ETHIOPIA – WEEK 7 – ADDIS
More photos from week 7 are now available at 
http://picasaweb.google.com/Guenter.Blog/ETHIOPIAWEEK7ADDIS
http://picasaweb.google.com/Guenter.Blog/ETHIOPIAWEEK7ADDIS Day 43 - 6th August
Today we spent the morning developing the agenda and preliminary findings and recommendations for our final deliverable - "the Workshop". Given the lack of office space at WV we decided to rent the conference room at the hotel and this proved to be a great idea as we were able to spend a solid five hours in the morning brainstorming with flipcharts and working uninterrupted. At World Vision we would have seen many people during this time, would have got tea served (which itself is sometimes a ceremony…) and would have spent 2 hours at lunch!
Belay and Sampson joined us in the afternoon and helped us refine the agenda and review the findings and recommendations. Belay and Sampson also let us know that the workshop had been moved up by another day due to participants' travel schedules. Last Thursday we were planning on holding the workshop on the Thursday after next. On Friday it got moved to Tuesday. Today, Monday, it got moved to next Monday. Errrggghhhh. We now have only 4 business days to prepare a day and a half workshop for 50 participants. All Anna's advice about making sure we spend more time on the Ulysses piece of our project (given that our main focus has been on the World Vision piece over the last 6 weeks) could easily go out the window right now.
After last night's discussion it was a very awkward team relationship day. We managed to put our differences aside for the day and focus on the project but it all felt somewhat unpleasant and by this afternoon there was a feeling that we could have happily said goodbye to each other... Thankfully we talked at dinner tonight and seem to have reconciled. Part of the reason things are so strained is because we are trying hard to coach each other on the issues raised in our coaching sessions and these issues are quite sensitive. I realized not for the first timethat this is one of the stretching experiences during our journey.
Day 44 - 7th August
Due to the tight schedule we had breakfast at 7:45 and planned another day working in the hotel conference room on our findings and recommendations. We had a much better day team-wise and created a lot of valuable recommendations.
Last night we bumped into Peter (the friend of a friend of Katherine’s parents, who we met in week 1) and over our dinner discussion he suggested we talk to Kristen, from Perth/Australia who is a lawyer working with Hope for Children, an Australian based NGO working in Ethiopia about her experiences working in Ethiopia. So, after dinner at the hotel (again) tonight, Katherine and I met with Kristen at the Black Rose Café. This café was the hippest joint we have been in all our journey and it was nice to be "out" somewhere. Kristen has spent just over two years working here and shared her very open and honest perspective of Ethiopian business culture with us. With our workshop utmost in our minds we asked lots of questions and she gave us lots of tips and tricks on running a successful workshop in Ethiopia (Make sure any findings are coached in only positive (never negative) terms, Make sure the most senior people don't participate in the whole workshop to ensure that the rest of the participants engage. Have a man introduce the discussions to ensure they are taken seriously. Make sure the women wear skirts. Be prepared to deliver an energiser (or we will be asked to give it - being a silly game or some other refreshing activity), Use Amharic phrases where possible. Don't be cynical or sarcastic at all). It should be an interesting workshop…..
Day 45 - 8th August
Another day of working in the hotel. The conference room was booked today and so we shuttled back and forth between the Restaurant and the Zebra lounge attempting to find quiet places where we could work together with access to power for our computers. Ahhh, the challenges of working in Ethiopia.
Tonight we went to Loti, a French restaurant. We were again the only people in the restaurant but our waiter assured us that this was only because it was 'Salsa' night and everyone next door dancing. Hmmm. A French restaurant was probably not the best choice for us to make for Anne-Sophie tonight who is very homesick and missing her children terribly. Our talk turned to the end of our journey, our flights home and what we would do when we get home….
The end of our project is approaching terribly quickly. I miss Sonja, my family and friends, my colleagues, Poland and Germany and my home but, I am still truly treasuring the experience and hoping I learn something new each day.
