The Foo Fighters Weigh In

Visiting is pretty, visiting is good…. 

I started writing this blog post and these opening words from the Foo Fighters song “This is a call” kept coming to mind.  That song wound up on my iPod thanks to my cool cousin Selome who downloaded a bunch of music for me something like fifteen years ago.  I cannot make sense of the rest of the song.  But that is not the point of this blog.

The point is to try to jibe what everyone says about visiting Ethiopia with our experience of living in it.  To hear it told, visiting Ethiopia is not only pretty and good, but the prettiest and goodest.  I’ve heard it my whole life from tourist friends; “Ethiopia is amazing!  I can’t wait to go back!  Oh my gosh, the people…so kind, so beautiful!”

And really the point of moving here for a year is so that we don’t have that wide-eyed wonderment that comes with the territory when you’re a tourist.  No; we wanted our boys - our whole family - to know the country.  And if at the end of it we could walk away and say Ethiopia is pretty, Ethiopia is good, well great.  If not…

The day we left Silver Spring

Well, what then?  What if you’ve lived in a country for a year and no amount of open-minded curiosity can quite make-up for the resentment and bewilderment you regularly navigate?  What if your kids feel even less Ethiopian than they did when they first moved?  Do you decide that your grand experiment to connect with a culture and its people is a failure?  Do you accept that you’re too mired in your own expectations and anxieties to receive the full blessing of this radically different culture?  Do you concede that a year is too short a time to connect with a country?

Or do you turn yourself back into a tourist and go visiting?

My college friend Mary’s visit to Ethiopia gave me just that opportunity.  She came armed with an especially wide-eyed enthusiasm for all things Ethiopia, being a resident of Doha, Qatar, world traveller, and lover of less beaten paths.  She held the distinction of being our last true visitor, and found herself in the company of a family who didn’t quite share her head-space. For my part, I was done trying to find the charm in the people of the country, its terrible toilets, strange jumbling of history with myth, etc., etc,. etc.  Mary got off the plane at Lalibela already practically teary-eyed at being in this “amazing” country, finally, while I was like, “Let’s go see these churches already.”

Mary arrives at Lalibela Airport

We did go see the churches in Lalibela.  They are indeed amazing.  I had to remind myself of this.  I had to put my hands on the stone walls and recall that they were built by priest-kings using nothing but sharpened pieces of metal, rock, and single-minded devotion.  This is not unique to Lalibela.  In Tigray, priests climbed impossible cliff ledges to dig into mountain faces to create cool, darkened hollows filled with color and the scent of incense.  The more difficult the challenge of creating a worship space, the more magnificent that space.

An areal view of the cliff with Abuna Yemata Chuch in Tigray (entrance is the little oblong hole far left on ledge;
The little white figure on the ledge is the priest.  Note the lack of railings.)

My father navigates the ledge outside Abuna Yemata Church

The nine Syrian saints who helped to establish Christianity in Ethiopia
(Abuna Yemata Church ceiling)

In Lalibela, many churches were built out of single rocks, springing from the vision of priest-kings that were part architects, part sculptors.  Lalibela was the geographical center of the Zagwe dynasty (begun around the 10th Century AD), which  followed on the heels of the Axumite kingdom (between 1st and 7th centuries AD).  While the Axumite kingdom began as a pre-Christian dynasty, by the fourth century AD, Syrian missionaries had helped establish Christianity as the predominant religion in Ethiopia.  It is the faded paintings of these saints that adorn the interiors of the cave churches of Tigray, where we live.  However, Christianity - if the New Testament is to be believed - first came to Ethiopia via a high-ranking eunuch who was baptized by the apostle Philip on the side of the road.  So between that eunuch and the Syrian missionaries, by the time of the Zagwe dynasty, much of the country was already deeply Orthodox Christian (today it is 44% Orthodox, 34% Muslim, 13% Protestant, and 3% Animist/Traditionalist).  

St. George's Church, Lalibela

Bet Gebriel-Rafael Church, Lalibela

In other words, while the grand cathedrals of Rome (where visiting is indeed very pretty and very good), speak to a very old and illustrious Christian past, Ethiopia’s Christian past is not much newer.  But why does it even matter?  

