Addis Abeba
Bicyle distances Ethiopia
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(*) Note:
In order to make the Amharic script visible you have to install a multi language editor on your computer
[Piassa]
I've been here already 14 days in the `Piassa`. Without knowing it, there is no sign that says: `Piazza '/ ፒያሳ / or it must be the human flies / parasites who accost you, yell nasty things at you when you ignore them ...that indicate you where you are (Piassa). Yet I notice that as you radiate serenity, communicate with those flies, explaining them that it is not very nice to yell at someone on the street you don`t know (yess my brother, you really have to educate these people!) it helps, also to get yourself in a positive state of mind
Addis...
Piassa
But if you have been in Dakar, Conacry, Yaounde, this is really peanuts. The arrival in Addis was very difficult in terms of cycling, from አዋሳ / Awasa / on I came through an extremely dry, desert-like area where the road was all the time ascending. Along a shitty village I got stoned (not by the good stuff but a little prig was throwing a stone to me!). I stopped cycling, got off and chased the little bastard with my stick through his village ...Of course it was impossible to catch him, they are cowards who immediately run away. On the other hand, if I just had stoned a GLWM (Good Looking White Man / ኮንጆ ነጭ ወንድ / kondzjo ne`ch wend /) I also would not wait for a spanking ..
I know that the chance to catch such a little bastard is 1 in a million so this kind of action I see more as a welcome break from cycling. I then stroll down the village, look as mean as possible out of my eyes, drink a Fanta in a bar in danger of collapsing, kindly refusing to join three homies that are picking some type of meat from the injera (/ siga fir fir /) with their hands and then smoke a cigarette under a pica tree, meanwhile observing carts loaded with jerrycans + children screaming `You! Where You Go?! at me....
20 km for Addis (Akaki) I stopped cycling because I was completely exhausted. Even here I heard the ፋራንጂ / Farandzjie / and `YOU! YOU! ', but less frequently.
But here I noticed that some people were confused at the sight of a ቲሩ ነጭ ወንድ / ti roe ne`ch wend / NWM = Nice White Man. In a hotel (!) on one evening I got harassed three times (!!): 1. the Guardien who started to yell in Amarinha at me, 2. the cleaning lady who at 07.00 am was pounding for two hours at door, pushing the curtain of my window aside and peeking into my room, 3. a moran that called himself the `manager` who at 06.00 slammed at the door and started screaming with a high speed staccato like voice: `... your bicycle, CHECK! CHECK! CHECK! CHECK! .. your bicycle! (I had left it outside and had told - the same idiot- that I was ok with it to leave it outside).
I have still not taken into account all the አምባ ደደብሰዎች / amiba dedeb (i) sewoch / = village- idiots / who stared at me in a moron way, asked over and over again the same stupid question (`YOU! From Where?`) Or individuals that wanted to touch me ... BUT as a plaster on the wound there was the European championsship game of the Netherlands versus Denmark (0 - 1 snik) that I together with a bunch of screaming homies (no women) watched.
In አዲስ / Adis / = new / I tried the mission (Bethel Catholic) but there was no one except the guard and that on Sunday!?. Right now I'm in an imperial hotel called the Itegue Taitu, a colonial-like somewhat dilapidated building with decaying grandeur, wooden balconies, thick walls and decay everywhere ... A wonderful place!.
Itegue Taitu hotel
For 140 Birr (= 8 USD = 5.33 Euro) I have a double (2 beds, talking the price down did not work, the lady was friendly but fierce. That is something, if you do something like what is not possible in general Ethiopians listen patiently, politely, with interest to your lecture and as soon as you have finished your oration they repeat exactly the same as what they told you before your lecture. As if you find yourself in a cave that echoes). The gay Amarinha yelling at 07.00 am you get for free but that's eventually ok: it is a good alarm clock and one really takes advantage of the day.
[Administrative ancillary matters]
... Have you already seen things of the city? ... Hardly, as I had had to go to the Ethiopian immigration to renew my visa that had expired two days ago. Antillean states: `s crowd, waiting, paper filling, wait for counter 1, wait, counter 2, wait. I really felt myself like some kind of Kafka, in an ugly, building that has not been painted for a long time. Then at closing time they tell you: `come back tomorrow!`.
The next day (with an Ethiopian visa extended with one month, allah-akhbarrr!) I went to the Sudanese embassy (the southern Sudan visa I had just in case removed). The visa is no problem but ... the good man wanted to see an Egyptian visa / to be sure that I would not stay in his beautiful desert country illegally (Really, they are queuing up to sneak into that country!), processing time: 15 days (!). Would they still have to plant the papyrus plants? 15 days just to paste a little sticker in your passport insane!.
Anyway,such a forced break is actually not so bad: a good rest / sleeping a lot, watching football, plus I look forward to the prospect of having to go BACK to the Ethiopian immigration. I have to because after all the bureaucratic fun I still have only 5 days, not enough to do the 1000 km to Metema (the border with Sudan).
