well it's my last saturday in lalibela, which is sad! i'm happy to be going home for christmas and to see my family, but i really love my life here and will miss the kids and staff tremendously!!
we have all been very busy here, we started our gardens last week and the kids and ayatil have really embraced the whole project. they all selected a couple of garden beds each and dug them all up by hand themselves, even the girls. the girls were lucky to find around 20 potatoes in their garden beds, leftover from the previous occupiers gardens. i helped them boil them all up and they had a very yummy feast of potatoes and salt, which they were pretty chuffed about! every morning at 6am they wake me up when they fill their watering cans and empty oil bottles outside my window, but i don't mind because i like seeing them so enthusiastic about watering their own little plots of earth :)
we also started a compost heap the other day, so hopefully we shall have some good compost by the time i come back.
oh! we acquired a new family member today! two, actually. we had been looking for a pregnant goat or goat with a kid because we want to start getting some milk, but all the goats we had priced were very expensive. so we were putting it off until we had the money- we don't even have a refrigerator yet due to lack of funds, so a goat was not high up the list of priorities.. but today the perfect goat kind of fell into our laps, so we had to buy it! S's brother buys a live goat for his family every saturday and today he bought a particularly fat goat thinking it would have alot of meat. however, when he took it to the butcher to have it slaughtered, they told him it was pregnant and they didn't want to kill it as it was due to have the baby anytime now. somehow he knew that we were looking for such a goat and long story short, we now have a pregnant goat at 1/4 of the price we otherwise would have paid! we named the goat valerie and the kids are all very excited about the new addition to the family and i think ayatil is secretly thrilled too, being a country guy. we had a photo shoot this afternoon and i am looking forward to coming home so i can post some pictures finally!
apart from agriculture, things are fine. there was no school yesterday and seems that when the kids aren't occupied, they fight like brothers and sisters.. and it always happens when im home and S isn't so i have no idea who the culprit is and usually comfort the wrong kid only to find out later that i had things backwards and was hugging the naughty kid and seding the wrong child to their room.. but it all works outn in the end. last night ayatil organised a meeting in the boys room with all the kids and he was giving them good avice about how to act decently. S and i spied on them through the window and it was very cute! he's so good with them all, and they all adore him.
ok must go
x
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Monday, November 23, 2009
the bright side
I had one afternoon of mild despair the other day when I last updated, mainly worried that I won't be able to sustain this project financially and everything seemed hopeless, but then I walked back up the hill to home and picked up both babies and i just knew that no matter what, I will make this work. I believe there are good people out there in this world who will help me sustain this, even if i can't do it all myself. So i'm just taking it as it comes. for now we have our little house rented for 3 months and the wages of our guard and cook and caregiver paid and we have food in our kitchen and most of all, we have big plans. and to me, that is the most important part because without big dreams and plans and hopes, none of this would be happening. but as it stands, i HAVE opened an orphanage, i HAVE given 10 children a family and clothes and a warm bed and food in their tummies and hope for a better future.
S and I have talked it over and we think the next step for the orphanage is to buy a 4wd van. it would serve many purposes. it would mean that during the day when S has nothing to do, he can either use the van as an airport shuttle (there's no public transport in lali, so it's the only way to get to town) or he can take tourists to the outlying rock hewn churches since he is a licensed guide. either way we estimate that we could earn enough income from a van to pay for at least a good portion of our daily expenses. the other good part about owning a van would be that it would save us alot of money with our flying to and from addis, and it would also mean that we would be able to drive the kids to dessie for things like dentists as we already know we need to make at least a couple of trips there. abraham may need glasses and temesgen really needs to go to a dentist and we need to buy a refrigerator which can only come from dessie etc. so a van is our first funraising goal. S estimates we need around 10,000 to buy a 4wd van that would fulfill all our needs, so when i get back to australia, that's what i will be trying to raise money for!
