We have Issues!!

This ball is very strange!

Hi there everyone,
Sorry it has been so long since I last posted but we have serious issues here........................with our internet!! We have been without the internet for 3 weeks now, and heard just today that it could be a few more months before we have it again!
How am I writing this? Well we have borrowed a friends stick to let you all know what is happening and to check our emails briefly. We hope to but one of our own next week because we have discovered its hard to live without technology once you get used to it.  Aparantly most of Addis has been without it. They are building the first ever train line in Addis and when beginning the work cut a telecom line in the city. So most of Addis has been affected and there is no knowing when the problems will be fixed.They have said it is a matter of priority, and we are not that!
So a very quick update before I go. We had thanksgiving with friends here at school - ate potato and marshmallow together. A very weird combo! Then we played American footy..another strange thing, give us Aussie rules any day.

Thanksgiving lunch under the school gazebo

 Shane and I have been working hard writing mid-year reports, checking fellow teachers and posting them on the computer. We also celebrated Christmas with all the Ethiopian staff who invited their families to a Saturday lunch we put on for them. There were over 400 people eating together! Its called Christmas Gibsha.
 We are excitied to be involved in a new venture here. The children at the dump that I help on Saturdays a few times a month, are entering into a sponsorship program. We are starting a program that should see the orphans housed, and about 150 kids fed, clothed, and educated. We have  helped the church to secure a sight to begin the project and house the orphans. It will be called Korah Kids, and we are so excited to be part of something that will change lives for the better. What a privilege.
Our kids are going great. They are looking forward to Christmas - even though it will be different here. We don't have set plans, but will be on campus and probably share lunch with people. Our boxes haven't arrived so nor have our decorations or stockings etc. so it will be low key! Max is in a christmas play that Shane saw today and I'll see tomorrow. He said it was really cute, so I'm looking forward to it, and unlike Daddy, I'll at least take the camera!

Christmas Gibsha with our National friends.

Shane is coaching soccer - what a joke. What he doesn't know he makes up. The kids have sports day early next term, and are practising events. I still teach English to the local poor girls in our community - so there is never a dull moment during our  weeks.
If I don't get hold of a stick for a little while, I'll say
MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU ALL AND  A BLESSED NEW YEAR.
Love Naomi

We celebrated Ethiopian Day at school and dressed accordingly!

A shocking visit

HI there readers
Recently I posted a blog about an amazing experience we had visiting a local dump. For reasons of keeping my friends safe, I've removed that post, but still want you to be aware of the situation over here so you can pray and be informed.
We spent 2 days with an Ethiopian friend Ato (not his real name) who took us to his 'home' area which is near the rubbish dump here. He is in need of support for many of the children in his church congregation, and he has invited several of us to be involved if we feel we are able. You see there are over 500 people who live on the dump, and many of these are families, all trying to simply survive on the refuse that most people throw away.
On a Saturday Ato runs a childrens program at his church and between 300 and 400 attend. Of these he and 4 elders have identified 150 children at risk - of not surviving the fight for survival. Many are orphans, some are part of a family, but their poverty is so great they have no food, clothing or education. We went and saw some of these children and were absolutely changed.
They were smiling, singing bible songs, learning memory verses and hearing stories, and yet as affluent westerners we could not help but notice their filthy clothes, and dishevelled appearance. They were fascinated with our white skin, and chubby hairy arms, and the blue veins they could see on our hands! One little girl kissed my skin over and over. It was very touching, and a little out of my comfort zone and personal space!!
So we now pray and wait for God to show us what he wants of us, and how we deal with this situation. My school class need to do a community project, so we will be collecting all outgrown clothing and shoes and toys to give to some of these children. It is a small thing, but at least it's something for now, and makes me feel better than currently doing nothing!!
Counting our blessings every day
naomi

Animals and humans alike, all scavaging for food.

Some of the young boys who need help, and hope!

Beautiful kids at Sunday School.

