Ethiopian New Year

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For those of you not down with useless facts, Ethiopia is on a different calendar than Europe, America, and most of the world. It’s some crazy calendar, where there are 13 months (all with sunshine!) and its only 2001 (now 2002). All months except for the last are 30 days, and they new year fell this year on September 11th (“Are you sure you can enjoy, it is a bad day for Americans, yes?”) For most Ethiopians it’s the second largest holiday, after Easter. You won’t find many differences in the style of celebration though.

For this New Year, Sean and I decided we were going all out. There’s a small orphanage we’ve been volunteering at once a week, and we convinced the caregivers to have a party if we bought everything. So two days before, we went with our friend Fitsum to the market and bought three chickens. Hilarity ensues.

Nowhere in Ethiopia, outside of the capital, can you purchase chicken meat (is that what it’s called?) by itself. Having chicken for dinner requires a complex ceremony of killing, skinning, gutting, cracking, etc. Betam difficult, yes? So we had a choice, and we choose to integrate. We decided to go our town’s weekly market with Fitsum because of his extensive knowledge of chicken quality (ex. “We no like the black chickens.” “Why?” “It is culture, I think?”).

Lined up at the holiday market were farmers/country people with between 2-5 chickens each. Avoiding the all black ones (blue black is o.k.) Fitsum went to town, picking all of them up, examining them under the wings/around their throats, and bargaining for the best price. After we settled on 4 dollars for each chicken, Sean and I carried them back to Sean’s shower room. By this time Fitsum had gone home for lunch so we were on our own. “Should we feed them?” “I don’t know, probably?” So, after naming them (Enrique, David Bowie, and Dr. Richard Kimble based on stylistic and behavioral attributes) we gave them some stale bread and water for the night.

The next morning I came back to bring them to the orphanage and I was immediately endowed with a new appreciation for the term “chicken sh**”. The shower room was covered with it. And Sean’s neighbors had a good laugh watching the two of try to catch them while avoiding their dirty rear ends (somehow the strings on their feet had come untied). We ended up getting them in bags and we were off to the orphanage with a fair share of stares, laughs, and appreciation for the ferenji’s trying out new things. Culture!

When we got to the orphanage, the first question was: so, who’s going to kill these? It was obvious to the women caregivers: the men who bought them. Why not? We tried to explain to them that in America we only buy chickens in supermarkets and that we’ve never killed one before. So they showed us how, and we slowly (and probably painfully for Enrique, David Bowie, and Dr. Richard Kimble) did it. Obviously I’ll spare the details, however hopefully I’ll be able to post some picture soon.

Then the caregivers went to work, preparing the doro wot with onions (three kilos!), garlic, berbere, and a whole liter of vegetable oil. We watched the two of them at work, took a ton of pictures, and then retired for the day with a new appreciation for the innate knowledge that Ethiopian women possess.

The next day for lunch, Sean, Mike, my supervisor Yohannes, and I all went to the orphanage to enjoy for the New Year. We had a huge meal, a coffee ceremony, and an overall great time. The kids were really appreciative and even let us have the eggs! And then we played soccer with them outside for a bit, demonstrating exactly how inept Americans are at such a sport.

So that was New Years. There were a few other “programs” that we attended, nothing beyond what normally happens on Holidays. Lots of doro wot. Lots of tela. Bizu enjoyment.

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Comments

[Mom and Dad]

you chicken killer
We're lovin' your blog entries Adam! See you in seven weeks.