Baby It's Cold Outside

Like I did for Kilimanjaro, I am going to post my journal entries on my blog. Again, apologies for the poor grammar, thoughts that should be kept on paper, abrupt change in subjects and crude writing style.

01/13/13

I arrived in Kathmandu yesterday after saying goodbye to Ethiopia for the foreseeable future. The week leading up to my departure felt so normal. Sure there were last meals and the nice office coffee ceremony and gifts, but it was all the same people in all the same places. I tried to feel different. I tried to be sad and I tried to cry, but nothing. Even on the plane I felt nothing. As we left Bole Airport I had flashbacks of my entire service, the people, the places, the memories, but they were just images, not emotions. I actually didn't even feel excitement for my travels. The only thing I felt at all was a craving for McDonalds - which I ate twice at the Dubai Airport. The 12 hour layover wasn't too bad, I used the wifi to check-in with family and chatted a bit with friends. I napped for a few hours and then proceeded to the gate. I met a few US expats. One was a police trainer with the UN. He is based in Liberia, seems strange that he was sent to Nepal for work. His education is in education, but police work paid better. He was given a 1 year assignment in Liberia, then upon returning home  he found himself bored and has been working overseas since. He laughed when I said I thought I was over living abroad. Now that I'm out of Ethiopia and on a new adventure, I think he may be right. I'm loving the excitement of a new place!

When I landed in Kathmandu, immigration and the visa process was simple. Ram (my guide) was waiting outside with a cab. He put a white scarf around my neck as a welcome and good luck. Ram is an adorable, tiny old man with 35 years of trekking experience. I also think he is Vulcan. No joke he looks like Spock if he were from Nepal.

The cab took roundabout routes that 3 years ago would have made me incredibly nervous. We ended up at Hotel Yambu for $15 a night. Clean, private bath and wifi. Not sure about hot water because I've been too cold to shower.

For dinner last night I went to Thamel House to try some local flavor. I ordered mo mo (dumplings) and a mushroom curry over rice. The waiter came over with a jug I assumed was to wash my hands. Nope! It was to pour a wooden bowl of rice wine. Not in Ethiopia any more! The food was wonderful and made me jealous of the PCVs in this delicious country. It took me over a year to adapt to injera!

Walking through Thamel is like walking through a maze - a very busy, beautiful maze. There are endless shops selling trekking gear, cashmere, pashmina and silks of brilliant colors, paintings, gold, gems, hats, gloves, bongs and other handmade goods. There are carts selling mo mo, apples and oranges and men asking me if I need hashish.

Today Ram picked me up at a little western breakfast place to take me to his office to settle the bill, to the Vipassana office to confirm my participation and to get acquainted with the area. We walked through a bit of the old local Asan Market and I wanted to buy everything! Jewelry  hippie clothes, hats, boots in all colors. The roads are crowded with traffic and exacerbated by motorbikes. It's loud, noisy chaotic and a bit overwhelming. I think if I lived here, though, I would get used to it.

Once I got back to the hotel to drop off my apples (!) and valuables I went out to find the Garden of Dreams that we passed earlier. I was a little insulted how worried Ram was about me getting lost, but within 5 minutes of being alone I was hopelessly disoriented. I only went straight and still couldn't find my way back. The streets were so busy I couldn't pull over to sort myself out so I found a sidewalk and didn't leave it. Lo and behold I actually stumbled upon my destination! Imagine my surprise. I can almost count it as a victory but it was a mistake that I found it, and I approached from the opposite way I expected to.

The Garden of Dreams is an old garden from the monarchy days. It was restored in the 90s and is a place of respite in the middle of the city. Dad sent me a link about it a while back, pretty cool that I stumbled upon it on my first day! I don't think I could find anything here on purpose. I may need a guided tour after my trek. This garden is a cute little place full of tourists and young lovers. A good spot to write! I may even grab a cake and tea. I'm overall quite happy here in Nepal. It's a new place and a very different adventure. Like Tanzania, it's reminding me that I love new experiences and I'm a nomad at heart.