Our first holidays

Sorry for the writing delay, but while all of you 'Down Under' are beginning to gear up for Christmas and count down til the end of the year, here in Addis we have just finished our first term of teaching and had a weeks holiday.
We have just begun term 2 and should be getting into the swing of things for the school year. Its just a pity my body clock and mental capacities are feeling very much in Aussie mode at the moment......the motivation to be at the front end of a school year feels all wrong!
Anyway, we headed to a place called Awassa for break...about 4.5 hours south of Addis.We were with 4 other families on staff at school, and travelled as a group.  We stayed on a mission compound belonging to Norwegens. It was very basic, but adequate (and in our price range!!!) We were on the edge of a lake.....with hippos and algae so alas no swimming. Here are some highlights for us.

The trip down afforded some great 'Ethiopian' scenes

We got up close and personal with the locals!

We took a trip to see the hippos -now we know we're in Africa!!

We took malaria tablets and slept in nets!

We saw our first mole ever - he was flushed out his hole!

On our hippo trip we visited a fishing village -  look for the disciples mending their nets!

We swam in the compound pool - green algae, bird poo and all! Desperate times!

Being with 5 other school families meant fun times together on the volleyball court

Shane and I went walking, and discovered planking is still done in Africa!

We met the ugliest birds ever - Maruba storks, native to Ethiopia

Out walking we made friends with the locals, who as always were super cute and friendly

And enjoyed God's super creation every evening around 5.30pm.

It was a lovely break, and if this was anything to go by, we look forward to all our school holidays from here on after!!

Until next time
N xxx
PS. The other 'true to form, yes we're in Africa'  thing to happen was Oli caught the gastro on our last day, then shared it with the remainder of our kids for the next week to come!

A surreal day!

Well we've had our first visitor to Addis and it was great. Shane's brother-in-law Rob (married to his sister Renae) came to see us, while on route to Frankfurt for a conference. It was lovely to share our life here with somebody from home, and to see things through his eyes......afterall we've been here for 10 weeks and are old hands!!!! (Its amazing how quickly you get used to things, and don't think of them as strange anymore).

Early Christmas presents from home were great fun to open!

So we planned a big day out Saturday, and drove 2 hrs north to see a huge Orthodox church, cave, museum, and mostly AMAZING scenery of the rift valley. The church was made out of lots of local marble, and was huge. How such a place could be built here I have no idea. They hold services that are famous for healing, that begin at 9pm Sat night and finish at 9am Sunday morning. They run everyweek! Makes you thankful for the 3 hymn 1hr service hey!!!! The stained glass windows depicted old testament people on one side and the other side of the church was the 12 apostles. Very cool!

 Adam and eve up the top, and Noah down the bottom.

The musuem we could have skipped......all their old books, crosses and utensils looked the same pretty quickly, and if we could have understood the thick accent of the guide it may have also helped!!
Next we climbed for 20 mins staight up a mountain to a holy cave that a monk made famous by standing inside it for 22 years until one of his legs withered away. Not to de deterred by this he continued to stand on just one leg for another 7 years until he died. I truly hope it was worth it and we'll see him in heaven........otherwise you'd be hopping mad you wasted your time!! (sorry about the pun)

The cave with healing water is behind the grey door!!

Along the track up to the cave were a steady stream of dirty, haggard beggars. Rob was quite affected and gave money to some women, one of whom began to kiss his feet. What hit me most was that I was feeling immune to them after only a few months. We see them everywhere, and they become a pest, and you forget they are real people suffering. Shame on me.






We then had lunch at a lookout over the rift valley and that was the surreal moment. The valley was so big, impressive, awesome, that I felt well and truly humbled by God's creation. I kept thinking "I'm in Ethiopia, and this is something you would see in National Geographic. Very very surreal" We went walking to a bridge the Portuguese made from limstone and ostrich eggs, and played in a waterfall. We saw baboons climb down a huge cliff backwards (this was Maxies favourite part of the day) then at last headed home.

The Rift Valley in all its beauty!!

Heading down to play in the waterfall

Who's that tripping over my bridge???

Oli makes a shepherd boy extremely happy

On the drive back Rob bought some soccer balls from a small shop and the kids gave them out to small shepherd boys looking after cows/ sheep etc in the countryside. The excitement of both them and the givers, made it a wonderful trip back! We arrived home 10hrs after we left, quite exhausted but unbelievably thankful to God for bringing us here to this country.

