When I first planned this trip I had an ambition to write some posts during the trip. I expected the trip to be interesting and exciting and worth writing about, and as I planned to travel alone I thought I would have plenty of time to make reflections and to write. But then my mother decided to join. Hence, no time to write. So I did not even bother to bring my laptop nor go to internet-cafés. Nevertheless the trip was intresting and we saw a lot of things worth writing about, but since I came home I haven't really had the time to write and as my computer is about to break down downloading pictures haven't been the smoothest operation. Anyway; I will now try to give a short summary of the trip.
First we started out in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
My first impression was that it all seemes surprisingly modern, well-working and efficient and hence, sorry to say so, rather un-African. Not that I have huge personal experience of Africa, but I have seen for African countries and I do have some professional experience of other African countries too. This first impression somehow lasted altrough the week that I stayed in Ethiopia. Things worked very well. Of course my friend complained about a lot of things that will probably annoy you when you live there for a longer time, but during the week we were there she only had two shorter power black outs, which I feel is not so bad compared to what we had in Harare (and later on Zanzibar). Ok, streets and roads are bad and traffic is chaotic, but so it is in many other countries too. I guess corruption is endemic, but still thins seem to work and people seemed to have respect for police and authorities, although that might not be a all-good sign... Even if you had to pay for a lot of strange things all the time and often had the feeling they just came up with different kind of fees for just about anything, you always got a receipt for the fees you paid. I even managed to get a recepit from a priest in a monastary , after some discussion...
Food was good where ever we ate, not least because we had good "local" guides of course. I just love the Ethiopian injira and "western" food was also good. One thing that I just loved were the fresh fruit juices. In many cafés they had just fabulouls juices, strawberry, mango, pineapple, guava, avocado and the best; mixes of them all.
The favourite was the "El Bingo" in la Parisienne.
With the help of my friends we were efficiently introduced to the shopping life of Addis. I bought a lot of textiles and crafts and some clothes too.
We were also provided with a driver and guide taking us around to the National and Ethnografic museeums, where we among other things saw "Lucy".
Toghether with my friends we had decided to flee Addis on the day of Timkat as my friends had the day off and we asumed the city would be completly crowded. Still we managed to get a glimpse of the Timkat celebrations in Addis the day before, which was nice.
Outside the Trinity Church we saw people starting gathering and I asked what was going on and learned that the Tabots were just about to be taken out and the processions to start so we stayed around for a while and got a good view. Interesting! At first I was a bit worried that people would mind us tourist hanging around in an very important religious ceremony, but on the contrary! Everyone was very friendly, helpful and positive. They made sure we had good places where we had a good view and even helped me to get further to make pictures and they were very willing to explain what was going on and answer questions. Nice!
The day of Timkat we left Addis early in the morning to awoid traffic and drive to Ankober. The road was very much worse than we expected so the trip took much longer. Most of the way there were road-works and parts of the way we were driving on the side of the road. Interesting! I think at times we all wondered if it was all worth it, but as we came closer to Ankober and higher up in the mountains the views were absolutely breathtaking.
The air was so clean and it was silent in a way you rarely experience. Beautiful!
One thing that also strikes you in Ethiopia is the good coffee. No wonder maybe in the home of the coffe bean, and the coffe ceremony where beans are roasted, grounded and brewed in front of you, served with popcorn and together with the smell of frankinscence is a national pride. But the Italian influence have also hade some positive effect on the matter. In every café, even in the smallest café in the shittiest village you can find a proper coffee machine and it is well looked after and working. This make it possible to always get a nice espresso, macchiato or cappucino.
My absolute favourite was the Tomoca in Addis. You could smell the freshly roasted coffee from afar and once you entered it was like a thick fog of coffee-smoke but the athmosphere was just fantastic as well as the coffee.
