The Ethiopian Highlands and Other Stuff: Warning: This is a Very Long Post. Read at Your Own Risk

Our three-week trip  to the north and first leg of our Ethiopia adventure has ended with a bang ( or rather a splat!).  I have Montezuma's Revenge.  ( Although Montezuma has never been here, his vengeance, I have heard, reaches far and wide).  Before even discussing the magnificent scenery of the northern highlands, the miracle of 12th century rock-hewn churches and other highlights of this vast and varied land, I must first describe the food and overland conditions, which are far from miraculous. 

The Food:

The national dish is injera, a kind of spongy, salty, slightly sour bread.  While one side is pock-marked with air holes like coral, the other is smooth like a wet cloth.  Its served completely covering a large, round platter, coral-side up, with a smorgasbord of sauces and/or cooked meat and vegetables speckled on top.  No silverware is ever given as enjera is eaten completely and exclusively with the right hand by breaking off a piece of the bread and then using it to scoop up the delicacies laid out on top.  

Injera is made from tef, a grain grown only in Ethiopia, and which, gram, for gram, contains more fiber-rich bran and nutritious germ than any other grain and is the only one to contain "symbiotic yeast" (whatever that is), which means that no yeast is needed during the cooking process.  

Ethiopians have quite a few semi-fasting holidays in which no food is eaten until dinner.  On Mondays and Wednesdays throughout the year, they eat absolutely no animal products at all.  Both the vegan and dinner-only days are considered "fasting" days.  Every other day of the week and non-holidays are "non-fasting" days.  All restaurants have two menu categories, regardless the day of the week:   "fasting" (vegan) and "non-fasting"(meat) choices.  

I got sick of the injera pretty quickly.  

The only other items on the menu, no matter the restaurant, no matter the town, are rice or spaghetti with tomato sauce, bolognese or vegetable sauce.  That is it!  Injera, rice or pasta.  I haven't had so many carbs since Dr. Atkins got his degree.  

After two weeks in country, I remembered the reason for the lack of food choice.  It was the hunt to gather our dinner shopping list that jogged my memory.  The reality on the ground is mind-boggling for someone from the west.  

I suddenly remembered that THIS IS AFRICA.  

We were traveling to Axum, legendary home of the Ark of the Covenant (the very same Ark that Indiana Jones has devoted his life to finding) a distance of two full days of driving.  Since the roads outside the cities lack any kind of amenity (gas, food, water, hotel are virtually non-existent), and because night travel on African roads is not at all advisable, we made camp in a dry, very wide riverbed, a day's drive from restaurants, cafés or "supermarkets".  We had shopped for dinner and other supplies before we left the "big" city.  Although it was no easy task, it took us only a few minutes to get what weneeded.   Lalibella, the number 1 tourist destination in Ethiopia, is a 1-street town with no sidewalks, a dirt main street and open sewers.  There was only 1 tuk-tuk, a 3-wheel taxi, in the entire city.  We bought the only food we could find:  two kilos each of tomatoes and potatoes from a couple of women selling these products on the side of the road;  we cornered the market on bananas, and successfully begged a juice seller to forego the juice and simply sell us his avocados, mangos and papayas.   We stumbled upon another woman selling some cabbage.  Our hotel manager had some connection to fresh eggs and 1 1/2 litres of milk.  That was all the available food in the entire town.   Thankfully, there was some pasta and lentils on the truck that had been purchased in Addis before we left.  It's quite clear that making a shopping list and dinner menu is a complete waste of time.  There are no supermarkets with aisles of choices in every category of food.   Eighty-five percent of Ethiopians are subsistence farmers - they grow their own food and have little surplus left for sale.   Moreover, this is the dry season. 

Despite our worst fears, dinner was a huge success: lentil soup, avocado and tomato salad, cooked cabbage and potatoes mashed together and fried, and of course, (we just can't get away from it) pasta with tomato sauce.  Breakfast was mango, papaya and banana PANCAKES!   Someone in the group had the foresight to buy some flour in Nairobi.  

The Roads:

One of the highlights of the northern route are the Simien Mountains, considered "The Rooftop of Africa."   Although Kilimanjaro in Tanzania,  is the tallest peak on the continent, the Simien range, at an average altitude of over 10,000 (and rising to 15,000 at Ras Dejen, Africa's second highest mountain), is the longest and highest.  

In order to start our planned 4-day trek and 3-night camping experience there, we had to drive to the National Park's entrance, at  9,000+ feet, along roads that would be closed as construction sites in the US. 

