After my last post, I spent a couple of days in Addis Ababa before heading north to Lalibela to see the famous rock-cut monolithic churches. The road from Addis Ababa to Lalibela was under construction, and apart from a few paved sections, it was mostly a maze of work sites. All the engineers were Chinese. The route wound up and down the mountains along dizzying cliffs, so even short distances took hours.
Traveling in Ethiopia is still a pleasure, thanks to the stunning landscapes along the way. The highlands stretch endlessly across the horizon in an immense expanse. Around Addis Ababa, the vegetation is lush, but as you head north, everything becomes arid. What impresses the most are the completely dried-up riverbeds, with majestic bridges spanning them, yet below there isn’t even a trickle of water.
For some reason, Ethiopian buses never travel at night. Before evening, they stop somewhere and then set off again at 5 a.m. the next day. It was tough for me, since I really don’t like waking up early, but at least it had one advantage: by 5:30 a.m. at the latest, the buses were actually moving. Indeed, another thing I hadn’t mentioned yet is that, practically everywhere else in Africa, buses and minibuses only depart when they're full. For minibuses, it makes sense: after all, they’re like shared taxis, so they wait until they are full (by “full,” I mean there isn’t even room to squeeze in a pin). But with buses, it’s maddening. I mean, if a bus is supposed to leave at, say, 12 o’clock, at that exact time — like Swiss clockwork — the engine starts. The driver even revs some “vroom vroom”, and it seems about to depart. Then ten minutes pass... half an hour... an hour. After a couple of hours, you start thinking about other things. And, by the way, often you have to wait that, after all the seats are taken, also the standing space is filled with people!
The 11 churches of Lalibela are truly extraordinary and unique in the world. Instead of rising majestically upward, they are literally carved downward into the rock, so that their roofs are level with the ground. Perhaps it was done so that Muslims wouldn’t see them from afar, in fact, you can’t spot them until you’re almost right on top of them. These are truly incredible structures, built from the top down, and some churches consist of a single block of stone, without any additional materials! Lalibela was the king who commissioned their construction around 1100.
In Ethiopia, there are also many traditional dishes that are both tasty and unique. The best known is called injera, a kind of soft, spongy bread that serves as a base for other foods on top, like curry and vegetables. You don’t use a fork or spoon, pieces of injera are torn off and used to scoop up the food.
Another typical dish consists of small pieces of meat with onion and chili served on a sizzling hot plate. Then there’s one I didn’t dare try because it’s a bit shocking: raw beef. It’s cut directly from the animal and eaten with chili.
As I said that German colonialism brought only one good thing to Namibia —the Windhoek beer— so in the case of Ethiopia, we Italians can say that we brought just one positive thing: the espresso machine, a real rarity in the rest of Africa. Even the smallest cafés have one, although I usually went for the ‘sprizz’, a mix of coffee and tea with a playful, interesting taste. Often, I would go to drink coffee in Ethiopians’ homes, what they call the ‘coffee ceremony.’ They prepare it from raw coffee beans, roasting, grinding, and finally serving it. More than anything, it’s enjoyable because it’s a way to enter people’s homes, meet the whole family, and often even get to know part of the neighborhood.
Both on the way to and from Lalibela, I stopped in a town called Dessie. It’s rather unattractive, with a long dusty main road and shacks all around. The second time, on my way back to Addis, I arrived there in the early afternoon. I was in the hotel restaurant when the waitress, Ejegaje, told me she was almost finished with her shift and asked if I wanted to go for a walk with her. And so we went out together.
First, we went to a small house where her sister and mother were, and we took part in the coffee ceremony. Almost all these little houses, everywhere in Africa, are made from a mixture of mud packed between wooden poles. Sometimes, the inside of these mud walls is covered with some kind of fabric, often stitched together from old sacks placed side by side. They usually consist of two small rooms: one serving as a living room and bedroom, and the other as a kitchen.
After three coffees, we set off for another small house, this one much farther away, inside the shantytown. There we met her brother and another mother (yes, there’s some inconsistency here, but I believe this was the biological mother). There too, we took part in the coffee ceremony, another three coffees.
Then Ejegaje stepped away for a while, and her brother dropped the usual talk about Arsenal, Inter Milan, AC Milan, Chelsea, and so on, and became serious. He said he was very happy, that he knew I was a good person who could absolutely be trusted, and that the only thing to figure out now was how soon Ejegaje could join me in Italy. There were some technical details to sort out regarding the marriage, for example, the fact that they were Orthodox and I was Catholic, but that wouldn’t be a problem. Later on, he would join us as well, perhaps in a year or so.
