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Beautiful??
Their eyes looks sad, it's a sign of cruelty! It's hard to understand why people live in this way.:(..
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 16th February 2013
Re-entry is always a bit tricky
Stumbled onto this blog today and you've captured some of our thoughts and feelings as our adventure has come to an end also. We'll see what comes next for us. Figuring out the differences between 3G and 4G may be trickier than you think. Welcome back. Hope you'll write again soon... as you are the expert in your area and we can learn from you.
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
Re-entry is always a bit tricky
Stumbled onto this blog today and you've captured some of our thoughts and feelings as our adventure has come to an end also. We'll see what comes next for us. Figuring out the differences between 3G and 4G may be trickier than you think. Welcome back. Hope you'll write again soon... as you are the expert in your area and we can learn from you.
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
Date: 15th February 2013
So the Big Mango said to the Big Apple:
please tell me you used the phrase the "new normal" just to spite me
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
So the Big Mango said to the Big Apple:
please tell me you used the phrase the "new normal" just to spite me
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
Date: 14th February 2013
Thank goodness for habits...
otherwise you wouldn't have wrtten this profound coming home blog. Best wishes as you experience the most difficult culture shock...fitting into what was your own culture,
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
Thank goodness for habits...
otherwise you wouldn't have wrtten this profound coming home blog. Best wishes as you experience the most difficult culture shock...fitting into what was your own culture,
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
Date: 13th February 2013
Love it, Colin!
Great story - thanks for sharing. Miss you guys here. Have been thinking about your adjustment and am glad to read it is going well!
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
Love it, Colin!
Great story - thanks for sharing. Miss you guys here. Have been thinking about your adjustment and am glad to read it is going well!
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.
ewww
why in the world is that women getting beated i mean come on.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 17th December 2012
I've been also in Abuna Yosef in september 2011
Congratulations for your blog. I went alone. I stole one blanket from the hotel. I walked up just knowing that there is a mountain named Abuna Yosef. I was surprised for the brightness of green wheat, the welcome of people and the big amount of people living in this plateau. I slept in Wedebiye Health Center. Thanks the nurses for their hospitality. I climbed next day to the top and even I climbed another big rock unknown in the west. Next day going down it was \"Holy Cross Day\", and everybody was doing pic-nic everywhere. I spent a lot of time accepting invitations for coffee and araki. I realized as nice is just walking without maps, guides and even clear objectives. I enjoyed a lot.
From Blog: No ferenji magic on Abuna Yosef
I've been also in Abuna Yosef in september 2011
Congratulations for your blog. I went alone. I stole one blanket from the hotel. I walked up just knowing that there is a mountain named Abuna Yosef. I was surprised for the brightness of green wheat, the welcome of people and the big amount of people living in this plateau. I slept in Wedebiye Health Center. Thanks the nurses for their hospitality. I climbed next day to the top and even I climbed another big rock unknown in the west. Next day going down it was \"Holy Cross Day\", and everybody was doing pic-nic everywhere. I spent a lot of time accepting invitations for coffee and araki. I realized as nice is just walking without maps, guides and even clear objectives. I enjoyed a lot.
From Blog: No ferenji magic on Abuna Yosef
Date: 29th November 2012
LOVE YA!
Hey Lumo, just wanted to say how much I loved reading about you and the rest's misery. I'm finishing a bachelor's degree at a non-descript university in Portland, and was thinking it miserable, but now I know much, much better. Keep doing ya thing Boy! Aloha from Hawai'i via rainy Portland Oregon
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
LOVE YA!
Hey Lumo, just wanted to say how much I loved reading about you and the rest's misery. I'm finishing a bachelor's degree at a non-descript university in Portland, and was thinking it miserable, but now I know much, much better. Keep doing ya thing Boy! Aloha from Hawai'i via rainy Portland Oregon
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
Date: 6th November 2012
Another great blog Colin. I have never been to Africa so I can only read from afar, you paint a very vivid and realistic tale for me. Pictures are drop dead dynomite as well.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Another great blog Colin. I have never been to Africa so I can only read from afar, you paint a very vivid and realistic tale for me. Pictures are drop dead dynomite as well.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 7th November 2012
thanks
thanks andrea. i can't claim to have anything to do with the pictures. those were all the doing of my friends - credit where credit is due. I don't really know what to do with a camera.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
thanks
thanks andrea. i can't claim to have anything to do with the pictures. those were all the doing of my friends - credit where credit is due. I don't really know what to do with a camera.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 5th November 2012
Excellent observations
I too experienced the "human zoo" in my visit to Southern Ethiopia in 2010, and was more than a little concerned about people lining up to be chosen for photographs and the endemic practice of payment for such photographs. One wonders which tribal practices are being retained just for the benefit of tourists, but this is difficult to discern. For example, there are two types of Hamer bull jumping ceremonies - one attended by women and foreigners and the other a local male only affair, so this practice would continue even without tourists, albeit in a less commercial form. Likewise, do all women wearing the lip plate and do all men subjected to scarification do so for commercial considerations - I would think not. It is still possible to experience a less-commercially driven experience when visiting the tribes, but it does take time. On my first visit to the Mursi, there was the usual onslaught of shirt-tugging and "photo, photo" calls, but this subsided after 30 minutes and the final hour of my 90 minute visit continued without avarice being the sole motivator for any interactions. The following day, I visited another Mursi village that rarely sees tourists and it was a far more sedate and relaxed experience, we even shared a few laughs.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Excellent observations
I too experienced the "human zoo" in my visit to Southern Ethiopia in 2010, and was more than a little concerned about people lining up to be chosen for photographs and the endemic practice of payment for such photographs. One wonders which tribal practices are being retained just for the benefit of tourists, but this is difficult to discern. For example, there are two types of Hamer bull jumping ceremonies - one attended by women and foreigners and the other a local male only affair, so this practice would continue even without tourists, albeit in a less commercial form. Likewise, do all women wearing the lip plate and do all men subjected to scarification do so for commercial considerations - I would think not. It is still possible to experience a less-commercially driven experience when visiting the tribes, but it does take time. On my first visit to the Mursi, there was the usual onslaught of shirt-tugging and "photo, photo" calls, but this subsided after 30 minutes and the final hour of my 90 minute visit continued without avarice being the sole motivator for any interactions. The following day, I visited another Mursi village that rarely sees tourists and it was a far more sedate and relaxed experience, we even shared a few laughs.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 4th November 2012
God Colin.