Pusu saga's

Hi everyone,
Thought I'd drop a quick line to tell you about our cat saga's lately!! For those that don't know we inherited a 7 yr old marmalade cat called Pusu. She belonged to Maggie Crewes (a fellow misso moving to another African country) and even getting him was a saga!! The school gave permission last year to have him but then they were going to change their mind this year. Lucy was heartbroken - she had spent 6 months looking forward to having 'her' pet........so after discussions Pusu was given a temporary visa to stay, but she is the last pet allowed on campus!!!!!

The pussy cat himself.....PUSU

When  Maggie brought him over she locked him in a small travelling bag (he escaped from anything else) and he was so frightened he disgraced himself and pooped in the bag!! He then spent the next 3 days hiding under Max's bed except when he poked his head out to get some food! His food by the way is home made, cooked just for him! Tinned cat food is unavailable, so we have to cook up some mashed potato, carrot and rice, then add raw mince to it. He doesn't seem to eat anything else.....though we have tried with a few other morsels!!
Now don't get me wrong - we're not complaining about him.The kids absolutely love him, and he is now well and truly used to us. He lays on one of them in the evenings and gets patted all the time. He does seem to miaow alot (in fact he is the noisiest cat I have ever come across) but now we know him I think he just thinks he is part human and is talking to us!!
So back to his story.  Last week Pusu had spent the evening lying on Oliver being stroked but occasionally he pricked up his ears and hissed. We were confused about what was happening. By 10 ish we had all retired to bed and lights were out when Shane and I heard an almighty scream and hiss. We jumped out of bed quickly and Shane raced into Tom and Olivers room where the noise had come from. As he opened the door, a white/grey mangy stray cat (of which there are several on campus) came streaking out into the hallway and into the lounge. Meanwhile Pusu was shaking and quuivering on Tom's bed, but ready to defend if needed. Shane had to open both our outside doors, and minutes later the stray streaked out the door to freedom. Now this may sound amusing, but the cats here are known to have rabies, and they are none too small and wild, so we were quite frightened. However what was funny was that the neighbours down-stairs heard the commotion, so did next-doors,..........but neither Tom or Oli heard a thing!!!They remained fast asleep and oblivious to the danger within.!

Cuddles with Pusu every morning!

The second saga happened last night, hence this epistle. Shane went outside to get something around 8pm and Pusu desperate for some night air bolted out the door. We left the door open for about 3/4 hr but he didn't come home. We gave up, and left him to fend for himself overnight. We were a bit worried about fights with other cats, and mongeese who can kill cats, but we left him in God's hands!! Well about 3am he miaows at the door to be let in - goes into the lounge and falls asleep. At 7 he wants feeding but seems to be cagey and hisses every couple of minutes. Suddenly at 7.30 Lucy screams in her bedroom and comes running into mine. She had seen what she thought was a white fluffy toy under Max's bed only to bend down and come face to face with the mangy stray again!!!! He had obviously got in the night before when we were waiting for Pusu and had slept the night on a spare mattress under Max's bed!! He had also in the night marked his territory on the mattress, plus in the lounge on our chairs, and in the bathroom. Yuck yuck. The smell was gross and Pusu could obviously smell it in the lounge hence his cagey behaiour and hissing in the morning!!
Shane threw a shoe at the stray as it raced for the door, but we were wondering......does anyone have a good idea for a cat trap??
Til next time
Naomi.......and Pusu.

New Year News

HI everyone,
Well I thought I should let you know how the New Year went, and how we spent our New Years Day.
Firstly I must apologize for false information about the Pentecostal church next door. Contrary to popular opinion, they did not hold an all night singing service New Years Eve. In fact they didn't meet at all, so we were able to meet here at school in the staff lounge for a BYO dinner with other families, play a few games, then come quietly home to sleep all night long. Bliss!!
Secondly, although I said I would take pictures of the cow slaughter at school, I unfortunately missed the event so couldn't show you the process. IT took place much earlier in the day than expected, to miss the rain in the arvo, so it was done and dusted before anyone knew about it!
However I can tell you about our new years day feast. My teaching assistant Lydia invited us to her family home to celebrate the day. They had bought 2 chickens to celebrate and half a sheep.

Meskel - an Orthodox holiday is next week. This is next weeks Doro wat!!!