It’s not the first time something like this has happened to me, but this one broke all records for speed. And don’t think that in the meantime I was encouraging him or being vague: I made it very clear that there must be some misunderstanding... that it was a bit too early to be talking about these things... yes, she’s nice, but I don’t think I’m in love... and besides, I’m like this, a solitary wanderer who sees marriage as a suffocating, claustrophobic golden cage... but it was like talking to the wind. He just kept on discussing visas, plane tickets, and wedding cakes.
Anyway, it was all fine... everyone was incredibly kind, and I really had a great day in their company... and in any case, I’m still considering the offer! 😉
And I answer your obvious, predictable, eternal questions in advance: No. In the end, nothing happened with Ejegaje.
The next day, the stretch from Dessie to Addis Ababa was dramatic, a bit of a bad-luck day. First, a tire on the minibus blew out and we skidded, but luckily we didn’t end up going over the edge of the cliff. Then, after it was repaired, the minibus broke down several times and eventually for good, it wouldn’t start at all. We were stuck there for a couple of hours until a bus came to rescue us and we all got on. A few kilometers later —bam!— another tire also went flat! In the end, though, we finally reached Addis Ababa at night.
My plan at that point was to go to Djibouti, but in the end I couldn’t make it there for an absurd reason: you should know that during my last days in Ethiopia I was literally starving, not in some ‘true traveler’ way of experiencing local hardships, but because, due to a series of circumstances I won’t bore you with, I couldn’t withdraw cash from ATMs. In theory I could still use my card for payments, but in practice nobody accepted it, except, luckily, my hotel in Addis Ababa.
So, with the little cash I had left, I set off towards Djibouti, but due to a series of misfortunes I only reached the border town of Dire Dawa, where I was supposed to get my visa, late on Friday evening, when the office was already closed and I would have had to wait until Monday. Too long given the amount of cash I had left.
But it’s in moments like that that you really realise how cheap Ethiopia is: I got a room in a pretty rundown place for 3 euros, and then I bought some water and a bread roll. The bread roll cost me half a birr, that is about one-thirtieth of a euro!
On the plus side, though, it was thanks to that trip that on the way there I ended up somewhat by chance in Harar, definitely the most beautiful city I visited in Ethiopia (of course, the churches of Lalibela are a different matter, but the town of Lalibela itself is rather unattractive).
Harar is made up of small streets and narrow alleys, with pastel-coloured houses against which the bright colours of the women’s veils really stand out, and of course I had a great time taking photos. There are also various little markets, a large livestock market, and an astonishing number of mosques, if I’m not mistaken, there are more than eighty within the walls!
It’s truly a wonderful place, there’s a certain magic in the air. Rimbaud was fascinated by it and lived there for many years. And the people are incredibly friendly, the arguments after taking photos, when they asked for money and I made up excuses, were some of the funniest moments of the whole trip. Also because I knew that if I started giving money to one, I would then have had to give it to everyone else, as indeed happened afterwards.
In reality, I had heard about this city from other travellers because of another unusual attraction: at night, hyenas come out in one place, and you can feed them, if you want, even from your mouth using a stick!
Obviously, I had no intention of going there just for this, but as I said, I ended up there more or less by chance and, once there, I did in fact try this experience.
In the end, it was much more interesting than I expected. Ok, feeding them from your mouth is a bit of a tourist gimmick, but seeing them up close like that is really exciting. They’re a very large type of hyena and, although they are in fact canids, they have many features that make them resemble felines, especially their fur.
The reason why these hyenas around Harar have become friendly with humans is a mystery, and there are various legends about it. In fact, hyenas everywhere in the world generally keep their distance from humans and sometimes even attack them. But in Harar, this kind of ‘bond’ has existed for over a century, not just in the specific spot where they are fed for tourists (which would at least make sense), but throughout the whole city. As soon as darkness falls, the hyenas come to visit, nibbling here and there wherever they find something, without ever attacking people.
I noticed that they don’t even attack cats. A cat had approached while they were being fed, a bit cautious and ready to run away, but the hyenas remained completely indifferent. They only snap at each other when competing for pieces of meat. And at night... howls and cries everywhere... uuuu... uuuu... spine-chilling... don’t fall asleep tonight...
The road from Addis Ababa to Harar is paved and generally in good condition, but I saw a lot of accidents that had just happened. As I had already mentioned, I don’t understand why there are so many accidents in Africa, since people don’t actually drive badly at all, rarely do you see any reckless behaviour. On that road there were accidents involving trucks, tankers, and minibuses. I also saw a poor man who had been run over and was lying dead on the ground with his head crushed. There was no one beside him, and he had not even been covered with a sheet. All the cars were just slowing down to avoid him and then driving on. It only drew a few "oohs" of surprise from our minibus.
