http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/GoKulbisGo/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from GoKulbisGo en-us Sun, 20 Dec 2009 06:48:42 +0000 Sun, 20 Dec 2009 06:48:42 +0000 Lukas writing...At home America when we went to Lithuanian school on Saturdays we learned how to dance some Lithuanian folk dances. Here in Ethiopia people dance very different. Here people mostly dance alone but sometimes they dance with two people in pairs. When people dance in pairs usually there is one man with one woman in front. They look at each other first over one shoulder then ove http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-416835.html Ruta writing...It is always fun to see the joy that donations bring. Here are photos from the distribution of donations of shoes and socks from my colleagues in Accenture. Upon seeing some of our past pictures from Ethiopia on their own initiative Rob and Beth organized a shoe collection drive. They gathered sports shoes cleats and baby shoes. These children live in tin shacks in our area or th http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-417343.html Kovas writinghellip It was a tough day at my summer job teaching at the Somalian School. On my way home my head hurt and I was physically tired. As a taxi finally arrived I got into the front seat and waited to get to my destination. Our taxi driver stopped at the side of the road to drop off a few people. Since there was a parked car in front of him he had to veer into the left lane of t http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-416750.html Kovas writinghellipNo I didnrsquot feed a sibling to the hyenas at the city of Harar but I did hand feed the wild hyenas meat. It was crazyThere is actually a man whose job it is to feed hyenas in the walled city of Harar in eastern Ethiopia. Every night he goes to a certain place and shouts a continuous call to attract the hyenas. He throws meat to them. Courageously he also hangs the s http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-416734.html Kovas writinghellip In the dry rural parts of Ethiopia we have seen many different cacti. They are diverse and interesting plants Some looked and grew as tall as trees because they had one main stem and many branches that grew up. Others had big thorns and were dark green in color. The ones that we mostly saw driving to the eastern city of Harar grew to waist height were light green and http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Harari-Region/Harar/blog-413443.html Kovas writinghellipAt fifteen years old my first job is not caddying or working at McDonalds but itrsquos teaching Somali citizens displaced in Addis Ababa. I have been working for over a month. I like it and Irsquom good at it. I am a teacher at the Shiloh International School which has students from Saudi Arabaia Egypt Dubai and many from Somalia. This is one of the few schools they http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-414766.html Ruta writing Tadas and I delivered baby toys that were given to us to pass onward to the 5060 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 13 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 http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-406841.html 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 ldquodilemmardquo 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 schoo http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/blog-406837.html 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 Ethiopiarsquos poor. We acknowledge and appreciate the significant time expense and efforts in http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-406050.html Vasara writing For school I had a project of finding all the countries from which our schoolrsquos 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 ldquoOh my friend is from Zimbabwe itrsquos south right here.rdquo I put thumbtacks i http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-405144.html Ruta writinghellip My friend Catherine is a VSO volunteer working at the Welfare for Street Mothers and Children Organization WeSMCO. This worthy organization hosts a variety of programs to support the poor women and children of Ethiopia. Attached are pictures from their urban gardening program which by the way receives funds from USAID. There are certain criteria of which women or famili http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/blog-403890.html Ruta writinghellip Part of the fun of travelling or working abroad is encountering completely different perspectives from onersquos own. Because Ethiopia is so different from our home we encounter many such situations. For example Ethiopia uses a different calendar system e.g. the current year is 2001 EC. When my coworker asked me ldquoWhat date is it in your worldrdquo I paused a m http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-399139.html Vidas writing We traveled by train from Nairobi capital to the coastal town of Mombasa then to Lamu where we stayed for three days. We first bought our tickets at Nairobi at a very old fashioned train station that was built in the early 1800rsquos British Colonial days. We thought it was interesting that there were only two trains possible one line going east to Mombasa and one going west. http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Kenya/Coast-Province/Mombasa/blog-395886.html Kovas writing On the last day of our Kenyan trip we spent the last of our money and food having a picnic at Hellrsquos Gate National Park. This park is fascinating because you can walk among the wild African animals like giraffes zebras warthogs gazelles impala and baboons. Our driver Milton warned us to be careful of the baboons but we had encountered baboons in other places and wer http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Kenya/Rift-Valley-Province/Lake-Naivasha/blog-395915.html Rytas writing Zebras are very cool animals. They are very common in Kenya. We first saw them at the side of the road near the airport. Every park we went to we saw them. I like to see them because I like their stripes. Their stripes are there to confuse the lions for whitch one to eat. It is very cute to see the zebra babies whose colors are brown and white. They have a fuzzy mane on top. W http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Kenya/Rift-Valley-Province/Masai-Mara-NP/blog-395881.html Vasara writing Imagine that you are looking at the African landscape. Over the bushes and trees you see dark silhouettes of three tall giraffes walking to the waterhole to drink. As they come closer you can see how beautiful these giraffes really are. When giraffes drink they slide their first set of legs to the either side until their head can reach the water to drink it. There are many kind http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Kenya/Rift-Valley-Province/blog-395876.html Ruta writing I was not prepared for the beautiful Indian ocean beaches on the eastern coast of Kenya. Near the Somali border is the capticating town of Lamu. Because the town has preserved its Swahili and Arab culture and architecture so well it is designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Walking through the incredibly narrow streets as tourist guides promise it does feel that you are in http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Kenya/Coast-Province/Lamu/blog-395870.html I felt that if we leave Africa having been simply across the border from the big game parks of East Africa without visiting them I would be full of regret. Thus we traveled to Kenya on holiday and had an amazing trip. Seeing elephants lions giraffes etc firsthand living free in the wild was a moving once in a lifetime experience. However somebody commented about our ldquodream vacationrdq http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Kenya/Nairobi-Province/blog-395866.html Lukas writinghellipWe arrived to Kenya by plane taking a 4am flight rented a car and driver and drove to the national park. The car that we got was made for a safari because the whole top of the car came off so we could just stand on a seat to get a better view.We went on a Safari to Masai Mara National park Lake Nkuru and saw Giraffes Impalas look like small deer Thompson and Grant G http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Kenya/Rift-Valley-Province/Masai-Mara-NP/blog-395862.html Kovas writinghelliphellipI wanted to share our daily ritual that we repreat over and over and over again walking home from school. When school ends at 320pm we go to afterschool clubs till 430. These clubs include basketball club soccer club Lukasrsquo chess club table tennis club volleyball club and a puzzlegames club ect. At 430 my brothers Vasara and I walk to Bole Bras http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ethiopia/Addis-Ababa-Region/Addis-Ababa/blog-389702.html