Anyway .. by going to all these organizations gives me a nice city tour of Addis. I do everything on foot and find myself once I get a little outside the center surrounded by children standing in front of me, staring at me as if I am an inhabitant of Mars, firing the little English they know at me: (YOU!) ... In general I encounter few people that something more than a (very) basic English. In a mixture of English and Amarinha I try to ask things like WHERE is a bicycle shop, WHERE is a bicycle mechanic, WHERE is the mission, etc.).
... St. Giorghis cathedral
I notice that I am not patient. It frustrates me greatly that I can not have a simple conversation, or asking something simple... I study fanatically Amarinha, I try to understand the script, write each word I hear. I have to build a vocabulary from scratch, just as I did with the Spanish language long ago. Inotice that I write down phrases like: `I don` t care / Why are you staring at me? / Do you want to marry me? / Leave me alone! / You should respect elders! / I don `t like you ! / Don `t speak to me! / Go away! / ... God bless you my black brother ... now go away! / (you should always remain positive). It's all pretty negative but in this is a piece of my own frustration of not being able to communicate, the fact that I am tired mentally (although I am recovering mentally by the `not doing anything` all day :)).
[Derg]
A weird city that Addis: built on hills with a huge Allee (Churchill Avenue) that cuts the town from north to south. On my walk to the immigration office I pass the Derg Monument (not DWARF: =)), a kind of obelisk with a huge red star on top of it. At the bottom a bronze plaque commemorating the heroic deeds of the comrades, entirely in Soviet style . The Derg was a military committee that ruled from 1975 to 1987 and more or less took over power of Emperor Haile Selassie (who in 1975 died under suspicious circumstances).
churchill avenue
The reign of the Derg was characterized by the enormous famine of the early eighties, war against rebels in the north and tens of thousands of disappearances what caused many Ethiopians to leave the country and settle down in almost the entire western world, thus creating for the first time in Ethiopian history the first big Ethiopian diaspora.
... the DERG monument/
After the fall of the Soviet Union, Mengistu (the leader of the Derg) lost the support of Russia. His days were numbered: he himself plus his immediate family went into exile in Kenya, Eritrea became a new state and Ethiopia became a federal republic along ethnic tribal lines with Meles Zenawi as prime minister. He is de facto a dictator: all opposition is silenced or jailed although you don`t notice any military repression in the streets or in the country.
[Waterhousehold]
There are 70 million Ethiopians (!), But their cities are relatively small: 2 million live in Addis while you find in a pretty big town like Awasa hardly a million people.Water remains a problem: about 80% of the population lives in rural areas and depends on the rain (and that in the year 2012!). Even if it rains, but too late, (here it started raining 2 months later than normal) farmers find themselves in trouble: crops such as bananas, sweet potatoes (which do well in dry Sahelo areas) couldn`t be harvested by the absence of rain so that the farmers were forced to eat their seed reserves. Absurd when you actually pass through green areas where there is a food problem, where children are starving ... Especially since this country has enormous lakes, perfect for irrigation, one might think ...
On my way to Addis, I came through very dry areas where children, women fetched water with their yellow jerry cans from muddy puddles as in Niger, Nigeria ....
lake Awasa/
Even 30 kilometers (!) from Awasa - that is situated besides a huge lake- villages are in trouble. Farmers in trouble get 30 Birr (1.5 USD) to survive, mainly funded by foreign NGO `s although regional government bodies try to deny the problem because the situation is seen as a bit of a shame or to prevent people who are capable of surviving come to collect the 30 Birr.
[La vie cotidienne]
Here in Addis you find again `la vie cotidienne`. You see beautiful women, (crowded) buses, huge hotels, cafes, bars as in southern Europe. If I walk outside the center it is as if I am in the Caribbean: men with dread locks, the laundry hanged in front of slum-like cottages, little street vendors ... A `Lion of Judah` reminds me much about Jamaica, Rasta Fari `s. I wonder whether a Jamaican Rasta Fari would feel at home here ...
Addis ...
I see headscarves, black women with straight hair, jeans, women who drink beer, cell phones. You could be here in Rotterdam, although here you find street characters who`s job is to yell the collectivos full of passengers, slum-like structures on the street, filth and a lack of parks (I still haven`t seen one).
... The lion of Judah/
[Bicycle]
I find the bicycle still a magic aparatus. I have to look at it again and again: imagine that it carried me plus my stupid things from Laayoun (the western Sahara) all the way through the desert, west africa, central africa up to here, east africa and it will carry me (again) through a desert to the north ...Crazy!.
The day before yesterday I got the luggage off my bike and did finally understand why cycling was so tough: 0for the third time there were three broken spokes simultaneously resulting in a huge discontinuity in the rear wheel (the wheel just didn`t completely block!). Anyway, I have put in the new spokes and have practiced with the balancing of the rear wheel. I did quite fine even if it is me that say so :). I have put in the spare wheel (which have thicker spokes), swapped the freewheel (finally I was successful) and I'm going to try to to replace the bearings of the crankshaft.