in the meantime, things here are going well, S managed to fix the bath yesterday so hopefully i will be able to have a warm trickle of a shower later! Hillary's darrohea is a bit better, our nanny is still tying rough scarves around hillary as a nappy of a nighttime and is still having to wash her at least once a night, but it's better than it was. ytinet has really warmed to me and only comes to me for comfort, which is very different to the early days when she would scream at the sight of me!! hillary is still S's girl and cries for him whenever he leaves the house. she eats nonstop and at the rate she is going will make a first class sumo wrestler. she's such a darling though, very sweet.
the sisters gabbayew and aesrasa have been fighting a bit lately and gashaw was in trouble for kicking today, but all of the got time outs and are behaving much better now. gashaw thought we were going to send him away though and was truly devastated, but we assured him that although we would send him to his room if he was naughty again, we weren't just going to send him away! poor kid came from a pretty terrible place, so its no wonder he was devastated. gashaw's parents are both dead and he was living in a truly horrible room with his deaf mute sister. the place he lived in was truly apalling and there is no way i would send him back to that life because it was pretty miserable.
our guard walked to his village yesterday for materials because we are building a chicken coop tomorrow and starting our permaculture gardens as well which is good! ayatil is a farmer when he's not working as a guard, so he is excited to have something constructive to do. im glad we will have a better supply of eggs as one of our kids in particular needs all the protein he can get as he has pretty severe kwashiorkor disease and looks about 9 months pregnant.
xxx
S and I have talked it over and we think the next step for the orphanage is to buy a 4wd van. it would serve many purposes. it would mean that during the day when S has nothing to do, he can either use the van as an airport shuttle (there's no public transport in lali, so it's the only way to get to town) or he can take tourists to the outlying rock hewn churches since he is a licensed guide. either way we estimate that we could earn enough income from a van to pay for at least a good portion of our daily expenses. the other good part about owning a van would be that it would save us alot of money with our flying to and from addis, and it would also mean that we would be able to drive the kids to dessie for things like dentists as we already know we need to make at least a couple of trips there. abraham may need glasses and temesgen really needs to go to a dentist and we need to buy a refrigerator which can only come from dessie etc. so a van is our first funraising goal. S estimates we need around 10,000 to buy a 4wd van that would fulfill all our needs, so when i get back to australia, that's what i will be trying to raise money for!
in the meantime, things here are going well, S managed to fix the bath yesterday so hopefully i will be able to have a warm trickle of a shower later! Hillary's darrohea is a bit better, our nanny is still tying rough scarves around hillary as a nappy of a nighttime and is still having to wash her at least once a night, but it's better than it was. ytinet has really warmed to me and only comes to me for comfort, which is very different to the early days when she would scream at the sight of me!! hillary is still S's girl and cries for him whenever he leaves the house. she eats nonstop and at the rate she is going will make a first class sumo wrestler. she's such a darling though, very sweet.
the sisters gabbayew and aesrasa have been fighting a bit lately and gashaw was in trouble for kicking today, but all of the got time outs and are behaving much better now. gashaw thought we were going to send him away though and was truly devastated, but we assured him that although we would send him to his room if he was naughty again, we weren't just going to send him away! poor kid came from a pretty terrible place, so its no wonder he was devastated. gashaw's parents are both dead and he was living in a truly horrible room with his deaf mute sister. the place he lived in was truly apalling and there is no way i would send him back to that life because it was pretty miserable.
our guard walked to his village yesterday for materials because we are building a chicken coop tomorrow and starting our permaculture gardens as well which is good! ayatil is a farmer when he's not working as a guard, so he is excited to have something constructive to do. im glad we will have a better supply of eggs as one of our kids in particular needs all the protein he can get as he has pretty severe kwashiorkor disease and looks about 9 months pregnant.
xxx
Saturday, November 21, 2009
still here but bleeding ethiopian birr
Alot has been going on here in sunny lalibela. The kids are getting settled into routines now, but they are also getting more familiar with us which is both good and bad. i love that they have all pretty much taken me on as mama, but you have to take the good along with the bad and the last few days they haven't been on their best behaviour. of course they dont speak much english, so most of it goes over my head but then S comes home and i find out they've been bad. nothing too terrible, just name calling and disobediance and it's stuff that we're getting on top of now that good behaviour reward systems etc have been introduced. but it's been a long past few days.