Holy shit. It makes my brain ache some to read this last piece- to wonder at their definition of beauty- and to wonder as well at which parts of their culture will come under attack. Your writing as usual is incredible. What I admire most in this piece is your ability to take them in and not judge them- but to admit some discomfort with the whipping and their "beautiful" traditions. You rock. Love Lisa
From Blog: among the southern tribes
God Colin.
Holy shit. It makes my brain ache some to read this last piece- to wonder at their definition of beauty- and to wonder as well at which parts of their culture will come under attack. Your writing as usual is incredible. What I admire most in this piece is your ability to take them in and not judge them- but to admit some discomfort with the whipping and their "beautiful" traditions. You rock. Love Lisa
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 3rd November 2012
Great
Somehow I've only just discovered you. This is some of the best writing on TravelBlog - thanks!
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Great
Somehow I've only just discovered you. This is some of the best writing on TravelBlog - thanks!
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 2nd November 2012
Ditto on the other comment
Thats an honest insight you plated up there.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Ditto on the other comment
Thats an honest insight you plated up there.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 2nd November 2012
Food for Thought
Thank you for this info. Great blog. The issues around food aid. When I was in Ethiopia in 2011 I heard of optimism that no further famines would cripple the country due to better farming practices and storing surplus for tougher times. The economy was booming. Road works everywhere...improving infrastructure. To lease out good land cheaply for overseas interests...doesn't make sense to me either.
From Blog: Food for Thought
Food for Thought
Thank you for this info. Great blog. The issues around food aid. When I was in Ethiopia in 2011 I heard of optimism that no further famines would cripple the country due to better farming practices and storing surplus for tougher times. The economy was booming. Road works everywhere...improving infrastructure. To lease out good land cheaply for overseas interests...doesn't make sense to me either.
From Blog: Food for Thought
Date: 2nd November 2012
“We must learn to sow and cultivate tourism like a sorghum field.”
Really enjoyed this blog. Your observations and perceptions...tough but fair...possibly coloured by 5 birr for adults, 2 for kids (last year when I was there it was 2:1! Pity you were part of a tourist turnstile for the Mursi...lucky you scored a Hamar bulljumping. There are many issues...also affected by the Gibe dams and relocation of the tribes in that locale. I blogged some of these perspectives in my Mursi, Karo, Hamar & Nech Sar blogs...worth a look considering your observations. Thanks again for an excellent blog. Enjoyed Jason\'s comments too. To me the question is \"Tradition versus Progress?\".
From Blog: among the southern tribes
“We must learn to sow and cultivate tourism like a sorghum field.”
Really enjoyed this blog. Your observations and perceptions...tough but fair...possibly coloured by 5 birr for adults, 2 for kids (last year when I was there it was 2:1! Pity you were part of a tourist turnstile for the Mursi...lucky you scored a Hamar bulljumping. There are many issues...also affected by the Gibe dams and relocation of the tribes in that locale. I blogged some of these perspectives in my Mursi, Karo, Hamar & Nech Sar blogs...worth a look considering your observations. Thanks again for an excellent blog. Enjoyed Jason\'s comments too. To me the question is \"Tradition versus Progress?\".
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 1st November 2012
Bravo! This is good…this is REALLY good!
