Abbaba'S Villa Addis Ababa

... detto che saremmo partiti alle 07.30 del pomeriggio. Tornati da Abba Filippo ci siamo consultati perché non capivamo come fosse possibile partire alle 19.30 non essendoci corrente e non potendo quindi essere illuminata la pista e abbiamo scoperto che in Etiopia c’è anche un altro sistema di calcolo dell’ora: vengono calcolate 12 ore di buio notturno e 12 ore di luce solare a partire dalle ore 06.00 del mattino, pertanto le 07.30 erano in realtà le 13 ...

... as the quote goes, but I'm not sure what that word means. My friends are NGO people in Addis, so I meet some of that group and glimpse the ex-pat life here. It's not bad. We go to a 'cultural dinner' complete with song and dance which is quite entertaining. Comparisons to northern Thai 'kantoke' again occur, but that's tame, just a sit-down affair. But traditional Ethiopian dancing has to be seen to be believed. It's hard to ...

... did not deter me what ****** me off was that I'd been booked on a later flight but was downgraded to economy - so much for my business class strut.  Anyway I got to the airport at12:00 midday expecting to fly at 14:55 and of course that did not happen because the Kenya Airways flight coming from Djibouti had a problem.  So in the end I was rerouted via Charles de Gaulle in France on Ethiopian airlines leaving at 23:55.  I guess I really was not meant to fly on the 13th.

... airport. After a while, I tried to take a photo of a magnificent church, and the driver suggested that he would stop, so we could take photos as much as we want. Or - at least - where the locals will allow us (which is not common in Churches). After he parked in the back side of the church, which called "Medhane Alem Church", we agreed to pay about 40$ for a whole trip around the city with him, until we get back to the airport. 40$, apparently, is an ...

... We were supposed to be linking up with the Ethiopian Rugby team, but Fekade has proved to be difficult to get hold of. I only have his e-mail address and he hasn't been in touch for a while. I can't seem to get on to Hotmail on the incredibly slow Ethiopian internet, so I have no idea if he has tried to contact me to make any arrangements. We drove north out of town to a large football field. It was just like any large football field you would find in ...

... after we were due to take off we got onto the plane from zanzibar to ethiopia which had broken air conditioning! i passed out after writing half a letter to mr nathan on loo roll, and woke u when we landed at 11.35pm ethiopia time. bought visas, wigs stomach exploded again and we tried to change flights to get home coz we are both dying of about 20 illnesses right now, but to no avail, so went to get luggage, where we find out its been put in ...

... mud and dust and disgusting pollution, gorgeous people with warm smiles, shoe-shine boys no more than 10 years old harassing you at every opportunity, and the typical "African bureaucracy" when trying to change money, hail a cab, barter for an item. Addis is like being plopped into another planet where we don't understand the language or the script, where there are beautiful churches every few metres, and in between ...

... jumping of the bulls", the whipping ceremony--where women related to the jumper taunt men and force them to whip them with thin branches and not flinch, while their backs are being scarred and bloodied. Then 7 of the herd of cattle are rounded up and rudely ...

... with a good bed and bath for $4 per night. We would find out later its $4 per 8-hour use. They served us great injera with fresh potato salad everyday. We got our bearings after a long sunrise. We also got fruit: bananas, oranges, pineapple and mango. Later along the way, we would slurp up our share of papaya, soursop, cazhmir, pomegranates and sugarcane. Finding food, water and a telephone is easy enough. All the ...

... friend came in from NY to join us on the trip. During that week we got to see what life in the city is like. In one sentence Addis is a mix of old and new, and there is no middle class. Either you have money or you don't. Driving down the street it's normal to see donkeys, sheep, chickens, bulls all walking down the same road the latest BMW X5 is parked. Some homes were spectacular looking with 3 or 4 stories but right next door would ...