Day 46 - 9th August
Wow, I think the rainy season truly has arrived. I have never seen it rain so heavily for so long. Our conference room is on the top floor of the hotel and so we achieved the full audible impact of the torrential downpour. In between, thunderstorms our "singer" seemed to be especially passionate in his vocals. The "singer" is actually a group of priests that sing at the Orthodox Church about a block away from the hotel. They start between 4.30am and 5am in the mornings and go for about 4 and 5 hours, break for a while and then start up again at what feels like random times during the day. As is common here, the service and the singing are broadcast via loudspeaker into the church grounds and local area. We therefore have the great pleasure of being woken up most mornings at around 4.40am by the wailing and moaning of our local priests. Even ear plugs and two pillows over the head do not block the din. The length, frequency and intensity of the wailing seem to depend on which holy day it is. Today must have been particularly special because they didn't stop all day. This noise will perhaps not be what I miss most about Ethiopia. We didn't finish work until 9pm and so had dinner in the hotel at the Indian restaurant. The food was reasonable but it took two hours (and there were only two other people in the restaurant).
Day 47- 10th August
Today Friday we met in the World Vision offices to work with the team there on the presentation.
Dinner tonight was Korean restaurant Rainbow. While the night's special, sushi, was tempting at a Korean restaurant in land-locked Ethiopia, we decided to pass. Kristen had invited us to a party being held by an expatriate. There is a reasonably large expatriate community here and she explained that similar parties are held almost every week. We were told that the proceedings wouldn't begin until 10.30pm and when we arrived at about 11pm there were about 40 people. The house had been completely cleared of furniture, a dance floor set up in one room with music blasting from two huge speakers and a kitchen containing more liquor in one place than I have ever seen.
Within half an hour the house was overflowing and the garden was full. I soon discovered that the "lawn" was actually mud with a light green scattering across the top. Such discoveries happen when you end up your with shoes firmly dived in the mud.
The night was an interesting peek in the life of an NGO expatriate in Ethiopia and maybe Africa. The crowd was mostly under 40, about 50% black and 50% farenji and quite intense. At about 1.30am I continued on the hot Addis nightclub "Memo", while the other three decided that it was time to take their bodies home and to bed.
At Memos, which was recommended by Kristen I found her at 2:30am with her boyfriend and another couple and we spent some hours there. A lot of the young Ethiopian girls there are waiting for somebody to dance with and maybe more afterwards…. – I resisted and went outside for a taxi at about 4:30am. An easy task with approximately 50 blue-white Ladas all 20-35 years old waiting for customers. I took the second one who accepted my offer for the ride and off we went. We were not the only one on the street and most impressive for me were two groups of people I saw on my 5 minutes tour to the hotel. The first population were roughly 6 groups of in total 30-50 runners who were running at this time of the day through the streets of Addis at a very high pace – My guess was, that these were at least semi professionals if not the Olympic team… - the second population was the Church-Group. Many (uncounted) white people on the road and on their way to the Orhodox early early early mass…. – I’d rather stay in bed at this time….
Day 48 - 11th August
Saturday in Addis. After a slow start this morning, we headed out to ‘Hope Enterprises’. This is a small Ethiopian charity that sells meal tickets. The tickets cost 4 Birr (€ 0,35) for 8 and each ticket grants the holder one meal at Hope for Children's facility. As we continue to struggle with how to deal with the beggars in the streets that continually approach us, and the consistent advice that giving them money only exacerbates the problem, this seems to be a good solution. The very first ticket we gave to a boy begging to us through the taxi window resulted in a big smile. It is amazing that the charity can provide 8 meals for 35 cents, and I really don't know what is served, but for many of these people the smallest amount of food can make a huge difference to their day.
Catching a taxi here is a process of negotiation. Before even opening the door, one of us peers through the passenger window and first asks the driver if he knows where wherever it is we are going is and then how much. After bargaining our way to a mutually agreed price we all pile in. In the majority of cases the trip is about €3 for a 15 minute ride. Most of drivers want to know if they can wait for us and bring us back. It seems crazy to me that a driver would be willing to wait two or more hours for us to have dinner so that he could drive us back to the hotel for another €3. Either business is really, really slow or we are being completely ripped off. Nevertheless, the service works out well for us. Our driver this morning picked us up at the hotel, drove us 20 minutes to the Hope Charity, waited 45 minutes while we visited the charity and two art galleries, drove us 15 minutes to the Hilton to exchange some money, waited another 45 minutes and then drove us another 20 minutes to lunch. His fee: 80 Birr (€ 7,50). We made him very happy when we told him we had dinner plans tonight and would like him to drive us there if he was free.