One other thing worth mentioning is the abundance of Buddhist temples. We came across a bigger one in Asan, but most are tiny like Asian telephone booths. Around these temples is relative silence. No horns, hushed voices and a bit of space. Quite bizarre considering the cacophonous setting. Also, quite amazing that people respect these places even though the area is overwhelmingly Hindu.

When I left the Garden I walked the way I thought I should have arrived from. After about a minute I actually started recognizing things and I made it back to the hotel quicker than I thought possible. When I arrived I remember Ram mentioning the view from the roof so I went to take a look. The roof was nicer than I expected with rows of potted flowers and a tented seating area. The whole place was surrounded my multi colored prayer flags and pointsetta flowers which reminded me of Mom. I spent some time up there reading about the people and religion of Nepal and watching the city from above. A lot of people were on their roofs tending to gardens or doing laundry, one man was just sitting on a chair doing nothing. The streets were bustling amid a backdrop of colorful multi-story buildings in front of the still, strong mountains (actually hills, but mountains by my definition).

Now I'm at Yeti Cafe (chosen because I like the idea of the Yeti) awaiting more mo mo and vegetable curry.

I need to say something about the cold. It's so surprising to me to be wearing a jacket in the day time and seeing people bundled up even at noon. Instead of oscillating fans, people are sitting in front of oscillating space heaters. There is a heater by my table and space heaters on the wall for people to stand in front of. I'm not sure why this is so fascinating to me, but it is. Also, at the Gardens I ordered tea and they kept the pot under an insulator to keep it hot. Crazy!

Reelin' In the Years

A lot has happened since my last update and untold stories have accumulated. When I see you in person feel free to ask to hear them. Or don’t. I’m scared that I’m going to drive people crazy when I go home. Just as it’s weird for me to hear the inside jokes and memories from when I wasn’t around, I know it’s boring for you to hear my adventures that you all weren’t a part of. I apologize in advance if I bore people, but please realize it’s the only thing I have to talk about, as it was my life for the past 3 years. I’ll try my best not to talk about it too much. But be forewarned if you ask me about my final months in Ethiopia, or my long journey home through Nepal, Australia and the USA, I’ll probably get over excited and talk your ear off. But it’ll make my day.

Instead of telling my final stories I’m going to reflect a bit. I haven’t had the time or emotional energy to really sum up my experience yet. So here are a few lists:

Things I’ve Learned About Humanity

1.   People want the same things, regardless of where they are. We want to be loved, to love others, to contribute and to be remembered.

2.  There are good people and bad people everywhere. You should seek out the good and don’t let the bad get you feeling down about the world.

3.  Just because people don’t always appreciate you, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t keep doing good things. It’s on all of us to improve the world’s karma and not expect anything in return. If everyone helps someone else, the world will be a better place and that’s how it’ll come back to you.

Things I’ve Learned About Ethiopia

1.  The culture can seem a little abrasive and pushy, but when you look past those differences it can be quite beautiful

2.   I could live here forever and never really fit in. White people will always be treated differently, whether it’s someone following me home to ask me for money (last night), or someone yelling “fuck you” because they don’t know what it means but they know it’ll get my attention, or someone kicking a woman off a bus so I can have a seat, or someone picking me (and only me) up on the side of the road when the bus breaks down, I’ll always be treated different, for good or bad.

3. People genuinely want the best for their country and there is a lot of work and progress being done. There’s a long way to go, but even in 3 years a lot of ground has been covered.

Things I’ve Learned About Peace Corps

1.  Staff really does try their hardest to support volunteers, but the program will never be perfect. And PCVs will never forgive staff for that fact. It’s too bad, PC/E has some amazing people.