 They were cooking all Mon night and then all Tuesday morning in a  tiny tin shed with a fire pit......all to offer us hospitality. True to Ethiopian custom we were served the best of everthing they had, and we ate doro wat,(chicken and egg spicy stew), shiro wat (lentils), and a specialty kitfo (finely minced lamb and spice). We ate at about 1.30 and Lydia and her family didn't eat til about 3.30 when they were convinced we couldn't eat anymore, and we were all done. It is a custom that puts Westerners on the uncomfortable side - hosts not eating with guests, but they see it as a way of honouring us.

Lydia laid fresh grass and flowers for our coffee ceremony!

 The meal itself was delicious, but would have cost them at least a months wages. In a small way we could help out by taking a box of groceries for them, (eg. coffee, sugar, fruit) but it seemed so small in comparison to the love and honour they showed us.
What hit  me most, was the challenge a feast day like that is,when you have no running water, gas and only enough electricity to power a light bulb! They cook over fire in the small shed, carry jerry cans of water from a nearby tap, and wash in buckets. They grind the coffee for our ceremony with a wooden mortar/pestle and pound it.

Lydia's mum cooking in the 'kitchen' for our meal

We were just finished eating and it started to pour (arvo rains are common) and Joel (Lydias husband) was worried our car might get bogged. So he and his brother insisted on pushing it out of the mud while Shane steered in the dry car. They came back soaked to the skin and muddy, but laughed about it, and thought nothing of the kind deed. This act of serving and loving is so common here. The Ethiopian people think nothing of putting themselves out for others. They are such an unselfish people, and we are certainly learning lots from them, and also growing to love them more and more as we spend time with them!
We left their home at about 6pm at night, with lots of kisses, and them telling us we were now part of their family. What a warm way to begin the New Year here in Ethiopia! We thank God for bringing us here, and placing lovely people in our lives.

Lydias family...........Our new family

Happy New Year in Ethiopia

Hi everyone and happy new year (almost) from Ethiopia
Tomorrow it will officially be New Years Eve 2004 and then Tuesday is New Years Day 2005. Where did all that time go?
It means we have school tomorrow but Tuesday is a holiday to mark the occasion. Today we went to church and the streets were packed with people buying goats (we saw one being put into a taxi with his legs tied together!!) sheep and lots of chickens! They are all buying them for the family celerations of New Year when extended families get together and feast! The staff here at school (about 60 in number) bought two cows, fattened them up and plan to slaughter them after school near the back of the oval!! Stay tuned for photos! Then they will share the meat up between them all and take it home for families to cook up!

Kentucky Fried Chickens on the roof racks!!

We have a pentecostal church right next to our apartment and they love to sing loudly and praise God for large amounts of time. We have been told they will probably sing the New Year in by an all night sing-fest and church service! I guess that's quite a good way to begin a new year - in devoting it to God and praising Him........it's just my Western mindset that says, it would be quite nice to get some sleep too!! I'll keep you posted about what happens
The New Year here could see quite a bit happen. With a new Prime Minister and leader the country will definitely see some change! We pray it will be for good. They will also have a new leader of the Orthodox church (the state religion here) which again could change things for all the churches in the country. Please pray that both will mean good things for Ethiopia and its beautiful people!

Guess where these sheep and goats will end up tomorow night!

We feel privileged to be here, and are so thankful to God for sending us, and to so many of you for helping us get here. We love our jobs, and have begun hearing about some of the ministries our kids parents do - makes it extrememly rewarding. For example today we met Anna's parents. Anna is in my yr 1 class and is originally from England. Her Dad works for TEAR in Addis and works with another English lady and 4 Ethiopians. Together they try to help the poor in the city begin small businesses that will be sustainable.They teach them business skills, accounting etc, and investigate ways they can begin small businesses then help them find investors to begin. Anna's mother is a midwife and training young girls at the Fistula Hospital who will then go out to villages in rural Ethiopia to help women giving birth. For those who have read books about Catherine Hamlin it is her organisation and she works at the Desta Mender site out of town! What a privilege to help Anna while her parents are doing this!

So Happy New Year from over here everyone, and I''ll leave you with
 Our top 5 Ethiopian New Years Resolutions for the coming 12 months
1. Learn language, language and more language if possible! We want to feel comfortable out in the community!
2. Remember to use our horns more often when driving (every minute honk at least once!)
3. Wash our hands more to try to avoid the tummy bugs!!!!
4. Learn to go with the flow more and take off our watches....nothing happens on time anyway so why be reminded of this!!
5. Be people orientated instead of task orientated! Things will get done sooner or later if need be, but the relationships around us are what counts!
Happy 2005!

