Landmarks

The second group of PCVs arrived in Ethiopia last night. It has me
thinking about how far I've come in the past 14 months…and about how
far I still have to go in the next year. I remember stepping off of
that plane exhausted, disoriented, and terrified. Lugging my 80+
pounds of luggage to the bus they had rented for us and staring,
stunned, at the city, which was empty as we drove through it around 10
pm, on our way to the hotel. I remember thinking, more than once,
"what have I gotten myself into?"

With this new group arriving, and with the departures from Bahir Dar
of two dear friends (one a short term intern from Germany, the other
Teddy, my first friend at I-TECH), I've been imagining my own
departure. It's hard to fathom. I can't picture what it would be like
to say goodbye to these people, to this place, that has become my
home. I suppose that's a good sign—that I am indeed settled here. I
have a feeling that, for better or for worse, that this next year is
going to fly by.

It's been a while since I've posted an update. I moved into a new
house about a month ago. My old landlord, not unsurprisingly, given
ridiculous inflation, tried to increase my rent when my contract ran
out in October. The surprise was that he wanted to raise it by almost
50%. So, with the help of just about everybody I know in Bahir Dar, I
found a new place, not far from the old, and moved in. I love this new
place, and kind of can't quite remember how I survived a year in the
old one. I have a kitchen, an indoor bathroom, and quite a bit more
room than in the old house. And particularly nice is the fact that I'm
not alone on my compound any more. There's a wonderful family sharing
the yard with me. Mom, Tsehay (which means "sun") is a jewel: kind and
helpful and with such a warm smile. She often brings me an injera and
a little pot of wot if there's extra. Dad works for the Ministry of
Capacity Building and is often out in the field, but also seems quite
nice. Two kids, Tsion (age 9), and Beniam (age 4), are super sweet,
though still a little bit shy and not quite sure of what to make of a
ferenji living on their compound. They both go to a good private
school in town, and are learning English. Yesterday Tsion came to my
door after school, her first exams of the year in hand. She wanted to
show me how well she was doing (20/20 in English!). I gave her a
high-five. She also drew a rabbit for me to put up on my wall, having
seen drawings from other kids hanging there. Beniam won't really talk
to me yet, but I can see by his shy smile that he wants to like me. We
have a full year—I'm sure he'll be my buddy by the time I leave here.

Holiday time again now, and much better than last year. I remember
being lonely and unsure of myself last year. At Christmastime, we'd
only been in Bahir Dar a little over a week. It's so nice to have
friends and a home and to know how things work here. We orchestrated,
along with 6 volunteers, a huge Thanksgiving celebration at Charlie &
Dee's (my adopted parents here) house, complete with a turkey special
ordered from the US Embassy. What a treat! Their house is lovely and
warm, and they're incredibly generous. A friend from the States had
come for a visit, and acted as a Thanksgiving-food-mule, delivering
cranberries, huge golden onions, celery, and sweet potatoes. Charlie
and Dee's guard didn't even recognize the onions—they look nothing
like our little tiny red onions here. We shared an incredible dinner
(how good to have such friends!), and then spent the afternoon
painting a mural on the inside of Charlie and Dee's gate.

My parents are arriving in Ethiopia in less than three weeks. I know
that they're excited about seeing my life here, and I'm excited to
show them around. It will be interesting to see how they react to life
here. Sometimes it's easy to forget, in the routine of it all, how
different my life here is. I know that all of my friends here are
eager to meet them, as well.

What else? I'm struggling again with finding productive work, but am,
at least, making progress on my thesis. The goal is to have my
proposal done and submitted to the ethical review boards in the US and
Ethiopia by the first of the year. I'm planning to look at the
factors—demographic, clinical, and social—that are associated with
poor outcomes in the first six months of HIV treatment. We're seeing a
lot of clients coming in to the hospital acutely sick, getting tested
for HIV and started on treatment, and then never showing up again.
Will be interesting to see if we can sort out just who the patients
are who are most likely to drop out of care. I'm also hoping to
conduct (through a translator) a few interviews, to try to tease out
some of the problems people encounter with HIV treatment. My best
guess is that transport costs, fear of stigma (and therefore not
telling others about the treatment and not having any social support),
and perhaps drug and alcohol use, will show up as issues. But I
suppose I'll have to wait for the data to tell me…

So life is fine here. It's starting to feel like I've been away for a
very long time, and I'm sure that it will be nice to have a short
break with my parents (and who wouldn't be excited about spending a
few days on the beach in Zanzibar?!). I miss all of my friends and
family back in the States (and around the world…). Know that I'm
thinking of you often, and particularly during the holidays. Hope that
you're all well.

OBAMA!

Jubilant.

And very, very tired.