it kinda seems like it never rains but it pours here. everything broke down at once, hillary got a nasty eye infection and her diarrohea got alot worse, the babies somehow managed to dismantle part of the sink in the kitchen so we couldnt use it, the bath wouldn't drain, the kids broke one of the light switches, the lights in angelini's house wouldnt work and then we heard news that both of the babies mothers had cleared out of town. we went to investigate that yesterday and indeed they have left and noone knows where to. i'm sad for the babies as it means loss of contact with their birth mothers, but im hopeful they will resurface at some point. it means ive taken on the role of mama for real with them though and it's funny timing because all of a sudden, the babies really have adopted me as mama and only come to me for comfort whereas before they would go to S, and ytinet was terrified of me.
but anyways, we got the electrician and plumber in yesterday and got the house stuff sorted and were able to move our guard into the downstairs of angelini's and S moved his stuff upstairs. of course today the kids all decided to take baths despite our alternate day policy and surprise, surprise, the bath is now broken again.
but it's ok, i have faith things will work out. these are all just teething problems and at the end of the day, i take comfort in the fact that these kids now have a family and i will do everything in my power to make sure they can continue as such. it's saturday today and every saturday so far there has been at least one meltdown because on sundays the kids who have extended family here in lalibela go and visit them after church. there are 3 kids though who have literally no family left at all and when the others go to visit their aunts/uncles etc there are always a few tears. so tomorrow we will take those 3 (abraham, winesnet and turet) and go do something nice with them.
ok well someone is waiting for the internet so i shall have to go
xx
it kinda seems like it never rains but it pours here. everything broke down at once, hillary got a nasty eye infection and her diarrohea got alot worse, the babies somehow managed to dismantle part of the sink in the kitchen so we couldnt use it, the bath wouldn't drain, the kids broke one of the light switches, the lights in angelini's house wouldnt work and then we heard news that both of the babies mothers had cleared out of town. we went to investigate that yesterday and indeed they have left and noone knows where to. i'm sad for the babies as it means loss of contact with their birth mothers, but im hopeful they will resurface at some point. it means ive taken on the role of mama for real with them though and it's funny timing because all of a sudden, the babies really have adopted me as mama and only come to me for comfort whereas before they would go to S, and ytinet was terrified of me.
but anyways, we got the electrician and plumber in yesterday and got the house stuff sorted and were able to move our guard into the downstairs of angelini's and S moved his stuff upstairs. of course today the kids all decided to take baths despite our alternate day policy and surprise, surprise, the bath is now broken again.
but it's ok, i have faith things will work out. these are all just teething problems and at the end of the day, i take comfort in the fact that these kids now have a family and i will do everything in my power to make sure they can continue as such. it's saturday today and every saturday so far there has been at least one meltdown because on sundays the kids who have extended family here in lalibela go and visit them after church. there are 3 kids though who have literally no family left at all and when the others go to visit their aunts/uncles etc there are always a few tears. so tomorrow we will take those 3 (abraham, winesnet and turet) and go do something nice with them.
ok well someone is waiting for the internet so i shall have to go
xx
Friday, November 13, 2009
Hi again from Lalibela!
I have been quite sick lately and unable to update this blog, sorry about that! Alot has been happening here meanwhile!!
We finally found a house we were able to rent, there was some difficulty locating an appropriate place as alot of places were reluctant to give out long leases as it is coming up to christmas and Lalibela is a bit of a mecca, so the owners know that they will make more money if they rent there buildings short term over christmas in the peak season. finally we found the perfect place- it's known as 'the palace' as it was built for king Haile Selassie's daughter. It's really just a lovely ramshackle old wooden house, but with the most glorious view i've ever seen! The house is perched right above the town on it's own little hill. There are actually two houses- the wooden main house and next to it; a two storey traditional stone tukul which is going to house our guard upstairs and a traditional kitchen downstairs since our cook- habtum prefers her charcoal stove to the electric one we bought with us from addis!
