Our weekend in Ginir

When I came back to the farm on Thurday the 28th, I told Alan we should try to go to Ginir on Saturday and take Ashreka with us so we could meet her family as I promised her we would do sometime.  I was thinking at the time I promised her that we would be going in nice Dodge pickups, but since those haven't arrived at the farm yet, we had to arrange to go in a land cruiser.  Unfortunately for us, we had to share it with four other people who also wanted to go to Ginir for two days.  We had the driver, Nahom, Ashreka, Zakir, whom we invited, Nati, an engineer trying to get back to Addis and I forgot his name, and Alan and me all in the land cruiser.  We got up at 5:00 am and trotted out to the land cruiser only to find our seats taken by three tractor drivers who were trying to hitch a ride.  Alan told them no, they weren't going with us, and they reluctantly got out.  The ride was uneventful, long, and bumpy.  Two and a half hours later we got there and I found Ginir to be about how I imagined.  Larger than Beltu, very noisy, muddy, and full of Saturday marcado shoppers. I was surprised to see how many little donkeys there were all over the place.  Some of them are used for taxis, but most for hauling wood and other goods.

  We ate breakfast first, since it was 8:00 am., at the best restaurant in town, Mana Foni (the House of Meat). We had beef tibs.  Nahom ate his beef raw.  Yuck!  BTW - has anyone noticed that Nahom loves to pose for pictures, especially when he's eating.

Then we went to the guest house, provided by Infomind, our HR company and put our stuff there.  Ashreka wanted to go shopping - she loves to buy scarves, jewelry and oranges.  Alan and I soon found ourselves running from shop to shop with Ashreka looking for scarves.

 I told her I would buy something for her baby to wear and she picked out a blue jean outfit that I knew was going to be too big, but Ashreka loved it and insisted on it.  So we got it for about  US $6.50.  Then we looked for a blanket for Zakir so he would have something to cover him at night.  I told him a couple of months ago I would get him a blanket.  Then I discovered that he was very picky about what kind of blanket.  He wanted a good blanket that wouldn't get lint in his hair.  That's a problem with people here.  If you are an Ethiopian with normal Ethiopian hair and you get a woolen felt-like blanket, in the morning when you wake up you have little fur balls in your hair because of the felting abilities of both your hair and the wool.  Zakir actually demonstrated this to me by rubbing his head on one of my woolen blankets and sure enough he got little fur balls.  So I had to get a nice acrylic blanket, but fluffy so that there would be no fur balls in Zakir's hair in the morning.  Funny, we worry about dandruff and they worry about furballs. Ashreka and I found a nice red one that I thought would do well.

Here is Zakir's beautiful new blanket.

 Then Ashreka bought a pretty white scarf which, I found out later, was so that she could tie it on my head when I went to meet her family.  It's easier to identify a woman if she's wearing a scarf also Mulims are pretty strict about married women wearing scarves, so a combination of the two probably prompted her to make sure I had a scarf on my head.  We went to lunch at a different restaurant, not as good as the first one.  Alan said he wouldn't go back there again.  Then we went to the outdoor market.  It was a bigger, better market than the one at Beltu, but more muddy because it had just rained.  They sell everything they can bring to the market in the way of fruits and vegetables, and many other items.  Here are just a few pictures of what we saw.

At first people left us alone, and we felt like we were going to be ok, but after a few minutes, we started to attract a lot of attention and we got a pretty good following of mostly young kids bothering us.

Zakir found a relative and had to get his picture with her.

 Both Zakir and Ashreka get really frustrated with people who won't leave us alone and they were trying to get us out of there, and at the same time Ashreka was looking for any family members who might have come to the market that day, so it was a hassle.  After finding her sister Fatuma and an aunt, Ashreka found that her family hadn't come to market that day, so we would have to travel out to her village, Hararle, on Sunday to meet  them. 

This is Ashreka's sister, Fatuma.