After a quick lunch we headed to the spa for the afternoon. Oh my goodness what bliss! Katherine had spotted the place last Monday when we met Kristen at the Black Rose and suggested to the group this could be an excellent team event. We made reservations and spent the afternoon being totally indulged with facials, manicure/pedicures and massages. The "Boston Day Spa" was surprisingly sophisticated and quite busy.
Tonight we were invited to dinner at Alex and Brigitte's - the German couple we met last weekend and had dinner with at the African Queens restaurant. They live just outside of Addis in a large three bedroom house. They moved in 2 months ago but only received their shipping container last week and are in the middle of unpacking. Alex had only finished installing their "kitchen" this week - prior to their container arrived they were living sans fridge stove and running water in the kitchen. Their son Marcus (15) lives with them, together with Günter, their 6 week old German Shepherd Rottweiler mix puppy. As you can see from the photos we spent the evening passing Günter around from lap to lap. Little Günter, not myself – the big Günter….
It was wonderful to enjoy a home cooked non- injera meal; our first in over two months. Alex took great delight in sharing his extensive music collection with us including tapes, CD, LPs and singles. After a few beers, the sing along commenced with the great hits of the past such as "We are the champions", "Roxanne', etc. Brigitte was really sweet and showed us her collection of porcelain dolls. Some of these dolls were incredibly detailed and life-like and apparently worth thousands of Euros. After eight months of uncertainty and struggle in getting their possessions and setting up their bakery they are finally on track in their lives and it was really nice to see people so excited about their future.
Day 49 - 12th August
Today we had a morning to ourselves. This was the longest time we have had to ourselves in over eight weeks. It was also the latest I have slept in that time – 8:30am! I repacked my suitcase in an effort to determine if it all fitted back in together with my souvenirs and gifts. I was happy as I saw it did fit and that there was even room for more shoppong…
Samson had very kindly invited us to Sunday lunch at his house. His brother Israel picked us up at our hotel and drove us to Samson's new house. He had just moved into his first owned home when we arrived in Ethiopia and has been telling us stories every day about his hard work on his pride and joy. The house is about 30 minutes outside of Addis, including a full 5 minute drive down a rocky unfinished road. The house is brand new with three rooms, an external kitchen a back garden and nice views of the mountains. Samson has four daughters between the ages of 5 and 15. The four girls sleep in one small room in one bunk bed, together with their housekeeper. The girls seem close and no wonder given how closely they sleep! Samson and his wife have a separate bedroom, with a quite advanced Western bathroom. The other room is a combination dining/living room.
Samson's brother, Israel, is a radiologist and he explained to us how the education system works in Ethiopia and how doctors are identified. Broadly, the children with the highest grades are sent to medical school; there is very little discussion about whether the child wants to be a doctor or would indeed be a good doctor. The key seems to be attendance at a private school vs. a public government school. Israel is able to send his children, two boys and a girl, to a private school and believes that the difference in education is astronomical. The cost for one child is about € 320 per year. Being able to finance that would make an incredible difference to one of these children's lives.
Samson and his family were very generous to us; it was wonderful to see the level of engagement between Samson and his wife and his children, and with his brothers and sister in law. There is an incredible sense of pride and joy in their accomplishments and peace and contentment in their relationships. We really enjoyed our time with them.
At night we went again to the Serenade – a Restaurant we visited also in the first week and enjoyed again the atmosphere in this lovely place.
Today we spent the morning developing the agenda and preliminary findings and recommendations for our final deliverable - "the Workshop". Given the lack of office space at WV we decided to rent the conference room at the hotel and this proved to be a great idea as we were able to spend a solid five hours in the morning brainstorming with flipcharts and working uninterrupted. At World Vision we would have seen many people during this time, would have got tea served (which itself is sometimes a ceremony…) and would have spent 2 hours at lunch!