Stayed up all night to watch the election returns (first ones came
back just after 3am). Watching the concession and acceptance speeches
this morning around 8am (having been there since midnight) at the
Obama Cafe (with fellow Americans, Ethiopians, a Brit, some Dutchmen,
a few Canadians, and a German) was one of the better things I've ever
done. I actually cried with relief.

Congra, Obama, as they say here.

VOTE!

We're getting down to the wire on the US election. It's big news here
(and has been for several months). Many of my friends, both Ethiopians
and ex-pats, are asking about it and thinking about it. A great new
café in Bahir Dar opened up a couple of months ago—Obama Café and
Restaurant. It's quickly becoming one of my favorite haunts. I even
(thanks to friends and family back in Denver) brought them some
additional Barack paraphernalia from the convention last August (which
the proprietors were exceptionally excited about). I got my absentee
ballot in the mail a week or so ago, sent it back, thanks to the Peace
Corps, priority. While my vote isn't going to change the situation in
Washington State, it still feels like such a privilege to be able to
make a choice (at least symbolically) from so very far away. It's
really overwhelming to see how many people here care, and how deeply,
about the results of this election. I'm inspired to see people without
a lot of access to international news media who know more about the
repercussions of this election than many Americans do. A great new
café in Bahir Dar opened up a couple of months ago—Obama Café and
Restaurant. It's quickly becoming one of my favorite haunts. I even
(thanks to friends and family back in Denver) brought them some
additional Barack paraphernalia from the convention last August (which
the proprietors were exceptionally excited about).

If you haven't already, PLEASE make sure to vote in this election. Do
it for yourselves, for me, and especially for those millions of people
in Ethiopia and elsewhere who care deeply about what happens in
America and don't have that privilege.

A year?!

Happy Halloween! My pen-pals (elementary school students from North
Carolina) had lots of questions for me about what Halloween is like in
Ethiopia. They may be sad to learn the truth that there are no
costumes or trick or treating here. Though I can imagine that my
neighbor boys would be absolutely nutso for Halloween if they heard
about it.

We just passed the one year anniversary of being in Peace Corps.
Amazing. We finished our Mid-Service Conference (complete with lots of
interesting--and a few less interesting--presentations, a bowling
outing--human pinsetters!, physicals, a slightly-too-aggressive dental
cleaning, and an eye exam at an Ethiopian clinic that turned into a
join appointment--Kristen and I had our eyes looked at
simultaneously), and I've been hanging out in Addis for the week
taking advantage of some time to get stuff done in the capital. It's
been a nice break, but actually, for the first time in a while, I did
in fact feel sad about leaving Bahir Dar. I've been feeling *good*
there these days. Incredible! I'm making real friends, enjoying my
work, and trying to get started on the thesis project. I've finally
been able to cobble together about 10 different projects at I-TECH and
elsewhere, and have been (can you believe it?) _busy_ these days. So
it felt like bad timing to be away from home this week. It has been
lovely, though, to get to spend time with the other volunteers in a
big group. I haven't seen some of these guys since April. We're down
to 29 of us now (lost another one just last week), and so the group
feels particularly close knit (that's code for small...). Our Country
Director resigned last week, meaning that nearly every single member
of our original senior staff has turned over since we arrived. Ah, new
programs. We've been an experiment from the very start.

So things are looking and feeling up. I'm moving out of my house next
week into a beautiful new place, complete with indoor toilet and
(gasp!) kitchen counters. I'm hoping that my new landlord will have
arranged to turn on the water, fix the windows so that they actually
shut, and get the kitchen door to unlock in the week that I've been
gone. Too much to ask? Potentially. Anyhow, the place is great, and
I'm excited about the move. It's a bit farther from work and town, but
I'll no longer be living on a compound by myself, which I think will
be great news for my (currently struggling) Amharic. The family also
has two adorable little kids, Tsion, who is in second grade, and
Biniam, who's in first. So given how much I love kids, this is going
to be a perfect situation.

My parents will be coming to visit in just 8 weeks. I'm already
counting down. Excited to get to share Ethiopia with them, and also to
get to see a little corner of Tanzania. Many of the volunteers have
visitors over Christmas and New Years or are going home. It feels like
a really big milestone in our time here. I'm sure that the next year
is just going to fly. The new volunteers--Group Two--arrive on
December 4th. We're all excited to get to meet them. There's lots of
speculation about what this group will be like. If it's anything like
ours, then *unique* might be the best descriptor.

To an English Friend in Africa

A poem by Ben Okri, a Nigerian poet. Yes, it's a little cheesy, but
sometimes these things just speak to me, and I thought I'd share it
with you all. I particularly liked these lines: "Remember that all
things which happen/ To you are raw materials." I think that it's a
good mantra for when things don't go exactly the way that I would have
liked them to go, here and elsewhere...