We wandered around the market a little bit more; Alan bought Zakir a knife and some sandals, and I bought Ashreka two brass rings that she fell in love with because they are golden colored and she thinks they are gold even though I told her they weren't.  She wanted me to buy her a large container of perfume, but I refused.  It was stinky.  The perfume bottle was in the shape of an oil lamp and was gold colored hard plastic with a large plastic red jewel glued on the top.  The inside was where the perfume was.  Ashreka loved it and asked if I would buy it, and then Zakir saw it and said, "Look mom, ees gold.  It ees good you buy gold."  The shop owner said, "Yes, ees real gold."  I said, "Yeah, right, sounds like real fool's gold," as I clicked on it with my fingernail.  I left the shop and Ashreka and Zakir were sure I had missed out on a sure thing.  Sometimes they are really disappointed in me. There are many shops in Ginir that get their goods from Somalia, so its all black market good and it's really cheap and comes from a lot of Oriental countries.  After we left the market, Ashreka went to visit her uncle and aunt and Zakir went to visit his brother.  Alan and I  went to visit a farm in the area, and it looked very nice and green.  They have received much more rain than we have up north in Beltu.  This is Haptamo, the owner of this farm.  Below is a picture of Nati, Haptamo, Yarid one of our tractor drivers, Nahom, and Abraham, another tractor driver from our farm.  Somehow the tractor drivers made it to Ginir in another vehicle.

 Such posers (dorks).  You could tell the tractor drivers aren't used to posing like Nati and Nahom.
We were invited to go to Haile's home and eat dinner on Saturday evening.  His wife, Tsehay, fixed tibs and spaghetti.  She was very kind and gracious, but her little boy didn't like us at all.  Haile wasn't there, he was up in Addis trying to buy a truck.  Then we went back to the guesthouse to sleep.  May I just say at this point in the story that the bathrooom was a non flushing stand/squat type latrine out in back.  Oh my goodness.  I had to get my courage up everytime I had to use it, because it was so bad.  I cried, and that was before I even went inside.  Once I was inside, I gagged pretty much until I got out.  I hate latrines!  I was so glad to leave there the next morning.  Once again we had beef tibs for breakfast at the house of meat, and then we took off to Hararle, Ashreka's village.

Walking to the farm with Ashreka's father.

 I was really happy to go and meet her family.  When we got to the place we could see her father hurriedly coming on a path to meet and show us the way to his farm.  We walked for about 10 minutes to the farm and house where Ashreka was raised. She was happy that we were coming, but at the same time she was worried about what we would think because she told me, "My family is so poor, we live in round house."  I told her I knew that, but we wanted to meet her family and we wanted to let them know how much we love her.  So we got to the house, and yes it was little and dark (no electricity at her village) but her family was so welcoming and happy that we were there that we didn't hesitate at all to go in and have a good little visit. 

 Ashreka meeting her father.

Going through the banana, mango, avocado, and papaya trees. 

They thanked us for taking care of Ashreka and loving her.  We told them that we were grateful that she was with us and helping us so much and that she was a very hard worker.  They seemed to really appreciate us and her father said that Ashreka tells them all about Alan and Shelley when she comes home to visit.  Ashreka's little girl, Karina, was not too happy with us.  She cried when I held her, and Ashreka told me that she is sick.  Ashreka dressed her in her new little jeans outfit and we took pictures with the family. 

 Greeting Ashreka's Mom. above.  Below - Zakir, Karina Ashreka's daughter, Ashreka and me.

 Inside their home.

 Ashreka, Karina in her new little blue jean outfit, and Nahom.

 Ashreka's sister Maryam, Ashreka's mother Naimaa, Ashreka, Karina, and her father Sultan.

 Karina and Ashreka.

 The whole family and a few neighbors.  The little boy in the striped outfit is Ashreka's little brother Yaasin, and the little boy next to him is Aharad.  The firl squatting is Ashreka's siter Maryam, and the little black one in the grayish polka dot outfit is another sister named Musharafa.  Others in this picture are neighbors. Below a picture of Alan  and I with the fam.

 Another picture with neighbors that came to see the visitors from America.

 I'm willing to bet that Ashreka's mother in the picture below is about 40 years old at the most and she has eight children.

 In the picture below is another little brother named Hasan.  The guy on the left came running up the road and wanted to get in our picture.  You can tell Ashreka did not know him.

Ashreka and I had made banana bread to take to her family and she cut up a loaf and passed it around.  We had to borrow Zack's new knife that Alan bought him to cut the first loaf.   We left a second loaf there with her family.  But seeing that the only cutting utensil they own is a machete, I wasn't sure how they would cut it.   No big deal, they can break it up.  After taking a few more pictures, and many Gelatomas, Thank Yous, shoulder bumps, kisses, and bowing we headed off to the land cruiser and took off for the Sof Omar caves. 