we spent the first day or two cleaning up and getting beds organised, buying more blankets etc and then the next day we spent walking around the villages meeting families who were housing orphans and it seemed that every person we talked to knew of another poor little waif who needed care and it got to the point where we took in 10 kids rather than our original planned 6. after that we had to say no and even now 5 days later, word is still going around the villages that there is a new orphanage opening in lalibela and we are getting approached by people multiple times a day asking us to take children. it's hard to say no to them but even if i wanted to take them in, i cannot. We sat down with the administrator (mayor) of lalibela yesterday and he said that whilst we can continue as we are until we get an official license, we can't take in any more kids. The kebele will like to have a hand in assigning the kids in the future, which i expected. so for now, our little family shall remain 10.
As for the kids themselves, they are:
Terut- 15 a boy who was living on the street and who has no family here. he's the sweetest 15 year old i've ever met, very much the protector of the family!
Abraham- 13 an orphan who was also homeless, he was staying with different friends before we took him in
Temesgen- 13 not an orphan but from a very poor family and was spending most of his time on the streets also
Gashaw- 11 an orphan, was living with his deaf sister who was very very poor
Bereket- 8 an orphan who was emaciated and living with his elderly grandmother. his family begged us to take him as they could not afford to feed him
Aesrasa and Gabayew -10 and 8 are sisters that are orphans and who were living with their very poor uncle. i met them last time i was in lalibela and was very happy to take them in as i knew their situation beforehand
wenisnet- 11 a homeless orphan. a local restaurant owner begges us to take her as she had noone and the local restaurants had been feeding her. she is very very sweet but quiet, very much a survivor
the babies are ytinet and hilary- 17months and 2 years today. daughters of local prostitutes, they are not orphans, but were very neglected so their mothers very happily placed them in our care. prior to living with us, the babies were left every night to cry alone in their rooms while their mothers worked. Ytinet is quite sickly, hilary is in better health. both have flu and chronic diarrohea and ytinet fits 00 clothes or 6-9 month old clothes while hilary is more the size of an 18month old. they are both walking and talking a little bit, but are very small for their age.
so far they all get along very well, they all walk to school together and come home together and play nicely and it is just amazing to see them smiling and laughing as they were a very solemn bunch the first day i met them!
I'm learning alot here in lalibela- the kids are very much habesha and reject alot of my western ways, especially my food haha. the first night before our cook started, i made them pasta with bolognaise sauce and they all ran to the bathroom and washed off the sauce in the sink! they didn't eat the pasta either! i also tried to give them peanut butter to eat on their bread for breakfast but they rejected that too telling me it was 'kaka' or yukky, instead they prefer to tear chunks of bread and dip it into black tea, which i find very strange. so i eat my bread with peanut butter and drink my tea with milk and they have their plain bread dipped in black tea and we agree that never the twain shall meet!
i've also never met cleaner ethiopians, they would happily bathe 5 times a day if i let them! to begin with i was a little more lax, but now i am getting tired of cleaning the bathroom a million times a day so we have set restrictions on bath time, much to their dismay :)
ok well i must go, ive tied the internet up too long!
x
--
Here's a sigh to those who love me, and a smile to those who hate, and whatever sky's above me, here's a heart for every fate.
- Lord Byron
I have been quite sick lately and unable to update this blog, sorry about that! Alot has been happening here meanwhile!!
We finally found a house we were able to rent, there was some difficulty locating an appropriate place as alot of places were reluctant to give out long leases as it is coming up to christmas and Lalibela is a bit of a mecca, so the owners know that they will make more money if they rent there buildings short term over christmas in the peak season. finally we found the perfect place- it's known as 'the palace' as it was built for king Haile Selassie's daughter. It's really just a lovely ramshackle old wooden house, but with the most glorious view i've ever seen! The house is perched right above the town on it's own little hill. There are actually two houses- the wooden main house and next to it; a two storey traditional stone tukul which is going to house our guard upstairs and a traditional kitchen downstairs since our cook- habtum prefers her charcoal stove to the electric one we bought with us from addis!