_To an English Friend in Africa_

Be grateful for the freedom
To see other dreams.
Bless your loneliness as much as you drank
Of your former companionships,
All that you are experiencing now
Will become moods of future joys
So bless it all,
Do not think your way superior
To another's
Do not venture to judge
But see things with fresh and open eyes
But praise when you can
And when you can't, be silent.

Time is now a gift for you
A gift of freedom
To think and remember and understand
The ever perplexing past
And to recreate yourself anew
In order to transform time.

Live while you are alive.
Learn the ways of silence and wisdom
Learn to act, learn new speech
Learn to be what you are in the seed of your spirit and
Learn to free yourself from all the things
That have molded you
And which limit your secret and undiscovered road.

Remember that all things which happen
To you are raw materials
Endlessly fertile
Endlessly yielding of thoughts that could change your life
And go on doing so forever.

Never forget to pray and be thankful
For all things good or bad on the rich road:
For everything is changeable
So long as you live while you are alive.

Fear not, but be full of light and love;
Fear not, but be alert and receptive;
Fear not, but act decisively when you should;
Fear not, but know when to stop;
Fear not, for you are loved by me;
Fear not, for death is not the real terror,
But life—magically—is.

Be joyful in your silence
Be strong in your patience
Do not try to wrestle with the universe
But be sometimes like water or air
Sometimes like fire
And constant like the earth.

Live slowly, think slowly, for time is a mystery.
Never forget that love
Requires always that you be
The greatest person you are capable of being,
Self-regenerating and strong and gentle—
Your own star and hero.

Love demands the best in all of us
To always and in time overcome the worst
And lowest in our souls.
Love the world wisely.

It is love alone that is the greatest weapon
And the deepest and darkest secret.

So fear not, my friend.
The darkness is gentler than you think.
Be grateful for the manifold
Dreams of creation
And the many ways of the unnumbered peoples.

Be grateful for life as you live it.
And may a wonderful light
Always guide you on the unfolding road.

A bit of promotion

Just found the URL for the orphanage that I've been working with.
They're are really great organization, currently struggling to find
room for more and more children who are being given up for adoption.
When I arrived in Bahir Dar, they had about 12 live-in children and
maybe an additional 20 attending day care. They're up to 23 live-ins
and probably 60 total in day care. They're building an additional
center, hiring qualified staff (including a social worker, hurray!),
and trying really hard to do what's best for these kids. Grace Center
(or Centre, if you were to ask them) is one of the best stops on the
tour that I give to every visitor to Bahir Dar. It's a pretty special
place. Clean, bright, filled with happy, healthy babies. My visits
there (and the relationship I'm forming with the family that runs it)
have definitely helped me to keep my sanity, and it's doing SO much
more for the kids and the families it serves.

Here's the link: http://www.gracecentres.org/index.html. Take the
religious affiliation as you will--they're a pretty fabulous group
(and the religious element here in Bahir Dar is actually rather
minimal). I'm sure that they would appreciate your support.

It's the Little Things

It was Ethiopian New Year last week. I've never seen so many sheep and
goats being dragged, pushed, carted, or carried home for the
slaughter. People must be so sick of sheep leftovers after New Year's
Day. It was a festive week; very little work got done. Everyone was
out and about, dressed to the nines in their traditional clothing,
visiting friends and family. Little boys also carry around flowers or
drawings of flowers and exchange them for coins (kind of like trick or
treating).

My major accomplishment over the holiday was baking a pumpkin pie with
Marcy. Here is what we used: one pumpkin (7 birr, or about 80 US
cents), a graham cracker (actually Digestive Biscuit) crust,
disposable aluminum baking pans, and a Dutch oven. It took the greater
part of an afternoon, but with what results! How rewarding to have
started with nothing and to end up with something so great. We also
managed to play about three games of Scrabble while it was baking,
which was an added bonus.

Other recent achievements: forming a committee for my thesis, making a
toilet paper holder for my latrine (out of dental floss, duct tape,
and a stick, no less), finally getting all of my utility bills up to
date, and making hotel reservations for when my parents come to visit.
It's the little things.

I'm trying hard to reframe my attitude. It's easy to complain: about
lack of work, about cultural difficulties, about the rain or the sun
or the mud or the dust, about not being able to find cheese, about how
gosh-darn hard this language is. But I'm trying to start thinking a
little more positively, about what I do have, and what I have
accomplished. I think that this is especially important as I'm coming
up on the year mark of being here in Ethiopia. It would be easy to
feel like I've done nothing this year and like I've achieved very
little. But instead, I'm trying to focus on the fact that I'm
comfortable in this town that was completely foreign to me a year ago,
that I can have a basic friendly conversation with the little old lady
selling me salad greens, that I have friends and neighbors who I love,
and that I understand the HIV treatment system and can navigate the
hospital, which was once such a scary place. And, of course, the
knowledge that I can bake a delicious pumpkin pie without a pie tin or
an oven!