Released from Lock-Down!

Our three months of being confined to our sites is finally over.
Christie, Straw, and I took the opportunity to head to Gondar for the
weekend, with my friend from the Clinton Foundation and his wife (it's
about 3 hours North of me). I'm trying hard not to be insanely jealous
of the volunteers living in Gondar. It's a great little city, tucked
into the foothills, cool and breezy, and full of medieval castles,
pine trees, and much-friendlier-than-in-Bahir-Dar street kids. We
spent the weekend relaxing (being away from work!), cooking delicious
food, meeting fabulous travelers from all over the world, and
exploring the city.

On the way up to Gondar in my friend's car—got to avoid the bus!—we
stopped to see a castle built in 1537. It was already about a million
degrees out and the sun was pretty intense, but the mile or so walk up
to the site was absolutely lovely. A group of four little boys, about
10 or 11 years old, followed us all the way up. They were sweet, until
we got to the wall surrounding the castle, at which point, the four of
them ran in front of us, made a line blocking the path, and told us
that we had to stop, that they were the guards, and that we had to pay
them 10 birr (about a dollar). Um, no, we're not going to pay you, we
say, and we go back and forth for a few minutes, arguing about whether
or not they could actually charge us to get in there. They finally
relented when we just decided to push through the brambles to get in.
A slightly older guy showed up a little later, and reiterated that we
needed to pay 10 birr, apiece. The castle was beautiful, and worth it,
so we just ponied up. This "guard" was probably no more legitimate
than the kids, and we realized that the kids didn't get anything out
of the deal (and 50 birr is the equivalent of a couple of days worth
of work), but what can you do? None of us spoke Amharic with enough
authority to get out of being cheated. Hindsight is 20/20. And I
suppose he needed it more than we did.

In Gondar, we stopped by the Tara Center, where the three PCVs living
there volunteer some of their time. It's a
child-sponsorship/environmental/animal rescue/artisan
support/generally amazing NGO run by an Englishwoman who's married to
an Ethiopian man. The most exciting moment of the visit? Having a baby
Gelada baboon (named Mary, no less) sit on my shoulder and groom my
hair. Yes, this is Africa.

Got back to Bahir Dar on Sunday afternoon, and met up with Levi and
Megan, who was visiting town. Meg is one of the only volunteers who
can cut hair, and we opened up an impromptu salon on my lawn. In the
dark. She cut hair by the light of a headlamp. It was a very Peace
Corps moment. I'm planning to have my hair braided into elaborate
cornrows in a couple of weeks by the hair cutters who live down the
block from me; they've been eyeing my hair since I moved in.

Less than two weeks now until our In-Service Training. Time is
simultaneously both flying and crawling along. Each day feels long,
but suddenly it's the end of the week, or indeed of the month. Been in
country nearly 6 months now, which is hard to believe.

P.S. Exciting news: mangos are in season as of a week or two ago. Four
birr for a kilo, which I will be buying approximately, oh, all the
time. Sad news: tomatoes are no longer in season. The ones that are
left are yellow and scrawny. Funny how much my life revolves around
produce…