2.  HQ and the field will always be at odds

3.  It really is “the toughest job you’ll ever love”

Things I’ve Learned About Myself

1.  I’m tougher than I ever thought, and with a little persistence I can do what I once thought impossible

2.  I’m a little more closed off and independent than I’d like to be.

3.  I’ve gotten to know myself these 3 years, but I still don’t know what I want to do or where I want to be. And that’s okay. I no longer feel pressured to be in the same place as my friends.

And since it’s the end of the year, and it’s the time you recall what you’ve done, regrets and goals for the next year:

My 2012 New Years’ Resolutions and Results

1.  Go on more intentional adventures

a.       I moved to my first city, Addis Ababa. I’ve lived here, so now I think I can live anywhere

b.      I explored Sof Umar caves, the largest in Africa

c.       I climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro

d.      I went on a safari

e.      I hiked through the Bale Mountains and learned how to do GPS in Lepis

2.      2. Be better at speaking in front of people and making friends

a.       My new job got me facilitating in front of groups of nearly 150. It no longer makes me nervous

b.      I’ve made a bunch of new friends, mostly Peace Corps, but also a handful of non-PC close friends

c.       I’m still shier than I’d like to be and terrible at small talk.

3.       3. Get healthier

a.       A few up and downs, but I finished the year 12 pounds lighter

b.      I went to the gym consistently all year

c.       My trips always have some physical element

My 2013 New Years’ Resolutions

1. Grow up. Have a job with a salary, be completely financially independent, have my own place that I don’t plan to leave in a year.

2.  Go on a few dates. Since moving to Ethiopia I’ve become disinterested and skeptical in relationships. No one in America is looking for a visa so I can trust again.

3. Get healthier. Climb a few more mountains (I’m summiting Ethiopia’s highest on New Year’s Day with a few friends), lose a few more pounds, and spend more time outside.

And there you have it. Lists of 3 to sum up 3 years, 3 months and 3 days of Peace Corps service. Thank you for your support and interest in my time overseas. I’ll try to update a couple times during my long journey home and then I’ll retire from blogging. Until the next big adventure.

September in the Rain

My apologies for the absence from my blog. Work has been hectic the last few weeks, as have my bowels (third time with the gut wrenching giardia). But I think things are finally going back to normal and I’ll be in the office for a couple weeks and able to catch up on my work and communications. In the last month I went through an entire Peace Corps service. I went to G7’s swearing-in ceremony and led a few pre-service training sessions. Then I facilitated sessions at G5’s mid-service conference and spoke about successes and plans for the second year. Finally, last week I was at G4’s close of service conference. That was bitter, sweet, motivating and depressing. G4 came in a year after I arrived in Ethiopia. Many of them were my neighbors in the Jimma loop, one of them my site mate for over a year. Group 4 is the reason why staying a 3^rd year wasn’t scary and lonely, they became my new group here in Ethiopia. And now they are all leaving. It’s weird seeing them leave before me, since I had a solid year alone in Masha before Alex moved in, and now, like my original group, they are leaving me behind. Sitting at that conference hearing everyone’s plans for the future and their countdowns until they day they get on the plane leaving Abyssinia to return to the seemingly mythical America was painful. I have to say goodbye again. I really hate saying goodbye. I’m bad at it. It makes me cry. A lot. I want to go home, too. I want to apply to jobs and have an apartment and plan reunions on the other side. I want to see my PC friends in new clothes (I can probably write out every PCVs entire wardrobe without seeing them for a few months) and in a place with solid floors and our own plates. It’s time to move on, but I still have 5 months left.

But it’s not all sad news. I actually still really enjoy Ethiopia, my job and my life. It’s just a temporary funk brought on by other people moving on. Previous to all these trainings and crazy travel schedules I went down to the southwest for summer camp, site visits and a return to Masha. The Bonga Summer Camp was amazing. Like the two years before, we brought a bunch of kids from all over SNNPR to learn about health, environment, leadership, teamwork and how to have fun. Unlike the two years before I wasn’t one of the people in charge. As much as I love being a leader, I have to admit, being present without a particular role to play was actually really fun. I was able to hang out with the kids without wondering if sessions were happening on time and in the right place, I was able to enjoy the waterfall hike without counting heads every few meters. It was great.

