After the first week of culture shock, I’d say this past week has been all about familiarity. We have gotten settled into our apartment, explored the neighborhood, and, most importantly, established a group of 25 or so core students who consistently show up to class prepared and ready to participate. We were disappointed that the class wasn’t as large as we’d expected the first day, but having an engaged and comfortable group of students is nothing to scoff at.
Having done most of the tourist activities within city limits, we turned our view beyond Addis Ababa this week. We took a day trip out to Entoto, a small mountain on the northern edge of the city promising excellent views of Addis. Even the hour-long drive to the site took us through regions of Addis we had never knew existed. Once we left the city limits, we saw things we’d never thought would exist so close to the city: dense forests, lush fields, and women carrying what could easily be one hundred pounds of twigs on their backs downhill.
Entoto proved to be a surprise to me: not only was it a small mountain, but there was a small village atop the hill complete with a completely restored royal palace. The view of Addis Ababa was still spectacular, allowing us to see the entire city all in one view. What it also revealed was the dense smog covering the city, which I attribute mainly to the thousands of minibuses zipping through the streets.
Turning away from the view and the guide-led palace tours, the most memorable part of the trip was in the village atop Entoto. Ethan had the foresight to bring a Frisbee along in his backpack, and we found an area of the village along the main road where we could toss it around, as we figured we had some time to spare before having to head back to the city. Slowly, like snow collecting on a window ledge, children walked up to us and joined the game. Some of them tried to throw it vertically or like a baseball. But they had fun while they were doing it, and so did we. Despite us being where we were (our impromptu game was interrupted by a farmer and his bull at one point), it felt familiar. The breaks we took to allow the minibus to zoom past us was not unlike how we had to move the hockey nets off suburban streets in the middle of a game of pick-up street hockey during the summer.
At the end of our game, we gave the group of children the Frisbee, though in hindsight I wish I’d learned how to say “share this” in Amharic. I’m not sure if our hand gestures communicated our intentions. But this experience mirrored what I’ve felt all week: that despite all the differences, I can still see similarities between my life in Canada and my experience here in Ethiopia. And with that comforting thought, we’ll keep trying to push the boundaries of our comfort zones so that we thoroughly experience Ethiopia.
Ethan,
Kyle,
Alex,
Justin