If I don`t fail doing that (replacing the bearrings) I really will be a bicycle CHIEF and I will be autonomous in terms of repairing the bike! The things you learn on such a trip, awesome haha. Of course I first located a bicycle shop/ bicycle mechanic where I can go in case I screw up. I find it difficult to actually start the procedure (hammering the pedals loose, bottom bracket removal, etc.) but it is important that I do such a reparation first myself. Later in the Sudan desert, there is no saving-Islamic-bicycle-angel to help me, I have to do it then all by myself!.
The rainy season has begun here and with a lot of force!. I think I'm the only one still in walking around with sandals and dressed in shorts. It is cloudy, fresh and I am dressed in a jacket. In that respect (avoiding the rain), this forced break is also not bad: =)
... a beatiful woman with a Klingon`like hair style! .../
[Greeting]
Ethiopians greet each other (both male-male and male-female) each other by shaking hands and moving their shoulders against each. With a little more love and they embrace eachother or move their heads against eachother. I rarely see people kiss eachother. You see a lot of love here, men / boys who walk hand in hand, but I saw that too in countries located in the Sahel / close to the desert such as Morocco, Mauritania, Niger, Mali, Nigeria. In the cafe, while watching football, I see men touching eachother. Wheather they are all gay here, OR it is something that dates from their childhood and is still there I don`t know.
Especially the shoulder-shoulder greating I found in the beginning hilarious. To me it was as if rappers/ homies from the hood greeted eachother. But now I'm used to it haha ..
[Amarinha]
And so I spend the days: I sleep until 12.30, have breakfast in an establishment with a very high ceiling (ትሪያኖን ካፌ / Trianon cafe /) where I start with a እንቁላል ፍርፍር / in koe la l fi r fi r / scrambled eggs /. The rest of the day I write down Amharic words and I try to build sentences. The sentence order in Amarinha is totally different from Dutch or English. If you say, `I read the newspaper every day', then it is in Amarinha: `I every day (the) newspaper read` / እኔ ሁልቀን ጋዜጣ አነባለሁ / Ine hoe l ke n ga ze ta a ne ba le hoe /.
Now I understand through what kind of hell a 'Habesha' must go who wants/ is forced to learn Dutch (or English) haha. But it never bores: I see the አማርኛ / Amarinha / as a mathematical problem. I spent hours and hours on the language learning the script. I forget everything around me only muscle pain in my neck, arms reminds me that I sit too long in one position. I am hungry, not for food but for words: the colors, the numbers, how do I order something, how do I ask something simple like where is the way to the toilet ... It gives me extra satisfaction when I pick words from conversations that I know or recognize letters in the street though I cannot read all the texts, let alone have a simple conversation.
[Arabic versus Amarinha]
Of course I know very little of both languages but so far I find the Amarinha a very logical unambiguous language. In terms of sound, I find it even very similar with our, dutch language although they don`t have the terrible `gu-gu-gu-gu` (احمدولله Hamdoelilah `i!). Of course it takes time to build a vocabulary, to learn how verbs have to be joined, to learn construct sentences in the correct order, to have a simple conversation, etc. But that applies to any language. Each letter of the Amarinha script has seven unique subletters associated with each consonant.
For example, the letter `b` is: በ / bae /, ቡ / boe /, ቢ / bie /, ባ / ba /, ቤ / be /, ብ / bi /, ቦ / bo /. These are our vowels a, e, i, o, u (u) where additionally there are the `i` and `e` (pronounced as `uh`). The Amarinha has 34 characters times seven thus giving 168 unique different characters (plus twenty letters of the form: `lwa','swa' etc.). So in total 188 characters to learn. This seems a lot but I find myself after 10 (half) days of studying (half days, because I am not capable of waking up before 12.00, aarrchhhh) I start to recognize letters and even (simple) texts on the street I can read.
It is possible that thanks to my divine mind I can read in such a short time (small) texts or lie in the fact that the አማርኛ / Amarinha / has a clear, logical alphabet (I think it is the latter : =)). In Arabic consonants are even omitted. Extremely unpleasant when YOU! as a non-Muslim want to learn the language. Moreover, words in Arabic can be interpreted in different ways (offcourse the context also helps to figure out what a word means).
An example: The word مدرسة / a s r d m / (read from right to left) can be read as:
- ma dra sa = school
- moe de rie soe = teacher
In Amarinha one get the following for this example,
- ma dra sa = ማድራሳ
- moe de rie soe = ሙደሪሱ
Watertight, more ambiguous is not possible!. (I just do not know why the Amarinha has two different characters for the letter `s`, but yes, one cannot understand everything).
... a John the Babtist`like figure with on the background Menelek II, the founder of Addis ... /
[The itinerary]
After I have taken care of all the administrative shit, visa`s the road will take me to the north, Ba` hir Dar, Gonder, Metama (border), Al Qadaref (Sudan). It will be very nice to leave once again a big city behind me and to be outside the whole day again. Also I am looking forward to the Sudan, the stories of other travelers are invariably positive and inspiring (also in terms of being left alone by locals, almost no harassment).
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