Belay and Sampson joined us in the afternoon and helped us refine the agenda and review the findings and recommendations. Belay and Sampson also let us know that the workshop had been moved up by another day due to participants' travel schedules. Last Thursday we were planning on holding the workshop on the Thursday after next. On Friday it got moved to Tuesday. Today, Monday, it got moved to next Monday. Errrggghhhh. We now have only 4 business days to prepare a day and a half workshop for 50 participants. All Anna's advice about making sure we spend more time on the Ulysses piece of our project (given that our main focus has been on the World Vision piece over the last 6 weeks) could easily go out the window right now.
After last night's discussion it was a very awkward team relationship day. We managed to put our differences aside for the day and focus on the project but it all felt somewhat unpleasant and by this afternoon there was a feeling that we could have happily said goodbye to each other... Thankfully we talked at dinner tonight and seem to have reconciled. Part of the reason things are so strained is because we are trying hard to coach each other on the issues raised in our coaching sessions and these issues are quite sensitive. I realized not for the first timethat this is one of the stretching experiences during our journey.
Day 44 - 7th August
Due to the tight schedule we had breakfast at 7:45 and planned another day working in the hotel conference room on our findings and recommendations. We had a much better day team-wise and created a lot of valuable recommendations.
Last night we bumped into Peter (the friend of a friend of Katherine’s parents, who we met in week 1) and over our dinner discussion he suggested we talk to Kristen, from Perth/Australia who is a lawyer working with Hope for Children, an Australian based NGO working in Ethiopia about her experiences working in Ethiopia. So, after dinner at the hotel (again) tonight, Katherine and I met with Kristen at the Black Rose Café. This café was the hippest joint we have been in all our journey and it was nice to be "out" somewhere. Kristen has spent just over two years working here and shared her very open and honest perspective of Ethiopian business culture with us. With our workshop utmost in our minds we asked lots of questions and she gave us lots of tips and tricks on running a successful workshop in Ethiopia (Make sure any findings are coached in only positive (never negative) terms, Make sure the most senior people don't participate in the whole workshop to ensure that the rest of the participants engage. Have a man introduce the discussions to ensure they are taken seriously. Make sure the women wear skirts. Be prepared to deliver an energiser (or we will be asked to give it - being a silly game or some other refreshing activity), Use Amharic phrases where possible. Don't be cynical or sarcastic at all). It should be an interesting workshop…..
Day 45 - 8th August
Another day of working in the hotel. The conference room was booked today and so we shuttled back and forth between the Restaurant and the Zebra lounge attempting to find quiet places where we could work together with access to power for our computers. Ahhh, the challenges of working in Ethiopia.
Tonight we went to Loti, a French restaurant. We were again the only people in the restaurant but our waiter assured us that this was only because it was 'Salsa' night and everyone next door dancing. Hmmm. A French restaurant was probably not the best choice for us to make for Anne-Sophie tonight who is very homesick and missing her children terribly. Our talk turned to the end of our journey, our flights home and what we would do when we get home….
The end of our project is approaching terribly quickly. I miss Sonja, my family and friends, my colleagues, Poland and Germany and my home but, I am still truly treasuring the experience and hoping I learn something new each day.
Day 46 - 9th August
Wow, I think the rainy season truly has arrived. I have never seen it rain so heavily for so long. Our conference room is on the top floor of the hotel and so we achieved the full audible impact of the torrential downpour. In between, thunderstorms our "singer" seemed to be especially passionate in his vocals. The "singer" is actually a group of priests that sing at the Orthodox Church about a block away from the hotel. They start between 4.30am and 5am in the mornings and go for about 4 and 5 hours, break for a while and then start up again at what feels like random times during the day. As is common here, the service and the singing are broadcast via loudspeaker into the church grounds and local area. We therefore have the great pleasure of being woken up most mornings at around 4.40am by the wailing and moaning of our local priests. Even ear plugs and two pillows over the head do not block the din. The length, frequency and intensity of the wailing seem to depend on which holy day it is. Today must have been particularly special because they didn't stop all day. This noise will perhaps not be what I miss most about Ethiopia. We didn't finish work until 9pm and so had dinner in the hotel at the Indian restaurant. The food was reasonable but it took two hours (and there were only two other people in the restaurant).
