys one each side of me, again begging for money. I made it clear I wasn’t going to give them any and we had a game of follow the leader with me criss crossing the road to get away from them. Given that I was now alone and there were few people around and that these boys both carried sticks, I wondered if I should be concerned. But even though it was unpleasant, I have not experienced behaviour that feels in any way ‘threatening’ nor have I observed such behaviour. Eventually we reached the hotel near to where I live – the guards had watched what was going on and stopped the boys from following me any further.

King Menalik's Palace

King Menelik Menelik II (1844-1913) was emperor of Ethiopia. Read about him here The Palace belonged to Emperor Menalik II who was crowned there in 1882. In 1886, he moved the capital to the valley below – this became Addis Abbaba (New Flower).

On the walk up to King Menalik’s Palace, we walked through Eucalpytus trees. The peasants chop these down for firewood and the taller ones are taken to make scaffolding (they are very tall and straight).

Here, the trees have been chopped down and some effort is being made to ridge (I don’t know the correct term) the area so it has steps and gulleys to prevent water pouring down the hill and eroding the landscape

On the walk to King Menelik's palace.

This is the palace of King Menelik.

The view...

Haile Selassie - our tour guide for the museum and King Menalik's Palace took this picture of me to show the view.

Me with Haile Selassie

Work

I am working for the Gondar Teacher Education College and my job is to set up a structure for ensuring in-service teacher training for 52 1st cycle and 36 2nd cycle schools and….

The newly springing up ABE schools that are an attempt to help the Ethiopian government meet it’s target of primary education for all by 2012.

I work in the Cluster Co-ordinating Unit which has two full time workers: Meleshew who is the hub of the whole thing and Mulageta who makes resources from nothing so that schools can set up ‘model classrooms’ and encourage active learning methodology.

My predecessor put in an enormous amount of work in developing a CCU committee made up of Teacher Trainers from the College and they are going to run a training day next Friday. This is a very exciting development because if it’s successful then part of the work of VSO will have been achieved e.g. that the input is sustainable. Having only been there a week, it’s much too early for me to comment. I haven’t even visited a school yet.

But a meeting I had with a young woman gave me a sense of the scale of the problem. Gondar Teacher Training College has been at the forefront of trying to redress the gender imbalance in schools and so appointed three very young women, top of their class as lecturers to provide role models for female students. Hiwat, the young woman referred to lectures in chemistry. She came to talk to me about some lesson observations she had done. The science teacher had read from the textbook and the children had written notes. She discussed with him about how he could use active teaching methods in his lesson. He pointed out that the school has a lab but no lab technician – he has no time to prepare even a demonstration experiment and even if he did, he has no idea what the chemicals in the lab are and they are probably out of date and dangerous. Add to that a class of 75 pupils….. and the scale of the problem begins to look insurmountable.

Undaunted, Hiwat has negotiated borrowing a lab technician from the college to accompany her next Friday when she runs a workshop for science teachers so that she can demonstrate using a demonstration experiment.

My House

One storey, two bedrooms, newly tiled floor, pleasant sitting area and bedroom.

Plumbing leaves a lot to be desired and getting used to cooking on a kerosene stove is a bit of a challenge. There is a ‘yard’ which my predecessors have tried to turn into a garden but sadly it consists mainloy of compacted rubble so it’s going to be a bit tricky. I wanted to get a compost heap going but Mesdek, my lovely day guard has different ideas and the food waste disappears. There doesn’t seem to be any general understanding that if they composted the animal dropping and food waste, they could improve at least the gardens.

The house is located half way between Gondar and the college. So I have a 30 minute walk in each direction. I can and do sometimes catch a line taxi – these are VW vans with seats, a driver and a conductor hanging out the side yelling where they’re going. If they have space, they will stop anytime you flag them down.

Mesdek and my house

Mesdek looks after the house and tidies it including putting furniture back where she thinks it should be! She does all my washing and ironing and, if I fail to leave it out, she will get it out of the wardrobe and wash it.

Across the road are some little shack shops that stock the basics. The family that run it are very nice and sort out the best tomatoes for me. It is early days, but I think it will be possible to get to know my neighbours – the children already know exactly who I am!

The back yard

This is my garden. It isn’t much to look at but there are several eucalyptus trees around it which give a lot of shade. The ground is compacted rubble. The soil all around is just like dust. I want to start a compost heap for my food waste but it does get very hot and I’m not sure how to go about it.

Beyond the corrugated iron fence is open space – to the right is a Police camp and to the left is a footaball ground. Directly in front is a small space shaded by trees where youths collect in the early evening and mums with babies sit during the day.

My house is located at the back of a small collection of houses. A new one is being built to the right.

Addis

Poverty and wealth live on top of one another. Tin shacks compete with bright new buildings. Corrugated iron everywhere – so ugly. From the bus you could occasionally glimpse lush green gardens behind the rusting fences. New buildings springing up everywhere.

Addis roads after the rain

The roads are a nightmare. Masses of pedestrians competing with the traffic that does not appear to follow any rules. Putting a seat belt on risks insulting the driver. Women with young children begging day and night at the side of the road. The most distressing part of this is the number of elderly and disabled people begging on the streets. And then, to my shame, I found myself becoming distressed at the sight of a horse past it’s useful life left on the main highway wandering up and down the central reservation, no water, no food.