After summer camp I braved the dreaded public buses that I have been pretty successful at avoiding this year. As uncomfortable as it is traveling in the southwest during the rainy season, it felt like going home. I remembered what it was like to be a real volunteer out in the field and how fun it is to be in the Jimma loop with all my old neighbors. I stopped in Masha, Gore and Metu to visit the volunteers and see their projects. I was SO impressed by all the work my colleagues were doing. Last time I was down there everyone was still figuring out their place and their work. This time people were planning trainings, spending grant money, building medical waste incinerators, installing solar lights, installing EMR systems and writing new grant proposals. I felt so proud of all the good work being done out there. Such an amazing group of people.

As great as it was to visit the volunteers out there, the highlight of my trip was my first trip to Masha since leaving in November. I was feeling nervous about the trip; afraid that people didn’t remember me, that they would all call me Alex or Dave, that I would have become just another random white person visiting the town. The feeling of anxious dread lifted as early as Tepi, the town between Bonga and Masha. In the Tepi bus station someone came up to me and exclaimed “Nikki! You’re back! Are you going to Masha?”. If people remembered me in Tepi, a town I only traveled through a handful of times, then surely I wasn’t forgotten. As the bus rolled into Masha and the door opened people were yelling “Nikki’s back!” It felt so wonderful to be remembered, and therefore appreciated and loved. I was only there for two nights, but in that time I finished up my work with the mill house, spent time with old friends, had too many tea/coffee outings, spent the night in my old compound and enjoyed time with my old site mates. It felt like no time had passed at all. The kids were still chanting my name in the streets (I forgot how much I missed that!) and the same characters were in their same places. I love Masha. I wish I could visit more often.

I am happy to be back in Addis for a while now. The recent travel all over the country has burnt me out, and I am looking forward to getting back into my routines. Kind of like my life in general – I wouldn’t trade the adventures for anything, but I’m ready to be home. 

Down in the Boondocks

Continuing to fulfill my New Year’s Resolution of going on more intentional adventures, last weekend my friend Tsion and I went beach camping at Lake Langano. Officially the only lake in Ethiopia that is safe to swim in because it doesn’t have shisto. Granted the color of the lake is still very brown, and people bathe, fish, water their animals and do other things in the lake, but it is safe to swim in. This makes it a very popular vacation spot for expats and rich Ethiopians and home to many fancy resorts and beach houses. We, however, stayed at a new place with few frills and plopped our tent down on a piece of sandy real estate. The only campers, while everyone else (2 families) stayed in the fancy cabins. More about that later.

Let me begin by introducing Tsion. Tsion is my first non-peace corps Ethiopian friend that I actually do things with besides drink tea and have lunch. I had Ethiopian friends in Masha, but because of the language barrier and lack of things to do we pretty much either shared a meal or had tea/coffee together. I still consider these people friends, but not real friends. Friends who share secrets, discuss ideas, talk about nothing and go on adventures. Tsion is different though. She is a smart, thoughtful, fun and outgoing person. She spent 8 years living in America so she gets it; she knows my culture, has similar ideas and is a great conversationalist. The coolest thing about her is that after living in America for years, she came back to Ethiopia to help her country. She volunteered as a teacher for a year and is now working with a group of young women at Addis Ababa University studying in male dominated fields as a mentor. When we first met we both expressed that we wished we had more female friends to do things with and how much we want to get outside of the city on the weekends. And now we do.

Over the summer, Tsion is planning to bring her young women on a retreat for their hard work during the academic year. She wanted to bring them camping at Langano, but had never been and needed to check it out. She called me up and we agreed to do a recon mission. After looking at a few of the ritzy resorts we found Karkaro beach camping, which was 80 birr instead of 80 dollars. Besides the water being brown and the rain the first evening, the weekend was beautiful. We camped, swam, sun bathed, read, walked on the shore and explored the area. It was relaxing and fun and everything that summer should be. It also made me very homesick for The River.