Yummy for our tummy!

Hi friends,
I have had a few people ask what the food is like here, and how is the eating going, so I thought I'd dedicate a blog to that very subject. what can we eat here that is yummy for our tummy!
Well firstly let me say we have been pleasantly surprised at the food we are able to get at the shops and the meals we can make. In fact if you are willing to pay any money, then pretty much anything is available at some time, but unfortunately much of it is out of our budget range! The things we miss are bacon -available sometimes but approx $32 a kilo, so we eat our eggs without bacon! Poor Tom really misses sausages which are about the same as bacon, and I've only seen them as fat frankfurt looking things.
 Cheese here that is yummy and matured is scarce, as is cream cheese, sour cream or light milk. In fact any dairy on the whole is tricky to come by in any reasonably priced form except whole milk which is bought in 500ml plastic bags.......yes, I said plastic bags!You cut a whole in the corner and pour it into a jug. The cheese available is quite tasteless and difficult to melt, with a hard rind on the outside. You can also buy cream in liquid form in a bag! Again its tricky to thicken - takes about 10mins beating and then is like our unthickened back home!! I've learnt to make my own yogurt, which involves milk powder and culture, and then I add mushed up fruit here to flavour it. The kids seem to like it!
That brings me to fruit - the best bit about the food here according to our fruit bat Oli. We have fresh strawberries, mango's, bananas. oranges (a bit average in my opinion) pineapples and watermelon. They are cheap and yummy. The down side is we need to bleach it all before eating because the water and ground here contains sewrage elements, but we don't mind. We've learnt to like papaya, prickle fruit (no idea what it is!!) and salad food like cucumber, tomatos, lettuce, capsicum,avocado are easy to find. Its a pain bleaching lettuce leaves individually but beats being sick. Potatos, onions, zuchinni,garlic, eggplant (haven't got it yet - don't know what to do with it!!!) are all here.
Meat wise things are a bit scarce - we have plenty of minced beef, beef meat (but has to be slow cooked or breaks your jaw its so chewy) and whole chickens (these are pricey - about $8 an  uncooked quite small chook) and did you know Aussies are the only people who call them chooks!! THe Americans here etc have no idea when I use that word!So if you put that meat with the veg available you can cook quite a number of things. Pasta, pizza is common (especially since the Italians lived here and left a legacy of food behind) and of course we eat injera and wat (the local food which we really like) We can order from outide here (like takeaway) and they bring it to our apartment and it costs about $8 for our family to eat that night!! ITs a great deal!

Eating 'local' with our next door neighbours here at Bingham!

 The things I've baked now sugar is back in town, have been lemon slice, cornflake cookies, little cakes and banana caramel tart (I found condensed milk and splurged at $5 a small can! It was worth it, althugh I had no cream to have with it!) I bought two cans, and may try to make icecream with the other if I get brave!

Mango's and lemon slice. Yummy! The kids like helping to cook!

 So there you have a run down of food. Needless to say with all that available we are not wasting away,nor in danger of losing much weight unfortunately!! The sook (small shop) down the road has lovely bread rolls fresh daily (hard and not so good on day 2) and we have jam, peanut butter (a bit runny and average but better than nothing) and we bought our own vegmite so all is good.
If at any time anyone wants to send a love package the things unavailable we would love is
dried fruit or nuts (costs a fortune here), cadbury choc (1 small block of average choc is $10) smiths chips (only have pringles here) and of course any Allens lollies. They have toffees, and wrapped fruit bonbons here but that's it! I did see Mars and Snickers, and Kinder surprise here but didn't buy. Better to stay away from such things!!!

Max has an "icy" mug drink everyday. It was the best thing we packed!!

 So if after reading the list of available things and you have inspiration for meals, then drop me a line or email. I could always do with inspiration - especially for the whole chicken (that comes complete with innards!!). Just chucking it in the oven is about all I do, although my house help can also make a chicken pie which is great.
Happy eating, and watching shows like Master Chef!!!Enjoy your cheese, cold meats and horse dovours, or simply have a sausage sizzle and steak. Oh bliss!
 