we spent the first day or two cleaning up and getting beds organised, buying more blankets etc and then the next day we spent walking around the villages meeting families who were housing orphans and it seemed that every person we talked to knew of another poor little waif who needed care and it got to the point where we took in 10 kids rather than our original planned 6. after that we had to say no and even now 5 days later, word is still going around the villages that there is a new orphanage opening in lalibela and we are getting approached by people multiple times a day asking us to take children. it's hard to say no to them but even if i wanted to take them in, i cannot. We sat down with the administrator (mayor) of lalibela yesterday and he said that whilst we can continue as we are until we get an official license, we can't take in any more kids. The kebele will like to have a hand in assigning the kids in the future, which i expected. so for now, our little family shall remain 10.
As for the kids themselves, they are:
Terut- 15 a boy who was living on the street and who has no family here. he's the sweetest 15 year old i've ever met, very much the protector of the family!
Abraham- 13 an orphan who was also homeless, he was staying with different friends before we took him in
Temesgen- 13 not an orphan but from a very poor family and was spending most of his time on the streets also
Gashaw- 11 an orphan, was living with his deaf sister who was very very poor
Bereket- 8 an orphan who was emaciated and living with his elderly grandmother. his family begged us to take him as they could not afford to feed him
Aesrasa and Gabayew -10 and 8 are sisters that are orphans and who were living with their very poor uncle. i met them last time i was in lalibela and was very happy to take them in as i knew their situation beforehand
wenisnet- 11 a homeless orphan. a local restaurant owner begges us to take her as she had noone and the local restaurants had been feeding her. she is very very sweet but quiet, very much a survivor
the babies are ytinet and hilary- 17months and 2 years today. daughters of local prostitutes, they are not orphans, but were very neglected so their mothers very happily placed them in our care. prior to living with us, the babies were left every night to cry alone in their rooms while their mothers worked. Ytinet is quite sickly, hilary is in better health. both have flu and chronic diarrohea and ytinet fits 00 clothes or 6-9 month old clothes while hilary is more the size of an 18month old. they are both walking and talking a little bit, but are very small for their age.
so far they all get along very well, they all walk to school together and come home together and play nicely and it is just amazing to see them smiling and laughing as they were a very solemn bunch the first day i met them!
I'm learning alot here in lalibela- the kids are very much habesha and reject alot of my western ways, especially my food haha. the first night before our cook started, i made them pasta with bolognaise sauce and they all ran to the bathroom and washed off the sauce in the sink! they didn't eat the pasta either! i also tried to give them peanut butter to eat on their bread for breakfast but they rejected that too telling me it was 'kaka' or yukky, instead they prefer to tear chunks of bread and dip it into black tea, which i find very strange. so i eat my bread with peanut butter and drink my tea with milk and they have their plain bread dipped in black tea and we agree that never the twain shall meet!
i've also never met cleaner ethiopians, they would happily bathe 5 times a day if i let them! to begin with i was a little more lax, but now i am getting tired of cleaning the bathroom a million times a day so we have set restrictions on bath time, much to their dismay :)
ok well i must go, ive tied the internet up too long!
x
--
Here's a sigh to those who love me, and a smile to those who hate, and whatever sky's above me, here's a heart for every fate.
- Lord Byron
Thursday, November 5, 2009
lalibela finally!
Well as you can probably guess from the title of this post, I'm in lalibela at long last! I arrived in Addis on Monday, S picked me up from the airport. he hired his friends car for 2 days which was a blessing because it was cheaper than taking taxis everywhere and meant we could go wherever we wanted and we needed to visit a few places in order to buy the things we wanted to take with us to lalibela. so that was great! we didn't do alot on monday evening, by the time we found a nice guest house (Da Liz Guesthouse) run by a very nice ethiopian couple from Boston, got settled and had a bite to eat, there was only enough time to go to the piazza area to price up some mattresses. We bought 10 mattresses at 160 birr or around $14 each, alot cheaper than i expected! I went to bed pretty early that night (actually i think it was still daylight) becaue i was pretty jetlagged. tuesday was a full day of shopping. we had to go back and pick up the mattresses and transport them back to my hotel room which was fortunately very large! we tied the 10 matresses to the roof of a taxi, squished them into my room and then went to the mercato (the largest market in africa) and haggled over sets of sheets, pillow cases, towels, a stove and bag to carry everything. then it was off to the supermarket to buy other essentials like cleaning products, milk powder, oats, some food stuffs that you cant buy in lalibela etc.