Scaffolding and building techniques - Ethiopia style

There are very real signs of regeneration though it is hard for any city authority to keep up with the vast number of people daily attracted to the increasing wealth.

The buses are heaving – I made no attempt to try and get in one. I simply could not have coped with that level of claustrophobia!

Street scene, main drag Addis

The night life is lively. Although there is a high prevalence of pick pocketing and thieving going on, there was no feeling or observation of impending violence.

Food

In the evenings, we ate out at various local restaurants (initially) sampling the injera and wat and just for variety, occasionally slipped in to the local Pizza house.

One memorable trip to Elsa’s (brightly coloured traditional restaurant) resulted in Marta having her bag snatched. M suddenly leapt from her chair yelling at the top of her voice that her bag had been taken – I ran out after her and so did quite a few other customers.

M was not going to give up easily and continued the chase, yelling until another man caught him and recovered the bag intact. Back in the restaurant, M was feted by all for her bravado and for defeating the bag snatcher.

Shola Market, Addis

In Addis, a wide variety of food was on sale. In Gondar, it is very limited. Most veg stalls stock potatoes, onions, chilli peppers, garlic and white cabbage. If you look hard or shop early in the morning, you can get eggs, lettuce, spinach and carrots. In Addis you could get mangoes and water melons as well as bananas. In Gondar you get bananas. Those of you who have visited the Museum of London and observed the first Sainsbury’s shop will be able to picture the average supermarket here.

Cooking Lesson

Since arriving in Gondar, I have shopped and cooked for myself. There not being many volunteers here, I don’t have anyone to eat out with and, like London, I don’t want to sit alone. I’ve only been here a week and I’m sure I will begin to investigate further as I become more comfortable with my surroundings.

Travel and Arrival

Not looking forward to such a long journey, I was pleasantly surprised. We stopped in Amman where over half the passengers (mainly Americans) disembarked leaving a lot more space to stretch our legs. We arrived at Addis at 3am and to the hotel at 5am. The journey was full of life – brightly coloured bars and people everywhere.

I thought perhaps this was because is was Sat night/Sun morning but later realised that like London, the streets of Addis never sleep.

The hotel, which initially felt like a tawdry B & B became my palace for the next two weeks. I had my own flushing toilet and shower – luxury. From 2pm on the Sunday, we embarked on two weeks of intensive training including 2 hours language daily with the immensely patient and good humoured Mossamo.

My hotel in the background - to left of my head

Each morning, a bus collected us from the hotel and deposited us at the Ethiopian Management Training Institute, travelling through roads clogged with line taxis, people, donkeys, goats…… and sadly, heavy pollution. As well as language, a lot of the training focussed on the geo/historial/political/economic situation delivered mainly through lectures - many of them of excellent quality

The Internet In Ethiopia

As many of you will now know, I am not able to maintain a blog through blogspot – because its banned. No idea why – answers on a postcard please (better make that letter) to: P.O. Box 1216, Gonder, Ethiopia. (Charles is posting these blogs which I am sending to him by email)

Hot news!!

I have just received a comment on my blog page. I can’t open the page but if a comment is posted it is emailed to me and I can get that.

Skype is also banned so no cosy tete a tetes with friends and family over the internet. I recently tried to send one photograph and it took 10 minutes. Each time I click, I wait from 1 – 5 minutes and sometimes endlessly. It is soo……… slow. The training I’ve received in preparation for this adventure has stressed patience – it’s needed in abundance.

I have kept a daily diary that is already the size of a small book so for this blog I will try to put some information under headings.

Ruth in Ethiopia with Limited Web Access!

Ruth writes "Have started work and been thrown in the deep end which helps." She is in Gondor but can't access her blog website, so sends apologies for the lack of activity here! She promises to update the site soon - which might involve her sending me (Charles) text by email, to post on here blog.

If you are interested in seeing where she is, here is an embedded Google Map of the Gondor region (it's facinating to zoom in fully and look at houses, roads, fields etc):


View Larger Map

bags are packed ... it's time to go

Saying goodbye is a lot harder than I anticipated. It makes me very aware of the depth of friendship that surrounds and enriches my life - buoys me up through the sad times, celebrates with the good. And life does feel good. My decision to be a volunteer and to go to Ethiopia has transformed my life. I am sad to leave my friends, old and new (especially one particularly new one!). I will also be sad to say goodbye to my dog Charlie. I'm sure he'll miss our long jaunts on Hampstead Heath as much as I will. Now I'm looking forward to walking/trekking in the mountain ranges of Ethiopia.

The biggest wrench will be saying goodbye to my children. We've had a trial separation for the past few months whilst I've taken full advantage of the generous hospitality of friends in Hackney. But I will miss them and I'm sure they'll miss me too!!

On the brighter side, I have a whole new group of people to form friendships with. I have met some amazing and talented people during the VSO training. I look forward to getting to know some of them during the in country training in Addis Abbaba.

Then there are the people I am going to work with. I have been very fortunate in having an excellent handover from my predecessor together with an inspirational photo session sitting in a cold coffee bar at Euston Station. His enthusiasm was infective.