While overall it was fantastic, there were a few mishaps. First, the town of Langano is really nothing. A few villagers, no stores or much of anything. Second, Karkaro is really nothing, a place to pitch a tent and cabins. No stores or cafes or much of anything. We didn’t think to bring food; we figured we’d eat out. The first day we survived on breadsticks that we bought on the bus ride for breakfast and some trail mix that my mom had sent in the last care package. Finally, for dinner, the woman working made us 2 eggs and brought bread. For a whopping 50 birr (eggs usually cost 2 birr each, bread 3). Not wanting to do that again, the next morning we set off, determined to find reasonably priced food and not to starve. We found the one and only café in the town and had them make us shiro, a simple Ethiopian dish. Since that was the only place we also took some home for dinner in a plastic bag (imagine putting stew in a bag with a flimsy piece of bread and eating it hours later). Nothing fancy, but it was food.

That evening a few rich children were on the beach. Tsion and I were playing Frisbee and they came over to ask if they could play. Of course we said yes and learned that they were all somehow part of each other’s lives, but not siblings. Two of them lived in Germany, they were all at least half Ethiopian. They were all rich and spoiled. By no fault of theirs, they asked all the wrong questions and made me feel so poor. They looked at our tent and asked if we were sleeping there. When we said “yes” they asked why we just didn’t rent a house. Then they asked how we got there, when we said we took a public bus and then walked they said “oh we have a land cruiser”. Then they asked if we went for a boat ride, when we said “no” they asked why we didn’t go to the adjacent resort and rent jet skis. Up until then we thought we were having an awesome weekend. Then I started the fire. During the process the kids were a bit of a pain, and since they have never been said “no” to, every time I told them to back away or stop throwing sticks on my perfect teepee in a log cabin they laughed and kept doing it. After they finally stopped that, the girl said she was going to take some of my water. Clean water on Lake Langano is hard to find if you are camping. I asked her if she had a tap in her cabin, when she said she did I asked her not to drink it. We had no water sources and between the two of us we had half a liter to last the next 24 hours. She opened it up and nearly poured it out. I had to explain to her that not everyone has access to water and that she was being mean. The last straw was when they asked what we were going to eat for dinner. We answered honestly and said shiro, but both Tsi and I were so embarrassed at this point and we didn’t want to eat out of the plastic bag until the children were far away and unable to judge us. When their parents finally called them inside we had a good laugh at our poverty (Tsion actually isn’t poor, but she just moved into her own place and is spending her money on settling in. She is also a fellow budget traveler). The whole time we found the food and water situation a little funny, but didn’t realize how bizarre our lifestyle seemed to rich people. Those kids will probably always remember the crazy Ethiopian and white girl on what seemed to them a badass retreat, when really it was just how we do. 

Ain't No Mountain High Enough

I returned from my epic journey to Tanzania last Monday. All the photos are posted up on Facebook and I finally finished writing about it. During my trip I kept a journal and to save myself some time and energy I typed up the journal into a blog for those interested in my trip. If you'd like to read about my Kilimanjaro climb (spoiler alert: I did it!) and my safari go to http://www.kilimanjaroandelephants.blogspot.com/