wednesday was up bright and early- and by that i mean not very bright, but very very early. S was at my guest house by 3:30 with a taxi and since ethiopian tme runs on a different system to european time, i thought he said 4:30 and so i wasnt reasdy and it was a big rush to shove stuff into my bags which meant that i was very unorganised and didn't think to put overnight stuff in the bags i was carrying onto the bus. which come into play a bit later..
so we got to the bus station and waited there for a good 2 hours along with a million ethiopians and eventually left at 6:30 on a very dirty, pretty crowded bus. there was noone standing or anything, but every seat was taken. so it was not exactly a comfortable trip. it was definately an experience though! it was great to experience travel the way that ethiopians do- rather than the nice short 1 hour plane trip i would otherwie have takn to lalibela. the days on the bus started out freezing cold, then got a little warmer until the sun came out and then it was boiling hot and stifling on the bus because ethiopians have a fear of fresh air and all of the windows are wired shut. so by the end of the day your bum and back are killing and you can barely breathe. i was pretty concerned about the toilet issue too because as my family know, i hav the bladder of a gnat. well i was relieved when we stopped after a couple of hours and s told me it was for a toilet break. that was until i jumped off the bus eagerly and discovered that by 'toilet' he meant a stand of very thin eucalypts. everyone was in the same boat, but still.. peeing in public takes a bit to get used to!! and that was only the start of my ethiopian public toilet education. by now, i can go anywhere. yesterday i went in a dark mud hut that was just a dirt hole.. gemma would have been horrified haha
enough about toilets though..
we stayed overnight in a place called dessie. it has a few large modern buildings but the roads are under construction so it was very very dusty and dirty. the nice motel was booked out, so we got 2 rooms at the next best option- the lalibela hotel. i was hanging out for a shower, but there were no towels and mine was on top of the bus along with my clothes so i settled for a wet wipe and dry shampoo- luckily i couldnt fit my toiletry bag in my backpack, so it was in my carry on! we met up with some of s's friends and priced refridgerators becaue you cant get them in lali. we found a small samsung that was pretty reasonable for $200 and organised to have it picked up sometime this week. we went to dinner with s's friend at the blue nile restaurat which was very nice- it was a fasting day so it was all vegetarian. did a bit more shopping as s had a bunch of requests from ppl in lalibela for gin and oranges and phones etc.
had an early night as had to be up by 4 again next morning for bus. i was devastated my sleeping bag was still on the bus becaus the motel was not very clean and i had no option bnut to sleep in the dirty sheets and just my luck- it was freezing and i had to cuddle up to them. but i survived and made it to lalibela yesterday afternoon and was able to get a room at the sven olives hotel again. of course my shower didn't work- they never do- but the manager found me a shower in another room that had a lukewarm trickle, so i made the most of it and washed my hair. felt a million times better once clean and in fresh clothes! i wouldn't take the bus again if given the option because it was verrry long etc but am really glad i did it at least once. the scenery was beautiful, ethiopia is very mountainous and it was fun stopping in at small villages for lunch etc or just slowing down so that villagers could quickly jump on and sell kolo (roasted grains like barley) or sugarcane for snacks.
last night in lali i had a lovely dinner with s at the hotel, laughed myself silly at his pronunciation of words like thick and silver and he taught me how to call a cat in ethiopia. there was a cat at the restaurant and i was calling puss puss or pss pssss and it totally ignored me, but he called brrrrrr and the damn thing came running!
slept very well last night all snug in my sleeping bag and am now waiting to go look at houses to rent this morning. we have 3 bunk beds being made up today as well. will update again with a rented house, hopefully!