On a personal level, it goes some way to explaining life here.  In Mekele - which is a very Christian part of the country - you are constantly reminded of the presence of the church and its place in people’s lives.  The priests from St. Gabriel church have been silently cursed by this very writer on many a night when their chanting reaches our house across the valley through loudspeakers, beginning at around 10 pm and continuing through six am.  These hours correspond exactly with the human body’s intention to sign off for the day.  And Christian history here also matters because you might be walking among a group of warring children who will stop their warring to make the sign of the cross in the direction of a church a few hundred meters away, only to resume their warring once the church is out of view.  It matters because your van driver might be listening to the most foul, most filthy hip-hop at a deafening volume - all bi*#hes, and n*!#as and choppas and bricks and whatnot - but will stop to give the monk with the upturned umbrella on the side of the road a few birr (coins) and slow to make the sign of the cross as he drives by a church on a distant hill. Life goes on in very human ways, but the church is never far from people’s minds.  This sort of piety calms me, for some reason.  I feel very safe in Ethiopia - at least physically.  Emotionally, it's a different story, but I'll get to that.

St. Peter's Basilica, Rome

One "small" detail of the ceiling in Santa Maria Maggiore Cathedral, Rome

You can visit old cities and churches anywhere in the world, but occasionally those churches feel like museums, or attractions.  I know that sounds offensive because a great deal of people likely worship beneath the Michelangelos and Titians in Rome and Florence.  But stepping into an ancient church in Ethiopia is like stepping into an extension of Orthodox worship as it happens anywhere else here - the street, the home, open fields…There’s nothing relic-y about the Christianity here.  I can’t say that makes it any more or less authentic than it is anywhere else; who am I to judge that?  But I can say that as far as the church is concerned, I can see a straight line connecting today’s Ethiopians to the Ethiopians of the early part of the last millennium.  If you’re visiting Ethiopia from the developed world where things move and change at breakneck speed, that’s a really grounding thing to see.

Is that a good thing?  Maybe.  But it’s not always easy for me, who just wishes Ethiopia would somehow get on with it.  But then I’m not sure of what I mean by “get on with it.”  It’s great that the church is so resilient.  But I wish there were more cold cokes in the cafes, I wish sugar wasn’t so hard to get, I wish the internet wasn’t so slow.  While these sound like petty first-world concerns, they do bear some relation to genuine problems for the country.  If coke - so widely available world-wide that no little town seems beyond its reach - is not available in the second largest town in Ethiopia (Mekele), then what the heck is going on? Is it a supply-chain issue or is it the result of the sort of complacency that is satisfied with a fridge full of sprites because none of your customers are going to complain anyway? 

But forget about cokes. Forget about menus with thirty dishes offered but only two available.  Forget about shops that advertise one hundred products only to have half that number in inventory.  It isn't quite false advertising, more...wishful thinking, perhaps.  It's irritating and baffling, but ultimately no big deal.  Here's what I really care about; in a country with such a grand past, I wish there was more exposure to the outside world so that being different doesn’t always require it being pointed out.  While Ethiopia is a very cool place to visit, maybe I selfishly wish it would be an easier place for a Western-minded person to live.

But that’s exactly the Catch-22.  If Ethiopia were just another Kenya (sorry Kenya!), with the African-tinged post-colonial mind-set, well then it would just be another Kenya.  Easy to visit, expensive as anything, English everywhere, modern conveniences - a country whose history is intricately connected to the Commonwealth.  And there’s nothing wrong with that.  Even ancient Rome was heavily influenced by ancient Greece.  But Ethiopia is not just another anything.  It’s Ethiopia.  Never colonized, molded through history primarily by its own internal struggles waged by its people against each other, and by nature against them all.  

