Ethiopia

Writing this from the Ethiopian airport in Addis Ababa 

Ethiopia was never in our plans and I actually actively avoided routing through it because of the horror stories I’d read about the airport and Ethiopia airlines.  Well, they were all true! The airport is badly designed in a few ways… for instance there are 2 security checkpoints and no food/drinks/anything after security point number 2… Of course you are only told this after you’ve bought an overpriced water thinking the first checkpoint was the only one… Oh well, live and learn.  Let’s talk about the 8 hour flight… Let’s say, the passengers were very helpful to one another, the 4 stewards for this giant plane not so much!  It seems like in a lot of ways ” anything goes in. Africa” I’ve never seen passengers grab their bags from overhead before landing, or be allowed to play African pop music loud enough to hear 5 rows away.  Etc etc

We made it tho, and all in all, it wasn’t bad, just different. I think our impression is aided particularly because we were all exhausted and slept; other than when they flipped the lights on to feed us twice

We arranged a quick tour of Addis Ababa with a local agent in advance and because we were laying over 10 hours Ethiopian took care of our visas, (and paid for a hotel we didn’t use) YAY!

Teddy our private tour guide was amazing for the day!

We visited the ethnilogical museum as well as the holy trinity cathedral and the national museum.  The ethnilogical museum has the remains of “Lucy” (the oldest dated human remains.  As well as lots of other fossils from homo species, dating back to 7 million years ago!

The trinity cathedral was really interesting because I honestly had no idea that the majority of Ethiopians were Christians.  We also went in the original Orthodox Church that is attached, it was built in the 1800’s(ish)

I also didn’t realize Ethiopia had such a rich history of fighting with the Italians (including world war 2)

Since we’d learned how they make injera We choose to eat a traditional Ethiopian lunch with our tour guide Teddy.  I liked it, it’s served family style in a huge basket table thing the bottom is injera bread and on top is different meats as well as a cheese and cabbage (traditionally they eat raw beef as well, we passed on that). It’s eaten with your hands, no forks.  All was good for the girls till Ashley asked what one of the meats was and the answer was “sheep” I can’t believe Ashley broke rule number one of crazy local food.  If you’ve already tried it, NEVER ask what it is!

Afterwards Teddy led us through chola market, it’s not “merkato” which is huge and we didn’t have time for because of a traffic jam… That’s a funny story too but you’ll have to ask me in person

The market was crazy and having been through several Asian markets already, we were surprised by the friendly non pushy ness of it.  Of course we were in tow with Teddy but, I doubt that mattered.  Watching them smelt silver and gold as well as husk garlic and other vegetables was interesting.  All the grains, spices, chickens, etc etc are local and all processed by hand as 85% of the population are farmers.  I hope the go pro video turns out!

We saw 10-20 story buildings being built with wooden scaffolds held together with nails and rope! Simply crazy!

I had literally 0 expectations about Ethiopia but, after visiting, I think it’s safe to say they were surpassed! It was a very interesting place with a proud, devout people.  They seemed friendlier than the average we’ve seen.  If it wasn’t for the airport/airlines I’d have no problem recommending a visit to others! 
On our way to Kenya 

Some pictures from the cathedral