The entire 60-mile distance was unpaved.  We traveled at a rate of 10-miles per hour.  Many parts of the road had recently been cut into the mountains.  There were no shoulders separating us from the abyss below.  Massive piles of gravel, large drainage pipes and other material were scattered across the road.  Bulldozers and men worked, while goats, cows, donkeys and people came in and out of sight, as we shimmied our way past, navigating the narrow switchbacks, and hairpin turns.  Three-point turns were often required to round a corner. Wheels were dangling on the edge of cliffs.   The scenery was gorgeous but it took courage to look out the window to appreciate it.  

    (Phone pics of this road hell on FB).  

The Sites:

The 10 churches for which the city of Lalibella is known were built by the King of the same name in 1101 and all ten buildings took a total of 23 years to build.  The structures are unique in the world - built as freestanding monoliths from a single rock.  According to legend, Lalibella was born the brother of the incumbent King.  As a young child he was covered by a swarm of bees, which his mother took as a sign that he would one day be King.  ("lalibella" has been translated as "the bees recognize his sovereignty.")   After a nasty fight with his brother, Lalibella was crowned King and immediately set about gathering the world's greatest craftsmen and artisans in order to carve the churches, which are something of a mystery - it has been estimated that 40,000 people would have been required to carve them.  

Incredibly, the ten churches were all built from the ground DOWN, starting first with the construct of the roof.   The entire structure was then carved out and separated from the rock to which it once belonged.   The top storey windows were chipped out to allow light and air for workers who hollowed out the interior of the rock for future worshippers.  Visitors approach the churches from ground level (which is the roof of the church) and descend a set of stairs as much as 50 feet to enter.  Hugh columns, both inside and out, support the roofs.  All ten churches are connected by a maze of trenches and tunnels.  Religious paintings using natural dye of local flowers and plants decorate the interior walls and date from the 12th century.  

A quote from the Bradt guidebook says it best:

"Were it virtually anywhere but in Ethiopia, Lalibela would rightly be celebrated as one of the wonders of the world, as readily identified with Ethiopia as are the pyramids....of Egypt.   Lalibela's obscurity is shameful, but for those who visit the town, it is part of its charm."

Lalibella's location is magical.  Perched at an altitude of almost 8,000 feet, among wild, old craggy mountains and vast rocky escarpments, it is majestic and isolated.  

Perhaps even more amazing is that Lalibela's churches have been in consistent use for 900 years.  Mass is held inside the carved-out rocks every Sunday, and white-robed Priests and monks emerge from their monastic cells within the 10-Church complex and into the early morning chill to wander the town's streets, handing out blessings, while the chants of the religious echo through the mountains and pierce our hotel walls, lulling us to sleep and awakening us (ugh) before sunrise.  

We had dinner at a crazy place - Ben Abeba restaurant - owned by a Scottish woman and her Ethiopian husband.  The building looks like a UFO, with multiple, staircase-accessible, round "landing pads" stacked randomly skyward, in all directions, where drinks are served. It sits at the edge of a precipice, midway between the lush valley thousands of feet of below and the wise mountains thousands of feet above.  Yosy said that in the course of a 5-minute walk from our hotel, we went from the Bronze Age to the Jet Age. The menu though was like everywhere else.   I had the spaghetti with tomato sauce.

Before reaching Lalibela we had spent 3 nights on the shore of Lake Tana, second largest lake in Africa and the source of the Blue Nile, which when it meets the White Nile in Khartoum, ( Sudan) forms The Nile, the world's longest river.  

We left our traveling companions lazing by the lake on the second afternoon to visit an unusual village - unique perhaps on the entire African continent.  

Awra Amba is a weaving cooperative of 400+ people, where there is equality between the sexes (men cook and women work the fields), pre-k through high school is a reality for all and adult receives the same wage and spends it as he sees fit.  The community was founded by an illiterate elder (whom we were fortunate to meet and interview) who believes that hard work and education are more reliable predictors of the fulfillment of hopes and dreams than religion.   The people of Awra Amba are not exactly atheists, but rather believe in one God for all people.  Prayer is a pasttime.  

The most striking observation about our visit to the village was that not a single child (or adult) begged as do so many other children in Ethiopia.  There was a fairly well-stocked library in Awra Amba and a senior housing center.  The latter was particularly memorable as it contained one relatively large room with cubicles, the size of a single bed, carved into the cement walls.  These cubicles were the sleeping quarters for the 9 aged women and 1 man we met there.  Like orphans, these seniors had no family to look after them.  

