What a great name to a great community... we found some info in the guide: It's a small community, isolated, secular, believes that education is the key to development so one can find adults attending primary school, they are socialists, they believe in Gender equality and children’s rights, the kids are not allowed to beg money from foreigners and visitors, the community charges the same price from locals and Faranji (white people) and the best way to support them is to buy the woven products they sell. We read, we were amazed, we thought it's interesting and surprising so we go [View Full Entry]

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I love the Bahir Dar area. I love it. But it is so sad because it's citizens deserve more. The city by the lake is a mixed blend of new and old, with condos and huts within the same area of town. Just walking the streets you get a sense of all these time periods colliding into one. There is so much I could write and I have volumes of photo's of the rural areas, the hospitals and Bahir Dar. But for now here are some photo's until I can condense the information into a non-novel form. I am a [View Full Entry]

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Charlie and Dee… The best way I can describe my first face to face meeting with Charlie was a white man in a sea of Ethiopian faces who spots me with my bags in tow at the hospital and runs up and hugs me like a long lost favorite uncle would. His smile was warm and his hug was deep. I know in that instant, he was a man I was proud to know. He couldn’t have helped more in my visit to Bahir Dar and it’s health facilities. He even invited me via email to stay in his home with [View Full Entry]

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Where do I begin? There is so much to tell; I don’t know where to start. We arrived in Bahir Dar and almost immediately went to Feledge Hiwot Regional Hospital where the CEO of the hospital along with a doctor from Spain who is working on the sewage project and my friend Charlie who is assigned here from the Clinton Foundation met us with open arms. Nolawi, my filmmaker with camera in tow was well prepared to film the conditions of the hospital. He is Ethiopian and he has said he knows how poor his country is and wants to help [View Full Entry]

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Up very early or late, I couldn't sleep with the upcoming trip tomorrow actually today. This is very windy night and I lay in bed wondering about the little subdivision next door to the hotel and what it must be like inside a press metal house with strong winds that roar like lions half the night. I am sure they are use to it but I know in my own strong house my kids coming running and jump right into bed to be protected from the angry roar beyond their windows. So what does a small child here whose entire house [View Full Entry]

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Continued... But I quite enjoyed my journey from Addis to Bahir Dar actually! Although the windows remained closed the entire 12 hours (sweltering!), some of the mountain scenery was incredible, and we wound our way through villages which reminded me of how I felt as if I’d been transported back to medieval times upon arrival in Twifu Mampong (Ghana) six years ago. Everybody is walking somewhere on the roads here, and as we approached maket towns we passed by hundreds of women in headscarves carrying traditional pots and bags of who-knows-what, children herding [View Full Entry]

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Well Hello! Typically, I seem to have chosen to start a travel blog when traveling in a region with terrible internet service! So apologies for the lack of entries thus far. I am yet to find a computer which will allow me to update the photos and maps too, so I apologise in particular for its relatively plain nature - I may have to wait until my return to spruce it up a little! So how is Ethiopia…? Well, friendly! The pople are very welcoming, and I have to say that I feel extremely safe here. Many polite conversations do inevitably [View Full Entry]

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There is a lot top be said about expectations especially if they are not met. I read about the famous monasteries, which are dotted around the shoreline and islands of Ethiopia’s largest lake, Lake Tana. I imagined extensive compounds and large impressive decorated churches. Well there is non of that. The compounds are small and so are the churches. From outside they are unimpressive as there is virtually no decoration and they are mainly made out of wood, straw and mud. The decoration inside is slightly better and there are lots of paintings on the wall. Some of the paintings and [View Full Entry]

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This was my second trip to the north of Ethiopia with the National Road Safety Coordination Office - we went last summer to see what was happening with a pedestrian campaign in Amhara Region. The main purpose this time was to observe a children’s pedestrian training scheme that is being trialled by a local NGO, called JeCCDO. We had to be there for the session on Thursday morning so we decided to the trip over two days - it is possible in one day, but being a road safety organisation, we would take our time so that the driver did not [View Full Entry]

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After an uncomfortable number of travelling issues throughout Europe, I was glad to return briefly to Dubai where a fabulous evening awaited that certainly improved my mood. Though I enjoyed the party I attended filled with socialising expats, it did not fully assuage my weariness from the rollercoaster of (mis)fortune I rode in Europe. The party lasted to the early hours, after which I headed to the airport for my 5am flight to Addis Ababa. This was to be my first experience of sub-Saharan Africa and my initial observations was of a leafy, sprawling city that was far more subdued than [View Full Entry]

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