Expect the unexpected!

This country amazes me everyday, and just when I think I'm feeling secure about things, something happens to upset the apple cart! For someone who likes organisation, control and predictability this country is a real challenge to live in!!
So the latest here is we have cancelled school for Friday - yep the day after tomorrow! And we found this out a few hours ago! So there goes my planning for the day, lessons will be carried over to next week, I'll miss my amharic lesson, kids will be home and need minding, and my house help won't come (and that's the worst part - there are definite perks to living here and Alimetu my help is surely one of them!)
So why I hear you ask? As you may have heard the PM died a week and a half ago, and his funeral will be Sunday morning. Before then millions (yes millions) of people will flock to the city for this time, and mourn his loss. The problem is others may be celebrating the event, and the coming together of the two in such amazing numbers may cause some problems.

On Sunday there were thousands lined up to view the PM's body at the palace!

 So as visitors to the country we will keep low profiles over the next 5 days, and pray that peace will continue in this place. As a strategy to keep it peaceful in the past phone lines and internet lines have been shut down, so this also is expected any time from now. Hence this weekend of writing newletters and updating my blog may not be possible. See how I'm learning to be adaptable!
Those of you that read this and are believers please pray for peace in this country, for the deputy PM Haile Mariam Debre to make good decisions in the near future as he takes office, and also for the Orthodox church. Their leader also died last week, and now they will elect another 'pope' who we pray will be sympathetic to evangelical churches in this country.
So all sorts happening here. Stay tuned to hear what happens - although you may know more than I do outside of the country with the media machines in the western world. Here it seems to be word of mouth on the street more than anything. we don't have TV and wouldn't understand it if we did, so perhaps you can let us know what we miss while we're holed up for the weekend!! Lets pray we miss nothing, because nothing happens!

Buses, taxis carry posters celebrating his life. People even wear t-shirts with Zenawi on them! Can you imagine Julia t-shirts in Australia???

That's Africa!!

Hi everyone,
This blog is well overdue and a lot later than I wanted it to be, but hey, just think of it as me turning African!! No seriously there are reasons for this. It is so frustrating here at the moment as we slowly learn to smile, laugh and go with the flow. I remember someone emailing me from here and giving me the advice to just laugh and say "That's Africa" when things don't work or go according to our plan. It seems to me at the moment that things don't work, more often than they do work, and you can never rely on things!

People are never on time...wonder why?? This is normal traffic!

 So sorry Mum and Dad, for not skyping or emailing etc etc the past few weeks. The network here at school has been on the blink time and again, leaving us unable to use technology we want to. Then of course I'm such a novice at such things anyway, I changed my email address and there went this blog page. The few people that are up with fixing things at school like this, have been more than snowed under so its taken me over a week to be able to log in and try type this.....oh well, that's Africa!
What else is new?? Rain, rain everywhere and not a drop to shower in!! We have no water here at the moment in our school compound! A pipe down the road has apparantly burst and all water is cut off....and they're not sure when it will be fixed. So its bucket bathing, and boiling the kettle to wash a few dishes! The funny thing (not really) is school begins tomorrow with 300 kids arriving at 8am tomorrow and no water, no flushing toilets!! Oh well, that's Africa.
The shops have run out of sugar. It's been about 8 weeks since anyone had sugar to buy here. It's good for dentists - no sugary substances for kids to eat, but puts a dampner on cooking treats for recess for the kids to eat! I still have a small amount from some they left for us on arrival, but its needed for when I have to drink tea or coffee. I haven't been able to drink the stuff without the sweet fix yet!

Talking of coffee. I had my teacher assistant Lydia and her hubby, 2 yr old and 10 month old for lunch on Sunday. I cooked all day Sat to prepare a feast for them. It's the best way you can show respect for someone - to give PLENTY of food. Well I'm still learning what and how to cook here, but I served beef curry, rice, flat bread (my house help had to  make this!) and 3 salads - tomato/cucumber, couscous (this was a hit) and lettuce/avocado/mango. Following this we had rhubarb crumble, cream (took me over 10 mins to thicken it!!) and lemon slice (which uses condensed  milk not sugar!!!). They loved the sweet things, which is a huge novelty to them - they don't have dessert in their homes. ANYWAY back to the point - we tried to give them Eth coffee to finish the meal like all good people in this country do, and the bloomin coffee pot wouldn't work. It was one of those silver things on the the gas. You put the jug on the gas, the powder in the bottom with hot water under it and wait for it to perculate through. Well 10 mins passed, 20, 30 and there was no coffee coming up. At about 40 we were laughing and serving a cup of tea!!! Who knows what went wrong. The hilarious thing was, our guests with their cup of tea used 3 teaspoons of sugar each!!! No wonder the country is short on sugar! Oh well that's Africa!

