Written in April from Gashena, Ethiopia days before the incident
I just lit a match to light a candle. It’s 5:30am and I’m over another night of tossing and turning. A slight dehydration can be felt in my head, my lips are chapped. The wind has been blowing strong all night causing the door to our tukul to flutter open and closed as it has for the last few nights. Peering out the door I can see the first glowings of a new day on the horizon. It’s a day that screams for a shower. My hair is matted in places, yet sticks up straight on command. Maybe it’s trying to mimic some of the incredible hair styles of the Ethiopian Highlands. My body stinks, my eyes are crusty, my clothes desperately need a wash.
There are times in your travels when you realize you are very far from home. Maybe it’s a rooster’s crow or a smell in the air, but sometimes it’s just you. You can feel it in yourself and you realize that your physical and mental condition are ones that you would never find at home.
Fleas have found a home in my trusty Sierra Designs sleeping bag. Lauren and I had prepared for this known fleas problem by purchasing flea spray from Petco before we left. Regardless of whether it works or not I can still feel them crawling , hopping and nibbling on my skin as I pretend to sleep. The dozen red dots on my abdomen are a reminder of how far away my fleece sheeted bed at home is.
The landscape of the Simien has given way to yet another grand escarpment. This one is the Mesket. We have walked it for the past 4 days over an unknown distance. The earth is parched and bare. Grand Canyonesque mesas surround and the vegetation is sparse.
The children swarm as we pass their homes. They smile, they get excited, they turn ferocious like the gnarling dogs that attempt to attack only to be held at bay by rocks and sticks. They beg, they beg, they beg. They have a feeling of entitlement with this begging. One that only comes from decades of handouts. The babies learn from the young ones, the young ones learn from the teens, the teens learn from the adults and the adults learn from the elders. A society of aid, a society if pity. “Give me money, give me pen, give me everything you and all the other white folks who have passed through have.”
The sun continues to light the sky. Voices begin to fill the air in the village below. A society of early risers. I guess I fit in.
There’s a few things the Lonely Planet left out like how does 55 days of fasting feel? What’s it like traveling in a land when the entire population is repenting their sins? Here is something I would be happy to shed light on. Eating shiro and injera on a daily basis has become a chore. That sour, gamey taste is getting more and more difficult to handle with every dig of my fingers and lump of mush that I pile in my throat. You can feel the hunger pains in people. The fasting for lent is in it’s 54th day. During fasting the people only eat after 3pm and seem to only eat injera and shiro nothing else. Needless to say it has created an incredibly dull cuisine for this Jewish traveler. Mix this with a dreary landscape and the death of Christ for an Orthodox population and you are on a one way street to Depressionville! We are actually in a week when the people abstain from dancing, smiling, fucking or anything joyous that translates into “Depression Week”! It culminates with one full day of nothing, no food or water. Should I feel bad as they watch me eat like an animal? or even as they prepare the food I eat? Am I a bad person?
But here is the catch, the sigh of relief, the light at the end of the tunnel…Tomorrow at 12 am begins Fasika or Easter. The breaking of the fast and lent. The curries, the meat, the food, the death of thousands of goats, chickens and cows that have lived their final days in a grace period, a safe haven free from the blade, free from the plate, free from my belly.
Halleluya!!!! I’m going to church tonight!!!!!