Ababa today!
> We've moved from the fourth to the second floor in order to get
> better hot water pressure. It's actually a nicer room (drapes in
> the bedroom, a better dinner table in the living area, and this
> fridge has a freezer), and they moved our luggage for us this
> morning while we were galavanting around town. Lyn-Dee noticed that
> we had a few US coins on a dresser that I kind of left as a half tip
> and that it was moved down to our room with everything else, so that
> she is feeling a little more trusting of our valuables in the room.
> Honestly, we're both kind of paranoid to be carrying what I would
> assume is a King's Ransom around town (traveler's checks just don't
> work here, and credit cards essentially don't exist). There has
> definitely been notice served about pickpockets all over (the more
> crowded, the worse) but muggings have never been mentioned by the
> hundreds of people that come for adoption, or even the thousands of
> foreigners that visit. The same with hotel burglary; they have a
> security guard and these hotels are on the web and ensure there are
> not inside jobs from staff. We do lock up our luggage with
> everything in them, which would make it easy to whisk away the
> entire set of valuables, I guess:) We are both very aware to secure
> cash with a money pouch underneath layers of clothes. Our cameras,
> and even our lip balm are in our hands in our pockets. We do get
> followed by little children (more on that in a bit) and a lot of
> interested folks watching two tall sort-of caucasians walking around
> (more on that later, as well).
> So tipping here is a bit different. Sparkie did some research and
> learned that it's more like India, it's just not a high percentage
> tip. There is tax on food (not like Oregon, but like California),
> and they do have a charge for service, so maybe that's why tipping
> is so low (about 10-25 cents for a meal. Meals cost between 5 and
> 12 dollars for us so far).
> So I'm going to kind of jump around here today but I'll try to go in
> some chronological fashion as that's how my brain works.
> We were picked up by the travel agency (a listed company by the
> adoption agency) at 9am local, natch. We had a tour guide and a
> driver in a van, something we did not see the rest of the day. All
> vans and buses were full, so we got a lot of looks having two
> 'servants' take just the two of us down the thoroughfares. Our tour
> guide, Yetasoh, got his BA in History specifically to become a tour
> guide. Funnily, he kind of showed how he felt about those 'other
> people who went to tourism college' and didn't get a full BA from
> the university. Yetasoh had a vast English vocabulary and we had a
> decent rapport with him. He was very knowledgeable and we could ask
> questions in any direction. I think he knew that he was going to
> get pushed to some degree when Lyn-Dee's first question was "tell us
> about Ethiopia." My thought to the second half of that question was
> 'in one sentence.' When he asked for something more specific, Lyn-
> Dee wanted to know the dynamics that led to the Civil War with
> Eritrea and I followed with the counterinsurgency of Somalia. He
> tackled the subject matter between what's reported locally here, his
> thoughts, and tried to give us some objective information. Yetasoh
> just came off a 9 day trip around northern Ethiopia with about 25
> Japanese Tourists; they had a separate translator, with English
> being the bridge. We considered a shorter version of this trip, but
> you fly about every other day to get around the country, and it's
> pretty expensive (package plus airfare for two was something like a
> grand or more US).
> So we opened at the national museum. It's nothing like the slick
> setup you see at the Smithsonian or NY Natural History Museums, but
> Ethiopia has some of the best archeological stuff in the world.
> They are very proud of their country and importance they have to the
> beginning of life. A few notable things we picked up while there is
> that the president and prime minister do not share their religious
> beliefs and it's unknown what and how they practice (very different
> for us). Also, the church (Muslim and Orthodox Christian) are of
> course at odds with the concept of evolution, but the government is
> secular so there is quite a display on 'Lucy' and species studies
> around that.
