*HobNob biscuits *Ploughman’s sandwich (actually and whole lunch with French bread and pickles and a pint of beer) *Pizza (I think it’s a cheese thing) *Pasty and chip shop chips (Cheese pasty of course) *Cucumber (preferably with cheese) /... read more

OK it’s been a good few days, so I though I’d better add another blog entry, plus Al has been nagging me! It’s been a pretty busy few weeks. I got the opportunity to get out of the office and attended some workshops that are being run by my team, it was really interesting to get to experience some of the huge differences but also how many similarities there are too. The first workshop was in Assossa at the high school, the second got me out of town to a place called Bambasi - known for it’s milk, it was an hours journey, with some amazing scenery on the way, I swear people here must think I’m challenged in some way as I have spent the past few weeks with a big grin on my face, ... read more

Come to Addis to get fat Strange though it may seem and contradictory to everything you might expect in Ethiopia, I have been getting fatter since I arrived in Addis! The restaurants serve up all the European dishes you dream about whilst out in the regions living off of injera and shiro, you are usually at a workshop taking very little exercise on a nice per diem and you normally have the company of like-minded VSOs who are itching to get stuck into a casa-casa jambo (pint of ice cold draught) and catch up on the gossip. Besides, my good work on Weight Watchers was rapidly coming undone after a Christmas of excess, 12 days in Harborne Hall (3 cooked meals a day + beer) and then TV dinners for a fortnight as our house was ... read more

Arrival All VSOs, no matter how long or short their placement is, are required to have some in-country training. This is where you are given some basic orientation, cultural information, language training and country history, geography and politics. For long-term volunteers (6+ months) in Ethiopia it was 8 days. The short-term volunteers get at least 2 days, but they are usually whisked away to get on with the job. We arrived at 3.30am ET on Sunday 3rd February and were met by 3 current volunteers from last September’s intake. The flight had been fine, but tedious. Remarkably my iPod batteries stood the test, which was lucky as the cabin crew insisted on showing Rush Hour 3 twice during the flight. The journey was broken by a 45 minute stop at Amman (Jordan) to refuel and drop ... read more

Al has been so diligent getting the blog up and running I thought I’d better start adding some comments and also get it up to date. I thought we’d have time in the first few weeks to work on this and we’d have a easy paced introduction to the country, when I’d have to keep myself entertained reading my books and watching episodes of Dawson’s Creek and recuperating after a hectic few months in the UK, what a naive women I am, it’s been none stop since we got here. We’ve not been in Ethiopia for 1 month yet and it’s been a whirlwind, of introductions, training, travelling, new houses, new jobs, new friends, new food and new routines, I could write for pages about each day of the past few weeks, suffice to say it’s ... read more

..and it might be my PC so I better be quick. We have been in country for 3 weeks now. Lots of pictures & thoughts to share. Never done a blog before and it feels a bit like praying. You send these messages into the ether and hope someone is listening and maybe cares! :) Well, anyway, disclaimer#1 - I've not done this before so if it is awful, bear with me. I have 2 years to get better at it! And, disclaimer#2 - there is a VSO policy regarding blog posts so I'll save anything contentious or outrageous for personal email if that's ok? Finally disclaimer#3 - if the collection of people who expressed an interest in reading about our Ethiopian adventure actually tune in on this wavelength then it will be a pretty disparate ... read more