Christmas is Coming

Just Back in Dessie after a great few days away. On Tuesday we flew to Addis Ababa. The plane from Dessie is a 17 seater little propeller jet. It is tiny and doesn’t even have real seats, well it has seats but they aren’t solid or padded just pieces of material suspended between two pieces of metal. The flight is fantastic though, you can see incredible mountains, rivers, valleys and little villages perching right on top of the mountains, this gives way to a flat blanket of perfectly neat fields as you approach Addis. From the air it is also possible to see how successful irrigation schemes can be here; as every so often you can spot lush green fields in amongst the parched yellow ones.
The airfield in Kombolcha is good fun too. It is basically just a stoney but flat field with a shed to the side of it and before the plane comes there are cows on the run way and horse and carts. In the shed you meet the man who sold you the plane tickets in Dessie, he looks after all aspects of flying except actually flying the plane himself. Looking at the runway I didn’t think the plane would take off but it did and very smoothly in fact I have had worse take offs and landings in Europe than here. The flight attendant told me that Ethiopian Pilots are the best (though he could be paid to say that) because Ethiopia is at such a high altitude the fuel doesn’t burn as well so they are really skilled at take offs at high altitude and also dodging mountains as they fly!

When I arrived in Addis Ababa last September I thought I had arrived in hell. It is one of the poorest cities in the world and the poverty is everywhere, however Tuesday was my first time back there after three months in Dessie and this time it looked like New York, I couldn’t believe how good the shops looked and all the modern cars driving around it was amazing. While in Addis I bought stock cubes, cupa soups, super noodles, Pringles, salted pea nuts, and English magazines, all are unattainable in Dessie. I ate cannelloni, Pizza, chips, I even had an Irish coffee! I also met other volunteers who are living in really small places in the middle of no where. One guy had taken six buses to get to Addis Ababa, even though he is only maybe 300km from Addis it had taken him 2 days.

After a day in Addis we headed to Sodere which was fantastic, it was really hot and there was an olympic size thermal swimming pool which was like a huge hot bath. I had a great time in Sodere we had a pub quiz one night, a camp fire and Christmas party another and well lots of drinking. I wasn’t in bed before two am any night which is quite unusual now for new Ethiopian Orla. During the day we also had workshops and sessions. There was a lot about the security situation here, there are still a lot of problems and people have seen horrific things in their placements and there is a lot of tension at the boarder so we are all braced for the worst but we don’t know what will happen. I hope it won’t get too bad, on the one hand no one should be oppressed in the way the Government oppresses people here but at the same time a war or trouble will cause so much damage here and Ethiopian people really need a break they can’t afford any more fighting. Anyway it is a complex situation especially as essentially we work for the Government here so that presents its own difficulties. Some of the NGO’s who publicly condemned what happened have been warned that any more complaints and they will be expelled. So you never know I could be home earlier than expected but I really hope not!

So, I am back in Dessie now for another week of workshops and then on Friday I will head back to Addis (by road this time) to meet James and Susan. One of the VSO in Addis is having a Christmas eve party so we will attend that and then fly back to Dessie where we will have our own Christmas party here. During the following week we plan to go to Lalibella for a few days to visit the rock churches there so I am looking forward to all that.

So Merry Christmas everyone, enjoy the last week of work and enjoy the festivities next weekend. I’ll miss the usual Christmas eve fun in Skerries and of course I will miss being at home with my family Christmas day, but I am really glad I will be with friends here anyway and it will be a different Christmas but one I am really looking forward too.

Nollaig Shona