Waiting for coffee with our Ethiopian guests - Lydia and her family.

The final clanger I will add is while trying out my new found language I went to my fruit and veg man and asked for 'An kilo nej shinkort amasagenallo' and walked away with a kilo of garlic.......when actually I wanted some white onions!!   Oh well, that's Africa!
Chow

Driving adventures

Sorry I've taken so long for this second blog, but a rodent of some sort was hungry and ate through the phone cabling here leaving us without Internet for the past 5 days!
Anyway I'm back and want to tell you about driving here. I have my license now (despite no practice really which is scary!) and have driven once on the roads (with me at the wheel). To get my license I had to verify at the embassy I had an Aussie license, then verify the verification at an Ethiopian place, and then go to the transport office and sign papers, wait a long time, pay ,more money, then they gave us a license on floppy pink paper, which will last two years. After this we will need to go through the whole process again!! Good money raising ploy!!
Finally with paper in hand I needed to do a car test with sim who own the vans we drive here. So there I am with a left hand drive manuel car, on the left side of the road watching out for pedestrians, donkeys, goats swimming pool size pot holes, not to mention other cars that randomly pull in front of you. Anyway, the lovely local man testing me said I changed gears smoothly, and did fine!! What a miracle.
So here are some of the rules I' ve learnt here
Don't use your blinkers on the roundabouts ( which are often 3 lanes across) because it confuses people!
Only indicate to let people behind you know what side they should pass use on!
When passing a car ( you can use left or right side) beep your horn to warn them
When animals or people are on the road beep your horn to make them get off!!
If you break down simply leave your car where it is and put some rocks around it so drivers won't hit it.
Stop lights don't need to be obeyed if it is busy traffic. Just go when you feel like you should!
There are no lane markings so make as many as you feel like.
Lock your doors and have windows only slightly open in busy market part just in case someone wants to grab your belongings. ( rare in occurrence)
If  you are in an accident try to pay money immediately and don 't involve others, because it will always be your fault and cost you!
If in doubt of anything, honk you horn!!
So there you have a western point of view about driving. Let me tell you, it's never dull and always an adventure!!
Until next time
Salem ( peace to you)
Naomi

We made it!

Our fruit and Vegie man is so helpful and polite!!!

Well finally we got here to addis after two and a half years!! Now we've been here all of five days I finally have a chance to fill you in on what it's like! The first thing is, anything I describe will not do justice to how things actually are here!! After seeing videos, reading books and talking to Ethiopians I thought I was well prepared but nothing can truly prepare you for addis! The color, sounds, smells are amazing.

Firstly the streets. It's rainy season here and even though the sun sometimes comes out in the days it doesn't dry out so the roads are mud, dirt then more mud. There is quite a lot of litter around, and basically everything looks and is filthy. But this is just the backdrop of a busy vibrant place full of noise and color. There are yellows,greens,blues of clothing, tarps, painted iron, all against the brown mud! People are busy, traffic congested and crazy! It seems there are no rules! Horns honk all the time warning cars you're passing or people are in the way, or just hello to others! Potholes the size and depth of swimming pools make things interesting and the main road to our compound has rocks on the side of the road for trucks to put behind their wheels whe they break down!! Then there is livestock that roam the streets with herders behind them. Donkeys carrying heavy loads, goats and sheep everywhere all add to the confusion and chaos. And to think we have a driving test Monday in all this!! Oh I forgot they drive on the other side of the road and the driver is on the left side of car not right!!

Potholes Everywhere!!!!

A bogged car outside the Church we went to.

The noises here are full on. The streets are full of people ( imagine after a footy game walking to your  car amongst the supporters that is how congested it is) and we are the only white ones. We stand out a mile and people openly stare. They look serious but then they smile and it changes their whole face! So you hear voices, sheep and goats, cars honking, Muslim mosques chanting, or in our case our unit is right near a pentecostal church and they sing and sing and sing into microphones turned up full! Nothing is ever silent here!