The Sof Omar caves is a big underground cavern that is very famous here in Ethiopia.  According to my guide book, the labyrinth of caverns stretches some 16km through limestone hills surrounding the Web river.  Only the first 1.7km can be explored on foot.  Luckily the walkable portion includes some remarkable formations, but unluckily, the water was very high and we only got to go in just a  hundred yards or so.  Very disappointing.  The caves have been an important religious site since ancient times and despite being greatly venerated by Muslims in the area, due to Sheikh Sof Omar reputedly taking refuge there in the early days of Islam, many pagan rites and ceremonies seem to carry on.  So when we got there, there immediately came a local guide to take us through the caves, which I didn't think we needed to have.  He said yes, we needed him and then told us through Nahom that it would cost the forenjees 150 birr each and the habeshas 25 birr each.  What a sneak!  He told us that it was the rule of Ethiopian government from Addis (that's a lie). We asked to see his license to be a guide, which he couldn't produce, and then we told him we weren't going to pay him only 50 birr per forenjee and 25 birr per habesha.  He wouldn't agree and so Alan said that we would have to leave.  We started to leave, and pretty soon the guide was running after us saying sorry, sorry, 200 birr is good.  Then he took us on the tour, and about 10 minutes later he said we couldn't go any more because the water was too high.  Wow, what a rip off! We found out from Seid later that he should have told us that he couldn't take us through the whole cavern because of the water and that the normal price for a registered guide (Which Seid is) is 50 birr each.  Seid also said that their shouldn't be a different price for forenjees and habeshas.  This country is just full of sneaks and cheaters, always trying to charge you more because you have white skin.  I think people in our country have nothing to complain about when it comes to discrimination.  Here in Ethiopia, they blatantly treat you worse if you are a forenjee, and they do it with a big smile on their faces.  That is something I cannot tolerate!

Then we went back to Ginir, picked up our purchased goods and headed home to the farm.  We had got the engineer off to Addis, but in the meantime we picked up Seid, who was on his way back to the farm from Robe where he had taken a little time off to see his family.  I was so thankful to get back to the farm.  I only say that when I've been off somewhere else that makes me more uncomfortable than I am in my own little house out in the desert wherein may be found a flushing toilet.  When we got home, I lit my jack-o-lantern and Ashreka, Zakir, Nati, and Nahom got a treat because they were the only  ones who came trick-or-treating. 

A funny little story to tell about Alan and Ashreka which happened while I was gone to Addis a couple of weeks ago.  I have taught Ashreka to make carrot cake, pancakes, and bread.  While I was gone, she was eager to display and demonstrate her cooking and baking skills.  One day, Alan said she was waiting for him to come to the house and pulled him inside and showed him two beautiful loaves of bread.

 She was so proud of herself that Alan had to take a picture of her with her bread.  Another day she made a carrot cake, but she may have taken it out too early because it fell and she was upset.  Alan said it was very moist and he and Dennis ate it and were more than happy to have it.  A little later that same day, he went out on the porch and bent down to put on his crocs when he noticed some writing in sharpie on the crocs.  He wondered why anyone would write words on his crocs and was a little irritated over it.  When he read it, the words said, "Shelley perfect woman from Idaho."  He really laughed because Ashreka thought she was writing the words on my crocs, not his.  She had felt a little bad about the cake and knew that I would have made it better so for  that reason felt compelled to write about me on my crocs. You can see on the picture that the shoe on the left has her writing on it.

 I know, kind of goofy, but that's Ashreka.

Well that's about it for the last week. This next week lots of good things are happening.  Friday, Alan and I will fly up to Addis and meet Morgan, Andrew, Leah and Lily at the airport Sunday am.  We're so excited we can hardly stand it.  OK, I can hardly stand it.  Ashreka, Zakir, Nati, Nahom, Seid, Haile, the maids, and many others are excited to finally see these forenjees who are coming from so far away for a visit.  Zakir has already requested that we all travel to Beltu to see his mother and brothers.  I hope we can and I hope Morgan and Andrew will be up for it.  It will be culture shock at its finest!  I don't know if I want to take the little ones up to Beltu, but we'll see.  Zakir is almost begging.  If we do, we will post pictures.

Until next time.