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Ethiopia Travel Blogs

Background: Unique among African countries, the ancient Ethiopian monarchy maintained its freedom from colonial rule, with the exception of the 1936-41 Italian occupation during World War II. In 1974 a military junta, the Derg, deposed Emperor Haile SELASSIE (who had ruled since 1930) and established a socialist state. Torn by bloody coups, uprisings, wide-scale drought, and massive refugee problems, the regime was finally toppled in 1991 by a coalition of rebel forces, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). A constitution was adopted in 1994 and Ethiopia's first multiparty elections were held in 1995. A two and a half year border war with Eritrea ended with a peace treaty on 12 December 2000. Final demarcation of the boundary is currently on hold due to Ethiopian objections to an international commission's finding requiring it to surrender sensitive territory.

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By JohnnyLamoney
June 17th 2009

6 Months In Country Africa » Ethiopia

Its 9am, I just finished the free breakfast buffet with the eggs that seemed way too yellow. This is the last day that all of us, PCVs, will be together until Mid-Service Training in nine months. Some left on buses early this morning and our group in the south will most likely leave around noon. I have to say that I am grateful that our group has gel-ed as well as it has. We truly are like a giant family. We know when people are lying, we know everyone’s mannerisms, and we put up with everything. There have been no big [View Full Entry]

By Kimbj
June 17th 2009

Catch Up on Addis Africa » Ethiopia » Addis Ababa Region » Addis Ababa

SMOG IN ADDIS!

Welcome to Addis Ababa... When you first come to Ethiopia and get your first breath of Addis, your nose and your eyes remember right away that you are back. The smell of injera (a spice used in all Ethiopian cooking) mixed with car exhaust and pollution assault your nose as soon as you walk out doors. It is a smell you get quickly use to and after a short while and you don't smell it anymore. My eyes take longer to adjust, the smog is thick here and my eyes burn from the pollution but they too will adjust. Addis [View Full Entry]

By Kimbj
June 16th 2009

Africa is a long way! Africa » Ethiopia » Addis Ababa Region » Addis Ababa

Traveling over here it struck me how much easier it would be for me to help here, if it was just a hour plane ride that you could do on a long weekend or a monthly trip. You could work a while and just go home and come back another day.... I say that realizing, that is probably not true. We have things right outside our neighborhoods that we drive pass everyday and do nothing about. And we can't blame it on the distance. So maybe that is the allure to Africa it is so far away and it take an [View Full Entry]

By Al and Sara
June 11th 2009

"40? But his face does not look that young?" Africa » Ethiopia » Benishangul-Gumuz Region » Asosa

The Big 4-oh!

Er, thanks. That was the assessment of one of Sara's colleagues from the Education Bureau about my passing of the middle-age milestone. People say things here like "you look like a baby" when what they mean is "you are very young looking" so I hope he got his adjectives muddled, but maybe not... I'm not a vindicitive sort who remembers such slights; but he can forget any PC support he needs on HIS b** laptop! Silicone Implants Before I move on and talk about the birthday in Addis, I should pass on a great discovery of mine, courtesy of eBay. Silicone [View Full Entry]

By GoKulbisGo
June 9th 2009

Donations: Aleltu rural area Africa » Ethiopia » Addis Ababa Region

Explaining kindergarten paper

(Ruta writing) In the previous blog, I listed the numerous organizations who have received donations from our family and friends. In this entry I share pictures from one particular trip to rural areas outside Addis. The “dilemma” in distributing donations - do we parcel out and donate a few items to each of the 30 schools with which I interact, or do we make a bigger impact in one school? We decided to make small packets of office supplies to donate to about 30 organizations, and then give a larger amount of items to a rural primary school and rural secondary [View Full Entry]

By GoKulbisGo
June 9th 2009

Baby Toys Africa » Ethiopia » Addis Ababa Region » Addis Ababa

Arat Babies

(Ruta writing) Tadas and I delivered baby toys that were given to us to pass onward to the 50-60 babies at the Arat Kilo Child Care Association. Of course the toys were a huge hit. At first when we displayed all of the toys on the ground, the babies (ages 1-3 years) simply stared in awe. Tadas sat down on the ground and started playing with the toys as if he is a little kid, to the great amusement of the children. They particularly liked the pop toy in which you press the top button and the bottom balls spin. There [View Full Entry]

By GoKulbisGo
June 7th 2009

Donation Distribution Africa » Ethiopia » Addis Ababa Region » Addis Ababa

Aleltu DSW youth club donation

Living in Ethiopia for the year, we, the Kulbis family, have been awed and amazed by many things but among the most significant impressions has been the deep generosity of our friends and families in the US. We have been humbled by the packages sent to us from our family and friends to distribute to Ethiopia’s poor. We acknowledge and appreciate the significant time, expense, and efforts in collecting, packing, and sending the items to us for distribution. Thank you all! We have taken the role of distributing your generous donations very seriously and have tried our best to allocate [View Full Entry]

By Al and Sara
June 7th 2009

The Al and The Pussycat all at sea Africa » Ethiopia » Benishangul-Gumuz Region » Asosa

The dim one & the vegetarian

Halellujah! The power is back! Well for tonight at least. It's been really shocking recently - one day on, one day off, which has kind of made it hard to find time to update the blog. When we do have laptop battery power, we use it for emails, banking tasks (ok, ok, eBay) and preparing for our trip back to the UK in, oh, under three weeks now! In fact is, the power is worse than last year, which is a shame. Plus the mobile network has been dire for the last week or so in Assosa. Normally it would take [View Full Entry]

By Kimbj
June 6th 2009

Ethiopia 2009 Africa » Ethiopia » Addis Ababa Region » Addis Ababa

Going to Ethiopia this time around feels so much heavier then before. Now I have to actually put my words into action. I have to follow through on the things I have been working towards, which is not an easy feat. I am excited to see old friends again and meet the new ones that I have been in constant contact with over the last year. I have been uplifted by the love and support of my family and friends who have taken on my mission as their own. But I still feel weight of the work that needs to be [View Full Entry]

By GoKulbisGo
June 4th 2009

My School Country Project Africa » Ethiopia » Addis Ababa Region » Addis Ababa

Vasara Rytas BIS Countries

(Vasara writing) For school I had a project of finding all the countries from which our school’s students come from. It was a good project. I got a list of the countries from school. I was surprised that some of the countries, like Bahrain, were hard to find. My brothers helped me. They would say, “Oh, my friend is from Zimbabwe; it’s south - right here.” I put thumbtacks into the capital city of each country. My brothers and I noticed that most of the capitals of the African students that attend our school follow the coast of Africa. My map [View Full Entry]

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