It’s what people like Mary come to see.  At our final stop on our day long tour of Addis Ababa, she put her hand on the Emperor Haile Selassie’s tomb and could hardly stop talking about it all day.  This last emperor was a forward-thinking and outward looking, yet Afrocentric ruler, who on top of everything else, inspired an entire religious movement (Rastafarianism).  Mary had heard about him since the time she was a little girl.  And through her eyes, I saw the connections she was making.  Her enthusiasm was infectious, and in spite of myself, I spent a lot of time taking in the aura of this man, how he fought for his country’s identity and for African self-reliance. I started to make my own connections between those old churches, that ancient history, the more recent history of an empire brought low by the same things that always seem to bring empires crashing down (famine, European aspirations followed by European wars, and communism), and its resurgence as a country with one of the world’s fastest growing economies. It’s tough, even for Ethiopia-cynics, not to be impressed by the story of Ethiopia.* 

Emperor Tewodros (Theodore), who united Ethiopia
(ruled 1855-1868.  I feel especially connected to him because I shared
his hairstyle for my entire childhood)

Behind us is reputed to be Ethiopia's first Eucalyptus tree, brought
from Australia by Emperor Menelik II (reigned 1889-1913), who established Addis Ababa
from Ntoto Mountain, where Mary and I are standing.

In Emperor Haile Selassie's palace in Addis Ababa (reigned more or less from 1916-1974)

The tomb of Emperor Haile Selassie in Trinity Church, Addis Ababa

But then you leave Addis, and you are at the mercy of the people out there…in the smaller cities, towns, and villages.  Well, what can you say about these people?  

I’ll tell you what most visitors say, which is that the people are so nice!  And I confess, I always just keep my mouth shut, because which visitor wants to have that notion contradicted?  But I have to say, it was with some satisfaction that I heard someone call my dear sister-friend Mary out.  Mary, the relentlessly positive charmer that she is, had struck up a conversation with a group of Ethiopian friends at a gathering.  At some point, she provided this throwaway line about people being so nice, and a thoughtful older Ethiopian woman cleared her throat.  She said, “When people say that kind of thing, what do they mean?”  And dear old Mares said, “Well….”  She looked at me for a little help, but none was forthcoming, you see, because I honestly didn’t know how to help her out.  

Look, if I were visiting Ethiopia, as some of my friends have, and then leaving within a couple of weeks to resume my busy life wherever, I would probably feel that same way.  After all, I’ve claimed that the people of Cambodia/Vietnam/Thailand/Malaysia are just the kindest ever.  That’s a luxury you get when you’re a tourist.  I have no idea if I would be saying that about the people of Southeast Asia if I lived there.  I really don’t.  But I have lived here in Ethiopia now for nearly a year, and I can reliably say that the people of Ethiopia are just people.  There’s nothing especially nice about them.  Some of them are very nice.  Some of them are rotten and I wish I could meet them in a dark alley somewhere and practice my newfound martial arts skills on them (they’d have to be drunk or very elderly to succumb to my “skills”.  And I’m afraid Mark might not be much help - I mean this in the best sense, but he punches like a Quaker).  And generalizing is no good and one shouldn’t do it unless one is writing one’s own blog so I’ll go ahead and say that many young men of our town and many others we’ve been to tend to be quite - shall we say - cheeky.  They like to get a rise out of you.  Maybe you like that, perhaps that’s part of the tourist experience.  I do not like that.  And I’m not a tourist, so I’m stuck with it.  Poor me.

Alas, that is my problem with Ethiopia in a nutshell.  I expect there to be a direct correlation between this rich and unique history, and the behavior and development of this country and its people.  In short, to be perfectly honest, I want life - not just for me, for everyone - to be easy and comfortable.  And when it isn’t, I sort of blame the country, and wonder what happened between the Axumite kingdom and today. Were there rock-throwing youths back then?  In this kingdom that used to trade with the Roman empire, were there constant calls of “Ferenji, Ferenji?”  Wouldn’t a group of ancient Axumite young men have had better things to do than to mock the Ethiopian lady and her Oregonian husband? Would there not have been cold cokes in all the Zagwe Dynasty cafes, for heaven’s sake?  It’s not that we can’t survive without clean toilets, cold cokes, anonymity.  It’s just that you look at the accomplishments of past Ethiopians and develop a steady refrain; how hard can it be to….  As in, here’s an entire church carved out of one rock, so how hard can it be to throw some cokes in the fridge?  How hard can it be to clean the toilet?  How hard can it be to just watch us walk by with your mouth shut?