> Continuing on to the church of St. George. This was interesting as
> we had to be handed off to a deacon of the church to conduct the
> tour. So I might ramble, but the area around the church had a couple
> hundred people milling about, with about a dozen or two circling the
> church and kissing various walls, doors, and steps (it was circular
> in architecture). The deacon let us in (shoes off in a church), and
> we were the only ones inside (it is an active church with services
> every day). We were given information on the artwork, structure,
> religion, historical significance of St. George, and some examples
> of the dancing and music during ceremonies. This was followed by a
> short tour of the museum on the same property.
> Part of the tour included the Merkato, which is the largest market
> on the continent of Africa. We'll be visiting with our adoption
> group next week, but for something crazy like 45 minutes. At a
> market that big, there was just no way, so we were happy to include
> a longer time frame (and an extra session) with the tour company to
> see the market. We've been told that if we see something we like,
> to buy it as this is unlike Target or RC Willey; you won't see the
> same thing again. Vendors come and go throughout the days and so
> start the haggling process (so Lyn-Dee says that we are supposed to
> cut in half the initial offer and land about 70 or 80 percent).
> Unfortunately, a major holiday just passed, and it was Sunday, so
> the market was a shell of it's normal craziness. We asked not to
> stop and move on to our break for lunch. We have a few free days
> where we'll hire a driver to take us there.
> Lunch ended up being at a pizza/pasta/steak/burger place. I believe
> this was a bit more upscale as the patrons appeared to have nicer
> and cleaner clothes, and were also more groomed. We had a 'sampler'
> pizza and a 3 bottles of soda for something like 5 or 6 bucks. As
> our lunch break was kind of long, we decided to walk down the block
> and see if there were any shops to check out. Not really, so we
> stopped at a coffee shop called Red Bean that seemed to be kind of
> like a more hip place to hang. Lyn-Dee got to have a latte and I was
> given a chocolate Macchiato on the house in addition to the coke and
> cake we ordered. The cake was fine with me, not so much with Lyn-
> Dee. As a non coffee drinker, that may have been the best drink I'd
> had; Lyn-Dee has a picture of the artistic layout of the drink. I'm
> going to interject here and say that we ran into our tour guides
> while waiting for our coffees to be served; it was still about 35
> minutes until we were to meet. Yesatoh mentioned he had stopped by
> the pizza place to see how we were doing and that they said we had
> headed in the direction of the coffee shop. I asked if he asked
> about which direction the two tall white people went and got a
> pretty positive 'Yes yes.' No surprise we are sore thumbs. Quick
> second interjection, there is a decent percentage of population that
> runs tall. I've seen enough people at eye level or taller and have
> seen several women that would be even with Lyn-Dee and trying out
> for the volleyball teams back home. Not surprisingly there are not
> too many people on the obese side.
> I'm actually forgetting which order the next two are in, but we
> visited another important church and our guide had to shoo a few
> children asking for assistance; they ran well over two blocks to
> catch up to us as they were hanging by the van at a stop light maybe
> three blocks earlier and decided to run us down.
> We visited the Ethiopian Heritage Museum at Addis Ababa University,
> got some interesting information on religion, the cultures of the
> south part of the country, and learned about the history of
> Rastafarianism.
> The last stop was a view of the city. We were bombarded here by
> about 10 children for chocolate or anything. Our guide was only
> mildly successful here, even with the threat of a rock and boot. We
> do plan to give out candy, but there are several problems with
> giving money or items to begging children. I'll only lay out a few
> quickies, but much of the begging is controlled by what I would call
> pimps and the children benefit very little from whatever you give
> them. The other thing is that assistance of that type does nothing
> to help them on a path towards sustaining themselves and brings in
> more begging (if you think of it as an industry, the increased
> supply by us offering money or food brings in more competition of
> people on the demand side). Okay, off my soap box now.
> So returning to the hotel, we owned up. Bill for the day (agreed
> upon while we were in the States) was 58 a person (I won't insult
> Yesatoh or the silent driver with the gratuity here). And I believe
> we may have been pretty tired and on the wrong time zone, so I think
> our afternoon nap might have ran a bit long.
> Please send us the occasional e-mail to let us know what's going on
> with everyone. Love you all.
>
> Dan
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