there are alot of farenjis in lali at the moment (foreigners, tourists) and it's funny but i dont feel like a tourist this time around. all the hotel staff remembered me from last time, which i didn't expect!
okay well i should go have some breakfast. love to all xx
wednesday was up bright and early- and by that i mean not very bright, but very very early. S was at my guest house by 3:30 with a taxi and since ethiopian tme runs on a different system to european time, i thought he said 4:30 and so i wasnt reasdy and it was a big rush to shove stuff into my bags which meant that i was very unorganised and didn't think to put overnight stuff in the bags i was carrying onto the bus. which come into play a bit later..
so we got to the bus station and waited there for a good 2 hours along with a million ethiopians and eventually left at 6:30 on a very dirty, pretty crowded bus. there was noone standing or anything, but every seat was taken. so it was not exactly a comfortable trip. it was definately an experience though! it was great to experience travel the way that ethiopians do- rather than the nice short 1 hour plane trip i would otherwie have takn to lalibela. the days on the bus started out freezing cold, then got a little warmer until the sun came out and then it was boiling hot and stifling on the bus because ethiopians have a fear of fresh air and all of the windows are wired shut. so by the end of the day your bum and back are killing and you can barely breathe. i was pretty concerned about the toilet issue too because as my family know, i hav the bladder of a gnat. well i was relieved when we stopped after a couple of hours and s told me it was for a toilet break. that was until i jumped off the bus eagerly and discovered that by 'toilet' he meant a stand of very thin eucalypts. everyone was in the same boat, but still.. peeing in public takes a bit to get used to!! and that was only the start of my ethiopian public toilet education. by now, i can go anywhere. yesterday i went in a dark mud hut that was just a dirt hole.. gemma would have been horrified haha
enough about toilets though..
we stayed overnight in a place called dessie. it has a few large modern buildings but the roads are under construction so it was very very dusty and dirty. the nice motel was booked out, so we got 2 rooms at the next best option- the lalibela hotel. i was hanging out for a shower, but there were no towels and mine was on top of the bus along with my clothes so i settled for a wet wipe and dry shampoo- luckily i couldnt fit my toiletry bag in my backpack, so it was in my carry on! we met up with some of s's friends and priced refridgerators becaue you cant get them in lali. we found a small samsung that was pretty reasonable for $200 and organised to have it picked up sometime this week. we went to dinner with s's friend at the blue nile restaurat which was very nice- it was a fasting day so it was all vegetarian. did a bit more shopping as s had a bunch of requests from ppl in lalibela for gin and oranges and phones etc.
had an early night as had to be up by 4 again next morning for bus. i was devastated my sleeping bag was still on the bus becaus the motel was not very clean and i had no option bnut to sleep in the dirty sheets and just my luck- it was freezing and i had to cuddle up to them. but i survived and made it to lalibela yesterday afternoon and was able to get a room at the sven olives hotel again. of course my shower didn't work- they never do- but the manager found me a shower in another room that had a lukewarm trickle, so i made the most of it and washed my hair. felt a million times better once clean and in fresh clothes! i wouldn't take the bus again if given the option because it was verrry long etc but am really glad i did it at least once. the scenery was beautiful, ethiopia is very mountainous and it was fun stopping in at small villages for lunch etc or just slowing down so that villagers could quickly jump on and sell kolo (roasted grains like barley) or sugarcane for snacks.
last night in lali i had a lovely dinner with s at the hotel, laughed myself silly at his pronunciation of words like thick and silver and he taught me how to call a cat in ethiopia. there was a cat at the restaurant and i was calling puss puss or pss pssss and it totally ignored me, but he called brrrrrr and the damn thing came running!
slept very well last night all snug in my sleeping bag and am now waiting to go look at houses to rent this morning. we have 3 bunk beds being made up today as well. will update again with a rented house, hopefully!
there are alot of farenjis in lali at the moment (foreigners, tourists) and it's funny but i dont feel like a tourist this time around. all the hotel staff remembered me from last time, which i didn't expect!
okay well i should go have some breakfast. love to all xx
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