Enjoy

On the Road Again

During the first two weeks of May I went on the first G8 site identification trip for the next intake of Health volunteers. We began in the dreaded Jimma, a dusty, rough and unfriendly city that I’m sure I have mentioned more than a few times over the past 2 ½ years. It’s the city that I used to have to overnight in on the way to Masha. Because of its reputation, Peace Corps is not considering it for a volunteer site, but we have started to look within the Jimma Zone and therefore were based in the city for 6 nights. Site identification is done in three rounds; the first is to meet with potential host organizations (generally town health offices) and the police to get an idea of the work and safety situation. So that’s what we did for 10 days straight. We drove from town to town and had meetings with these health officers. Meetings in Ethiopia are interesting. There is no phone book or database so we can’t schedule meetings ahead of time, so we drive hours and hours hoping that someone will be available to talk to us. This is made more difficult by the workplace culture. Often there are week long or multi-day meetings that are mandatory for entire offices, sometimes every town office is in attendance. When that happens, there’s just nothing you can do. Even if there is someone in the office during those long meetings he or she probably isn’t the head and therefore cannot talk to you or doesn’t want to have the responsibility of talking to you or, God forbid, signing a paper without supervision. Despite the setbacks and challenges we were able to visit 6 towns, of which only one has previously had a health volunteer, and deemed 5 viable options for volunteer sites. Most of the last health group was placed in towns that had previously had a volunteer (the aim is to have 6 years of Peace Corps presence in a town before withdrawing). It’s really exciting that we’re finally moving into new towns and spreading our knowledge and friendship to new places in the country. And this time we’re going a little more rural. Because PC Ethiopia is a young post and the infrastructure/communications leave much to be desired we’ve been hesitant to go too far off the main roads and haven’t been able to offer all volunteers the “real Peace Corps I-walked-15km-to-buy-bread experience”. We’re still not there yet, but our reach is getting further.

Other than sitting in meetings conducted in Amharic (I understood most but didn’t contribute a whole lot) and walking around towns to see how much harassment I got I was able to spend a lot of time with a couple staff members. The staff at the PC office is terrific, and we had a really fun time together. On the weekend we went to the former king of Jimma’s “palace” and shared a few meals. The funniest moment was a cultural exchange that I think you’d all find amusing. I was with two men, one an Ethiopian Orthodox Christian and the other Muslim. The Orthodox man was telling the Muslim man about his daughter’s 14th day celebration. In Orthodox culture children have a celebration on their 14th day and it is said that their fate is decided by God on that day (will they be rich, successful, a doctor, a merchant etc…). To ensure that the child will be fortunate and never go hungry they wrap the child in a piece of injera. Now remember, injera is the staple food here that is like a huge, flat, sour pancake. It’s like a real live Anne Geddes photo! This was the first time the Muslim man had heard of this tradition, and he thought it was the funniest thing in the world (so did I the first time I saw it). He couldn’t get over the idea of a baby wrapped in injera. And then he started asking why not just surround the baby in money? Then he really lost it when he learned that the injera is eaten after. It was the funniest culture exchange I have ever witnessed. And even though there was laughter and disbelief, there was also an air of genuine curiosity and tolerance. That is one of the best things about Ethiopia, there are so many different people, ethnic groups, religions and people, but they all coexist peacefully and care to learn about each others’ cultures. That is something that America can learn from Ethiopia.

The Long and Winding Road

When my dad was in Iraq many of our correspondences ended with the current soundtracks of our lives. What songs were playing on our i pods at defining moments, what songs seem to be narrating our stories and what songs have changed in our new contexts. At that point I was about 6 months into my service, and one song that I noted was “Waiting for My Real Life to Begin” By Colin Hay. I felt that living in Masha was leading to something bigger, I didn’t realize why I was there yet and didn’t feel like I was living my “real life”. Sometime over the next year and a half that changed. Ethiopia became my life and home, but especially now that I live in Addis and have a “real” job I feel like my ship has come in.

So what is my “real” job? This is something I’ve been asked frequently. I’ll try to explain it, but for the non-Peace Corps person it is a little hard to describe. My title is Peace Corps Volunteer Leader (PCVL). It’s a common position throughout Peace Corps worldwide. Our framework is made up of 6 main goals:

1. Volunteer Support (to help with work and integration within the capital and regional office locations)

2. Agency Relations (coordinate with regional Ethiopian agencies and NGOs to strengthen relationships with PC)

3. Site Identification (Assist staff in the site development process under the coordination and oversight of program managers)

4. Internal Office Capacity & Efficiency

5. PCV Training (support staff in technical and cross-cultural training sessions of PCVs)

6. Committee Work (work with Peer Support Network, Program Action Committee, and Volunteer Advocacy Committee to support their productivity, efficiency and organization with the goal of providing enhanced support to PCVs)

So what does that all mean? In a nutshell, helping PC Ethiopia run better and keeping volunteers happy through support. By putting a volunteer perspective on programming, office culture and protocols, PCVLs can make the program run smoother and reduce the number of PC issues that hinder a volunteer’s experience.