The Ugly American is Me!

On a lunch stop enroute from Lalibella to Axum, the religious center of The Ethiopian Church, home (according to Ethiopian legend) of the Ark of Covenant and the tablets within, written by Moses in the desert)  I lost my cool when I broke the  golden rule when traveling in Africa.  The guilt since then has been gripping me.  

Tourists have corrupted much of the Ethiopian and other African populations - especially the children in the tourist centers.  Decades ago no one begged here.  But then the foreigners - the tourists, the ngo's and other aid agencies all began to come and give handouts.  There's so little here that everything is considered a precious gift: pens, sweets, empty plastic water bottles.  When farangis (white people) are spotted, children run to them like flies, asking for money or anything that the whites are willing to give or throw away.  Responsible tourism has recognized the error of its past ways and the mantra now is to refrain from giving ANYTHING to the locals - handouts are strictly forbidden as they do nothing but help develop and encourage a culture of begging.

Its important for our sanity to know that,  unlike the consequence of the politically-induced famine of the 1980's, no one here is starving.  They may be hungry and have a limited variety of diet, but no one looks emaciated or malnourished.  Ethiopia is rich in fertile land and feeds itself. Eighty-five percent of the population are farmers.

We had bought pizza the night before we left Lalibella and ate it (cold) at lunchtime the next day.  As usual, within minutes of our arrival at our makeshift picnic area, 8,000 feet high on the side of an empty road, children came running from the surrounding hills and villages to observe the strangers.   We ate atop a cliff with a stunning view of the high mountains and numerous river gorges boldly carved between the hills and valleys.  Once satiated, we realized that we had 15 slices of pizza leftover.  There were 10 kids, mostly barefoot, with ragged clothes and dusty faces, quietly watching us.  This being the countryside, an area where tourists rarely tread, not a single one of the kids had asked for anything.  They simply stood or sat silently at a close distance, watching.  We proceeded to offer each of them a slice.  Three politely refused.  The rest took the cold pizza, not knowing quite what to do with it.  Some took a second slice.  We talked with them a bit and posed for pictures.  One of the older kids told us he wanted to be a mechanical engineer.  Another was minding the family's goats.  We cleaned our picnic grounds and left, as we always do, without a trace of our presence there.   Once back aboard the truck/bus in which we are traveling, we got reamed out by a fellow traveler.   He had done his masters thesis about the begging culture in the developing world; a culture developed by the well-meaning tourists who travel there.  "Did you see the elder from their village?" he asked.   I had not.   It seems that one of the adults from the boys' village ran to the kids and demanded that they throw the pizza away, IMMEDIATELY!!!!   "By giving these kids something for nothing, you are teaching them to beg rather work," our master thesis candidate explained.  Multiply our relatively small handout by hundreds and hundreds of tourists a year, over a decade or two of increased tourism, and within a relatively short period, the youth have learned to view every white visitor as an opportunity to relieve him of his hoards of cash and other spoils of the western world.  

I realized in a flash that my values and prejudices had replaced the reality of the situation.  

The kids came to our picnic spot not because they were hungry or wanted something from us, but because they were curious. We are as foreign to them as they are to us.   If they had cameras they probably would have clicked away too, taking our photos without first asking for permission either.  

The kids were definitely not hungry.  My standard for a normal weight has become so warped that I mistook their thinness for emaciation.  They were not emaciated.   In fact, they were probably closer to what is a normal size; certainly what is a healthier size, than many children of their age in the US.   

They wanted nothing from us other than to practice their english (which they learn in school), and to know where we came from.   They were curious and only wanted our friendship.   How dare I presume that they wanted something tangible; that they had simply been too polite or too shy to beg.   How ignorant I was!  How irresponsible!   I had forgotten the rule I had learned 5 years ago on my first trip to Africa:  No handouts!  Ever!  Even if hungry, for the reasons outlined in "Wahib and John," posted here and dated April 10, 2011. 

But what about gifts?   Can't I give these kids a gift?  What's wrong with the gift of a slice of pizza?  If I have leftover food must I throw it away?  Gifts at home don't foster begging or teach laziness.   Or do they?   Are our own kids spoiled and riddled now with a sense of entitlement because they received so many gifts?  

Everything about our culture of plenty is suspect after one visits Africa.