April 2005                                                                               View Ethiopia Photos
Tampa, Florida

Addis Ababa means new flower. I learned that while planning my recent road trip through the Ethiopian Highlands. My journey started when my friend asked me if I wanted to go to Ethiopia. Four weeks later, we landed in Addis. By the time we embarked from Tampa on our four continent, 24-hour adventure, there were three of us travelers- two businessmen and a doctor.

We traveled for 2,200 km along Ethiopia's two thousand year old Historic Route. On our road trip, we visited towns with science fiction-like names Bahar Dar, Gonder, Lalibela, Kompolcha and Addis Ababa, the capital city.

Ethiopia is a dense, broad mess of vitality twice the size of Texas. It possesses extensively diverse natural environments, many with animal species living only in Ethiopia. In the highland plateau, most people live a rural way of life, just as most of their ancestors have done before them for nearly 2000 years.

My overland highlights included: seeing our wonderful world from a fresh vantage point; making new friends; learning some Amharic and Ethiopian history; feeling energized at the balageru folk dancing clubs; hiking the Blue Nile Gorge; participating in 2 traditional coffee ceremonies and bearing witness to the positive and negative contributions that religion can play in directing society. (The twin towers of Ethiopian society are the Orthodox Christians and Muslims, who have lived and worked together, often side by side with occasional conflict from time to time, for over 1500 years.)

Rick Hodes, Girma Wolde and Barahama are three special people that we met during our adventure who warrant special mention. Each relayed his powerful story and methods for dealing with the difficult realities of thriving in a developing place. All three of them radiated joy in defiance of the harshness of life around them that poverty ensures.

Rick Hodes, an American ex pat who specializes in internal medicine, volunteers at the Mother Theresa Hospital in Addis on Saturdays. When chemotherapy medications are available, he will even administer treatment to children as they sit on the front porch of his home away from the clinic, just so the kids are more comfortable. I do not know what he does for his "work work", but Dr. Hodes' focuses his gifts toward healing as many of Ethiopia's sick people as he can. He reminded me of a pinball bouncing from patient to patient with the celerity of a super hero. He is also the closest I have ever felt to being in the presence a living saint.

Next, our new friend and guide, Girma Wolde, lost his young wife to a potentially treatable case of meningitis just six months ago. Mr. Wolde did not even get to tell her goodbye, because he was driving around group of tourists. Still, Mr. Wolde, blessed with strong wit and understanding, smiles often and authentically. Girma means "grace" in Amharic, and he resonates with a glow that reminds me of that mysterious energy that makes life curious, beautiful and worthwhile. We are going to raise money to pay for the education of his two young and wonderful children. (Please let me know if you are interested in contributing.)

Last, there was Brahama, a 23-year-old tour guide in Bahar Dar, who is also a public servant of the first form. His half-Jewish and half-Orthodox Christian heritage is peppered with the paired tragedies of losing his parents at an early age. The Dergue, Ethiopia's military government from 1974-1994, killed his father when Brahama was only 10, and his mother died of kidney failure within the past year. Instead of being broken or negative, this young man beams with the promise of life. Brahama told me that on the day his father disappeared, the two of them shared a conversation during lunch in which his father advised him that, above all else in life, he must first always be a survivor. So he lives, providing for his siblings, taking medicines to the elderly priests unsolicited and teaching others about the rich tradition and histories of the three great religious traditions of Ethiopia - Judaism, Orthodox Christianity and Islam. Brahama wants to be a computer engineer.

The road trip itself remains the most rewarding element of the adventure. From the road, we experienced rural Ethiopian ways set against a backdrop of rich greens, browns and grays. It is a very different way to observe our world. We talked with so many people and waved at five times as many daily. In this part of Ethiopia, life and commerce happen along the highway. On the road, healthy, sick and pregnant people walk alongside donkeys, cows and camels toward their destinations. The glorious smiles from the extraordinarily beautiful Ethiopian people and the jubilant greetings and waves from children along the hillsides made me feel so happy to be alive. (In case you are wondering, I saw neither fat nor sickly skinny people on the whole, and most people seemed healthy. You can forget about all that "world's fastest chickens coming from Ethiopia business!) Clearly, Ethiopia is a developing country with growth, challenge and opportunity ahead of it. It is not first world, but it is a good world just the same.

The greatest luxury of our road trip was having ample time for contemplation during the long drives. My surroundings enriched my ideas and thoughts. My days and nights were enlivened by the bouquet of wonder that surrounded me - expansive eucalyptus forests; the sweet smell of burning Eucalyptus wood for fuel; broken down tanks from the Civil War; students and elders meeting under the shade of abundantly canopied and otherwise lonely Bao Bao and Rain trees and endless rows of teff (wheat) and sorghum fields among the matrix of small hut hamlets, villages, mountain ranges and gorges. All of these wonders materialize beneath a sky that rests so low and so wide that it seems to hug the world.

Throughout the journey, I thought about the symbolism of a new flower. Inside the Toyota Land Cruiser, we three friends, sometimes joined by Girma, shared in an ongoing philosophical and general conversation that lasted six days. The talk spanned topics of race and ethnicity in America, Bush, Kerry, Clinton, the Iraq War, broadcast and print media strengths and weaknesses, fear versus love, economic development in Tampa and Singapore, the future of Florida, personal relationships, common sense and religion. (For the record I was the only Democrat, though two of us voted for John Kerry.) We have some really big ideas, and I look forward to realizing them.

The overland trip ended much too fast. We arrived back to a much fresher looking and cosmopolitan Addis, than the one we had departed from just 6 days before. Addis was very fun and special. It teems with friendly people, some museums, diverse restaurants, commerce and electric nightlife.

So overall how was Ethiopia for me? I strongly recommend Ethiopia as a destination for anyone who loves adventure, beauty, history, discovery and warm wonderful people. Coming home from an adventure is rarely easy, but always a blessing. I understood and loved Natasha and my family, friends, our country, our planet and myself a little more. I went into new flower and left with a bunch.