They stopped and searched us about ten times, especially once it was already dark. It was really exhausting, at most every half hour we were stopped, everyone had to get off, and they checked our bags.
On Sunday morning I was back in Addis Ababa, once again at the hotel that accepted card payments. I asked if they could kindly give me a bit of cash as well, charging it directly to my card as an extra expense, but they said it simply wasn’t possible: it’s illegal, etc. In any case, I had just a little money left, which I spent without worrying because I was sure the card would work the next day (for reasons I won’t go into). In the meantime, I bought my return plane ticket.
But even the next day, there was no way I could withdraw any cash. I went to several banks and even luxury hotels, but there was nothing to be done. As a last resort, I tried using a 100 Polish zloty banknote (my last job had been in Poland), worth about 20 euros, which I’d happened to find in my backpack after arriving in Africa. I had actually already tried to exchange it at the start of the trip in Mozambique and South Africa, but without success, not even on the shadiest black markets. So I asked a guy who was always hanging around the hotel, offering himself as a guide, if he could help me find someone to exchange it. We went all over the city, but nothing: no one wanted Polish zloty.
I went back to the hotel and searched through my loose change. Among various coins from half of Africa, I found 3 euros. So once again I went all over the place under the sun trying to exchange them, but since they were coins and not banknotes, no one wanted them. The whole thing also took on an even more surreal, Kafkaesque tone because, since it was illegal to exchange money, all these negotiations were happening in secret, hidden in alleys or back rooms, with constant nervous glances all around. All this just to change 3 euros in coins! Like I was moving billions through Caribbean banks. In the end, though, a guy gave me 20 birr in exchange, which is about 1 euro and 30 cents, so less than half, but I couldn’t really expect more.
A bottle of water, a small baguette, and I even managed to check my email!
The next day, hunger aside, I was starting to feel a bit light-headed, so I set off again in search of any restaurant that would accept card payments. I walked around for a long time without success, and just when I was about to give up, I tried a place called Pizza Pizza. To my great surprise, they said yes, it was fine! Thank goodness. So I finally got something to eat.
When it came time to pay, I pulled out my card and they looked at me like I was an alien. They even took it in their hands, turning it over between their fingers, and staring at it with a mix of amazement and concern, as if wondering: what on earth is this thing? It’s nice, though. But it can’t be that devilish object people talk about, the one you swipe on a machine and the payment is done… can it? In any case, it simply wasn’t an option: I had to pay in cash.
I didn’t know how to handle it. I kept saying that they had assured me it was possible in the beginning, but who knows what they had actually understood. Luckily, a pretty girl sitting at the next table took pity on me and said she would pay. That was a very sad moment for me. I mean, the other way around it could almost make sense: the Western tourist sees an Ethiopian girl next to him who might be a bit hungry but doesn’t have the money to pay, so he pays, and maybe something comes of it... that would be fine. But the other way around is really humiliating, I can assure you.
I told her that there was no way I wasn’t going to pay her back. So we went to the hotel reception, and I tried to make them understand that they absolutely had to give me some cash, especially since the next morning I had to take a taxi to the airport, and how on earth was I supposed to do that? They muttered some more about it being illegal, until finally one of them winked and said, “But at least you know...” meaning they wanted something for themselves. I told them, of course, I’d give them a tip... bastards (I didn’t actually say that last word, but I sent it straight into their brains with a look, telepathically).
And so everything was sorted out. I’m especially grateful to the girl, Rahel. She even gave me her phone number, but by then there was no time... the muzungu is leaving, back to Europe to look for work. On that note, I have a very Buddhist attitude: if I find it, good. If I don’t find it... good!
Well, the journey ends here, and so does the blog. I want to thank everyone who followed me, everyone who contributed with their comments, the African continent that embraced me so warmly, and above all its people, the Africans, who, apart from a few insignificant exceptions, always treated me like a brother and made me feel at home.
As for the photos, as in the previous post, I’ll have to share them as external albums due to censorship in Ethiopia, which blocks blogging platforms. Please use the links below to view them.
Photo Album 1.
The photo captions are in Italian. They start with some children on the journey between Kenya and Ethiopia, followed by a market in Addis Ababa, churches and people in Lalibela, Egaje and her family, and a bus in Ethiopia.
Photo Album 2
In this album, all the photos are from Harar, except the one in the minivan’s rearview mirror.