Yes, yes.  Even in the writing of this, I realize how absurd it is for me to judge an entire country based on my own expectations including how people should behave when blessed with such a rich history, how the service industry should work, how such pious and public religious practice should look in your interactions with others (as in don’t stop beating up that tiny kid just because you’re in front of a church, stop because it’s wrong to beat up that tiny kid).  Perhaps tourists don’t have those expectations.  Or maybe they never stay long enough to have those expectations disappointed.  Which is just as well. I want people to love Ethiopia.  Having lived here now, I can honestly say there are few countries in the world that deserve as thriving a tourist industry as Ethiopia does.  It’s that beautiful a country, with that delicious a food, with that rich a history.  In spite of all of its challenges, it's a remarkable place to visit.  And live.  Maybe.

Gheralta Mountains of Tigray, fields of tef in the foreground.  

Moral?  None, really.  If you ask us if we’d rather have forged a connection to Ethiopia by being tourists, rather than residents, we would say no, of course not.  Well, the boys might respond differently.  Connecting with anything - a country, your friends, your spouse, (maybe even your dog) - means living with the good and the bad.  But there is something to the idea that regardless of whether you live there or not, you should be a tourist of your own homeland sometime.  It may not fundamentally change your gut feeling about the place, but it might shift your biases ever so slightly, and remind you that you’re just one tiny part of a bigger story.  The moment you realize it’s not all about you is the moment you might be lucky enough to feel a lightening of resentment, a feeling of common humanity that allows you to participate in the story more fully, instead of holding yourself outside it, waiting for it to entertain you in some way and make your life easier.  This is as true for Americans as it is for Ethiopians, now more than ever, perhaps. 

A small story that I hope will illustrate what I’m trying to say, please excuse its black comedy nature.  Mark has had stones thrown at him once or twice when out jogging.  The boys have also had stones thrown.  It doesn’t happen often, but it’s weird that it happens at all.  The usual explanations flow from well-meaning friends; Curious kids will do stuff like that just to see your reaction.  They don’t really hate you or anything.  Great.  Anyway, last Sunday, some of the presumably Orthodox teenagers who play soccer outside our Lutheran church began throwing stones at the church, and eventually hit someone.  I assume it was an Orthodox vs. Protestant thing (long story).  In any case, the young boys were taken by the church elders to the police station and - with the blessing of their parents - have spent a few nights there so they can consider their actions.  I’m sure there’s a lesson here about how parents here brook no nonsense from their kids.  But the lesson I wanted to share with my family was this:  See?  They throw rocks at everyone, not just you!  

I’m so glad Mary’s visit allowed me to be a visitor to Ethiopia again.  Ethiopia’s tourism slogan is “Ethiopia, where it all began” (because of Lucy, the 3 million year old Australopithecus female, who was found in the Danakil depression.)  I think its slogan should be “Ethiopia, the land of contradictions.”  Either way, there’s no denying a visit here will be unlike any other you’re likely to have anywhere else in the world.  There’s just…nothing like it.  It’s like a therapy session; it will put you in touch with ALL of your feelings.  In fact... New slogan:  “Visit Ethiopia; it’s like visiting your shrink.”

The Lucy walk

PS:  Hazal is officially too boring to warrant an update.  Okay fine, that bimbo has somehow let herself fall in love with a bearded member of the Balkan Mafia.  

PPS:  In all seriousness, let me just say that if you do visit this amazing country, you will NOT be disappointed. 

* I will note that part of the story of Ethiopia includes how the Emperor Haile Selassie annexed what had been an Italian territory in1962, and included it formally within Ethiopia’s borders.  The territory was called Eritrea and the emperor’s annexation of this slip of land and its coastline (given to the Italians by the victorious Emperor Menelik II following the Battle of Adowa in 1896) precipitated a nearly forty year war for independence.  Eritrea eventually won its independence and recently celebrated its 27th anniversary.  As three of my grandparents are Eritrean, and the other was raised there, I consider myself an Eritrean/Ethiopian.