Aside from office work, I’ve done 2 Regional In Service Trainings for the new-ish health group. In the two trainings I worked at (in the Oromia towns of Ambo and Jimma) I did 2 full day trainings on creating Income Generating Activities, Accounting, Savings & Credit Associations and Program Design and Management. The third day I organized for other groups and individuals to come in to teach skills that PCVs wanted to learn. Overall I think they went pretty well, and a good start to this year. I’m keeping busy and I’m feeling quite productive.

That’s the work aspect. Living in Addis has also allowed me to have a “real” life socially as well. For those of you who knew me before junior year of high school you know that I’m actually a very shy person and it takes a lot of push for me to put myself out there in social situations. It’s taken a lot of effort and forcing myself out of my comfort zone to get as far as I have come. The tendency to hole up and enjoy my own company still remains, and I’m trying hard to make myself get out there and make friends in the new city. By saying “yes” to every opportunity I find that now I am too busy, and while I don’t have any new friends that I’d call to hang out with individually, I’ve met a lot of new people that I see regularly. I got a gym membership and I go every day that I’m in town, I joined a salsa dancing class with another volunteer 3 days a week (this may sound strange, but many Ethiopians were sent to Cuba during the Derg days for training and know latino culture), on Thursdays there is an ultimate Frisbee game and then there are occasional weekend trips. Which brings me to this past weekend.

While I was in Jimma doing the regional training another volunteer invited me on a trip that his doctor friends in Gonder were organizing. I was pretty exhausted from 2 weeks of training, but, because I know I need to make friends, I agreed to go. So glad I did. The first night we spent in Hawassa (I’ve mentioned this city in a few previous entries) because the doctors have never been, and it was good for me because one of my closest friends lives there now. The following day we drove to Dinsho, a small town at the base of Bale National Park, where another awesome volunteer lives. After entering the park and making reservations at the lodge we left for a long, winding, dusty journey to Sof Umar Cave. This is a religious place way in the middle of nowhere at the bottom of a valley in the Bale region. The cave system is 15.1km long, the biggest in Ethiopia and arguably the largest in all of Africa. I felt like Indiana Jones, Batman and Willy Wonka all at the same time. After a little argument about prices at the entrance we began our adventure into the cave. The first room has bowls with coals and a pile of animal skins. Our guide told us that people pray there, and if the prayer is answered they must slaughter an animal and leave the skin there. Moving on through the cave there was a “room” with a huge boulder that had fallen in, and a tree trunk on it. The story there is that long ago there was a thief who was killed and put there and turned into the tree trunk. That one may have gotten mucked up in translation. The rest was a maze of rivers, shrinking tunnels, crazy formations and bats. Lots of bats. It was a place unlike I have ever been, and the fact that it is so inaccessible and few tourists make it out there made it that much more romantic. Once we returned to Dinsho from the long drive, the volunteer there led us on a night hike that overlooks the park. On the way there we were startled by charging footfalls. Mother warthog was defending her piglets. It was fine, but the sudden angry sounds scared me a bit. I kept thinking of those wild boar in Lost. The next morning we did a bigger hike into a gorge, climbing trees, scaling boulders, seeing animals, waterfalls, birds and beauty.

And now I’m back at work. Both enjoying the break and trying to decide if I should go camping this weekend or if my yearning to be alone is the need for rest or my anti-social tendencies surfacing. But whether I decide to go or not, I am enjoying my "real life" and happy to be where I am at the moment.

Current Soundtrack: “Lull” by Andrew Bird