Saturday 24th September 2011
Sometimes you get days that seem to go on forever. Today has been one such day, partly to do with having to get up at 5:30am. Paul called the airport to find out about his luggage and got no reply so we decided to go and see if the bags had arrived anyway. We spent 20 minutes waiting for the girl to finally come and tell us that one of the bags should have been there yesterday and the other would arrive later.
Paul got angry, I went to look for the one that arrived yesterday. It wasn’t around and it was only by chance that after rummaging through every piece of luggage but our own that I happened to hear the conveyer belt start and spotted not one, but both of the missing cases. Great that we found them but slightly disconcerting that the airline and airport didn’t actually know where the luggage was.
Anyway, off we set on our 4 hour drive to Hosanna. I have to say I’ve really been looking forward to this. Ethiopia is known as the garden of Africa, which is hard to imagine as we only ever see the pictures of drought and famine on the news. Half of Ethiopia, the north and west mainly, is a green and mountainous region, Bole International Airport is 2,200 metres above sea level, and being so high gives the land a wetter climate that the much lower lying eastern and southern areas of the country.
Once out of Addis the scenery was quite stunning, stunning enough in fact to distract me from feeling like a sardine in the back of the pick-up. And there were people walking, carrying things, pushing things, herding things, even though we were in what seemed like the middle of nowhere. It was rather bizarre.
We arrived in Hosanna just after midday and went straight to the preschool where we were mobbed by some very excited children. Abyot, the young pastor who runs the preschool rescued us and showed us into the school grounds where we were mobbed again.
There’s something infectious about a kid’s smile that makes any amount of travelling worth the miles. And these children were infectious. Any plans we’d had about filming, for the time being were out of the window while we played, took pictures, tried unsuccessfully to speak Amharic and laughed.
We’d also bought with us two cases of clothing, new t-shirts donated by the Church of Christ The King School in Coventry and Kifle had some other supplies that needed unloading. We dropped these off and made our way to the guesthouse.
After an hours rest where I spent my time bird watching in the garden – they have some amazing birds – we headed off to the house of one of the school children to interview him. Sintayehu is 8 years old and lives in a small one roomed house with his mother and 2 sisters. His father died from an Aids related illness and his mother is also HIV positive. After telling me he wanted to be an aeroplane pilot, he showed me the kitchen – a covered area in the yard with a fire pit, and the pit latrine – a hole covered with strips of wood. One of the projects Kifle is promoting is educating families how to build effective pit latrines. Dug to shallow they fill to quickly and don’t allow time for the waste to soak away, increasing the risk of disease. They also encourage people to put a roof or cover over the pit to stop rain from filling it and creating the same problem.
I felt very humbled talking with Sintayehu. He’s grateful for simple things and with the help of the school he has hope for the future. Before we left he sang us a beautiful song. I have no idea what the words were but it was a very special moment.
We left and joined Kifle, Abyot and Solomon, the church co-ordinator, and headed to the Lamma International Hotel. The menu featured some amazing choices including roast chicken, beef goulash, burger and fries – unfortunately none of these were available. We could have spaghetti with meat or vegetables, rice with beef or vegetables or plain omelette. We saw a man on another table eating injera so decided to go for that with a bowl of beef wot. I never thought I’d say it but thank goodness for Pepsi.