Goats and donkeys everywhere!!!

Finally the smell. With fresh livestock among the streets it can be a bit smelly. Few people have toilets and use the gutter so that isn't great either although with so much rain it is washed away, so currently is not too bad.

Lucy and I walked up the street near us today to but bread from a small sook ( a little galvanized  shop). When we have been out it is normally in the school vans but today we went by foot. Boys called out wanting to shine my shoes and one cheeky boy said "hey good thing come my way" in English!! Another group of boys yelled feregi (foreigner) and giggled and stared at us and a boy called money money, but accepted my " no sorry" so all in all it wasn't too bad!

Not sure what their hats are made of!

I think that will do for now, but soon I will take photos of our apartment and describe our living conditions and the food here.
Chow (Amharic for goodbye!!)

Drop em' Bob

Well here I am watching the Adelaide Crows / Port Power show-down and thinking about my Uncle Bob, and the blog I've been planning to write for weeks!!! So the game can  wait, and I'm going to at last write this! You see my Uncle Bob died a couple of weeks ago, and he and my Aunty Audrey used to be at the show downs at Aami stadium just near their home. So Aunty Audrey I'm really thinking of you tonight, and hoping you've got some company to help ease the pain at this time!
 My uncle (my Mum's brother) was quite a famous footballer you see, and his funeral was held at Aami 2 weeks ago. His name was Bob Hank and he used to play for West Torrens. He won 2 Magary Medals and captained the state team etc etc, but to me he was just Uncle Bob.

This was from his funeral card so didn't photgraph well..but you get the idea!! MY UNCLE BOB!!

  He was the Uncle who was always cheerful, cheeky and positive. He was a charmer with all the ladies and used to always kiss our hands as a greeting. He had a great laugh, and would give us tomatos when we were near the packing shed where he and my other 2 uncles worked their market garden.

 Hank and sons would sell tomatos and cucumbers grown in the glasshouse right near our house. I can still remember the smell inside the glasshouse and the warm humid feeling when I would use it as a short cut to my friend Sharon's house! I can feel the soft dirt making puffs of "dust"against my thongs in summer as we walked through the glass-house sweating and gasping for fresh air at the end when you opened the heavy glass door, by turning the large wooden crossbar clockwise. In winter there would be muddy holes along the path some with tad-poles in them that we could collect and take home. The rain would leak through the glass roof in some places making the fertile dirt more like mud, that would stick in the tred of our shoes, and make us remove them before going into our house, (or Mum would be mad!) In cold weather the warmth in the glass house was lovely, warm and cosy, and the smell felt homely. I remember opening the door in stormy weather and the wind would catch it, making it too heavy for me to hold (I was only 7 or 8). It would swing outwards and crash as it hit a wooden holding post, and I was so frightened it would smash some glass!! But what does my reflecting have to do with Uncle Bob? Well he was always the friendly face somewhere along the rows tieing up tomato plants or harvesting the fruit. He would never ignore the small girl walking through his work place and territory. He would always stand up from what he was doing, wave, yell cheerio or beckon me to come down the row to collect tomatos for my Mum!! I was his youngest niece and number 16 for him but he would never make you feel inferior or unimportant.He had the habit of making everyone feel special, and I think that's why he was so well loved!

As a young man I think he was quite handsome looking!!

 So my heading of Drop Em' Bob.... where did that come from? Well I remember when my grandparents were still alive we would have Hank Christmases where we would all get together - with 5 kids and 21 grandkids, and numerous great-grands it would be quite a show. But my Nanna would give the 'boys' (her 3 sons) shorts for Christmas and without blinking an eye Uncle Bob would drop his old ones that he would be wearing and immediately put on the new pair! People would call out "Drop em' Bob" and it became tradition that anyone with new 'duds' for Christmas would be required to immediately try them on then and there (although I must say I only ever remember this applying to boys not girls!!) So even in our immediate family the cry continues to ring out "Drop em' Bob" at Christmas and Birthdays, and I hope it will continue to do so for much time to come, and we'll remember the lovely man and uncle who inspired it all for us!
May you be at peace Uncle Bob!