“The lower Omo valley is where the West comes to sate its thirst for the ‘primitive’. The Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples Regional State is a confederation of dozens of tribes, and being a tourist here is wading into an ethical morass: the fine line between human interest and human zoo…the clay lip plates worn by Mursi women are the quintessential archetype of the exotic and draw tourists like flies to shit. And in truth, the experience is about as pleasant…Plate lips are hastily retrieved and fitted into distended lips, necklaces donned, and random feathers and bones stuck fetchingly into hair. Authentically ‘exotically’ attired, the charade commences…” The real question here, in my opinion, is who is being conned the most, the Mursi performing exotic savage for cash, the tourist dishing out the cash in order to perpetuate this narrative, or the vicarious tourist viewing this myth at home, who knows none of the above, and dreams of one day experiencing it... the hermeneutic circle is complete.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Bravo! This is good…this is REALLY good!
“The lower Omo valley is where the West comes to sate its thirst for the ‘primitive’. The Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples Regional State is a confederation of dozens of tribes, and being a tourist here is wading into an ethical morass: the fine line between human interest and human zoo…the clay lip plates worn by Mursi women are the quintessential archetype of the exotic and draw tourists like flies to shit. And in truth, the experience is about as pleasant…Plate lips are hastily retrieved and fitted into distended lips, necklaces donned, and random feathers and bones stuck fetchingly into hair. Authentically ‘exotically’ attired, the charade commences…” The real question here, in my opinion, is who is being conned the most, the Mursi performing exotic savage for cash, the tourist dishing out the cash in order to perpetuate this narrative, or the vicarious tourist viewing this myth at home, who knows none of the above, and dreams of one day experiencing it... the hermeneutic circle is complete.
From Blog: among the southern tribes
Date: 21st September 2012
Discovery learning -- is it the bunk?
I submit that "discovery learning" is an inappropriate pedagogical technique for most academic subjects & most academic settings. If you are teaching (or learning) mathematics, physics, geometry, English grammar .... there are hard facts to be communicated by teacher & learnt by student. When one gets to advanced scientific work (say, organic chemistry) one needs to do repeat the work done by one's predecessors, to understand technique, but the instructor nonetheless should guide you through the basics. Discovery learning has a superficial resemblance to the Socratic method beloved of generations of faculty at Harvard Law School, but is not the same thing. Enough said.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
Discovery learning -- is it the bunk?
I submit that "discovery learning" is an inappropriate pedagogical technique for most academic subjects & most academic settings. If you are teaching (or learning) mathematics, physics, geometry, English grammar .... there are hard facts to be communicated by teacher & learnt by student. When one gets to advanced scientific work (say, organic chemistry) one needs to do repeat the work done by one's predecessors, to understand technique, but the instructor nonetheless should guide you through the basics. Discovery learning has a superficial resemblance to the Socratic method beloved of generations of faculty at Harvard Law School, but is not the same thing. Enough said.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
Date: 11th September 2012
Sounds like fun was had by all. Does this mean that you are not going to try and do this program again? I'm guessing they won't be happy if this is one of the higher Google hits on the program. Next time you are in the U.S. a phone call may be in order.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
Sounds like fun was had by all. Does this mean that you are not going to try and do this program again? I'm guessing they won't be happy if this is one of the higher Google hits on the program. Next time you are in the U.S. a phone call may be in order.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
Date: 12th September 2012
no google
I thought about that. No, I don't plan on going back even if asked, but it is probably better not to bite the hand that feeds you, especially if that hand belongs to Harvard. Luckily, I am unimportant enough that no amount of googling will ever fine me.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
no google
I thought about that. No, I don't plan on going back even if asked, but it is probably better not to bite the hand that feeds you, especially if that hand belongs to Harvard. Luckily, I am unimportant enough that no amount of googling will ever fine me.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
Date: 8th September 2012
So, how do you think Obama did about rebuilding the "City on the Hill?"
Would you give him another four years?
From Blog: US election reflection
So, how do you think Obama did about rebuilding the "City on the Hill?"
Would you give him another four years?
From Blog: US election reflection
Date: 8th September 2012
You have just described what is so very wrong with Academia...
and I feel sorry for the students.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
You have just described what is so very wrong with Academia...
and I feel sorry for the students.
From Blog: O tempora, o mores!
Maroon 
Brian Boultinghouse
non-member comment
yep
I sit here under a foot of snow in bfe and know exactly what you mean. The 4G world is bringing the asylum worldwide. We are reaching a crescendo of consumption and instant gratification that can only result in nothing good for anyone. Everyone needs to play hockey. Two of my favorite players were in an eastern European league during the lockout. Playing on home ice as the crowd chanted "monkey, Monkey!" in Serbian, the not exactly white players had no idea what was being chanted until after the game. Fear and ignorance are a fatal combination and the absolute cacophony of competing propagandists created by our nose dive into the information age make it damn near impossible to learn and not be afraid. Something has to give. Be afraid, be very very afraid. Having said that, I am not afraid. I love all of this insanity. I love the destruction of any attempt at communism. I love the inability of anyone to gather a consensus of anything about anything. Anarchy! ftw! If we can just find a way to burn all the money, (and weapons) we'll be fine :P Get on the ice, slip and slide around and try to put that biscuit in the basket!
From Blog: The Question: if you meet the buddha on the N/Q train to Queens, kill him.