Day 47- 10th August
Today Friday we met in the World Vision offices to work with the team there on the presentation.
Dinner tonight was Korean restaurant Rainbow. While the night's special, sushi, was tempting at a Korean restaurant in land-locked Ethiopia, we decided to pass. Kristen had invited us to a party being held by an expatriate. There is a reasonably large expatriate community here and she explained that similar parties are held almost every week. We were told that the proceedings wouldn't begin until 10.30pm and when we arrived at about 11pm there were about 40 people. The house had been completely cleared of furniture, a dance floor set up in one room with music blasting from two huge speakers and a kitchen containing more liquor in one place than I have ever seen.
Within half an hour the house was overflowing and the garden was full. I soon discovered that the "lawn" was actually mud with a light green scattering across the top. Such discoveries happen when you end up your with shoes firmly dived in the mud.
The night was an interesting peek in the life of an NGO expatriate in Ethiopia and maybe Africa. The crowd was mostly under 40, about 50% black and 50% farenji and quite intense. At about 1.30am I continued on the hot Addis nightclub "Memo", while the other three decided that it was time to take their bodies home and to bed.
At Memos, which was recommended by Kristen I found her at 2:30am with her boyfriend and another couple and we spent some hours there. A lot of the young Ethiopian girls there are waiting for somebody to dance with and maybe more afterwards…. – I resisted and went outside for a taxi at about 4:30am. An easy task with approximately 50 blue-white Ladas all 20-35 years old waiting for customers. I took the second one who accepted my offer for the ride and off we went. We were not the only one on the street and most impressive for me were two groups of people I saw on my 5 minutes tour to the hotel. The first population were roughly 6 groups of in total 30-50 runners who were running at this time of the day through the streets of Addis at a very high pace – My guess was, that these were at least semi professionals if not the Olympic team… - the second population was the Church-Group. Many (uncounted) white people on the road and on their way to the Orhodox early early early mass…. – I’d rather stay in bed at this time….
Day 48 - 11th August
Saturday in Addis. After a slow start this morning, we headed out to ‘Hope Enterprises’. This is a small Ethiopian charity that sells meal tickets. The tickets cost 4 Birr (€ 0,35) for 8 and each ticket grants the holder one meal at Hope for Children's facility. As we continue to struggle with how to deal with the beggars in the streets that continually approach us, and the consistent advice that giving them money only exacerbates the problem, this seems to be a good solution. The very first ticket we gave to a boy begging to us through the taxi window resulted in a big smile. It is amazing that the charity can provide 8 meals for 35 cents, and I really don't know what is served, but for many of these people the smallest amount of food can make a huge difference to their day.
Catching a taxi here is a process of negotiation. Before even opening the door, one of us peers through the passenger window and first asks the driver if he knows where wherever it is we are going is and then how much. After bargaining our way to a mutually agreed price we all pile in. In the majority of cases the trip is about €3 for a 15 minute ride. Most of drivers want to know if they can wait for us and bring us back. It seems crazy to me that a driver would be willing to wait two or more hours for us to have dinner so that he could drive us back to the hotel for another €3. Either business is really, really slow or we are being completely ripped off. Nevertheless, the service works out well for us. Our driver this morning picked us up at the hotel, drove us 20 minutes to the Hope Charity, waited 45 minutes while we visited the charity and two art galleries, drove us 15 minutes to the Hilton to exchange some money, waited another 45 minutes and then drove us another 20 minutes to lunch. His fee: 80 Birr (€ 7,50). We made him very happy when we told him we had dinner plans tonight and would like him to drive us there if he was free.
After a quick lunch we headed to the spa for the afternoon. Oh my goodness what bliss! Katherine had spotted the place last Monday when we met Kristen at the Black Rose and suggested to the group this could be an excellent team event. We made reservations and spent the afternoon being totally indulged with facials, manicure/pedicures and massages. The "Boston Day Spa" was surprisingly sophisticated and quite busy.
Tonight we were invited to dinner at Alex and Brigitte's - the German couple we met last weekend and had dinner with at the African Queens restaurant. They live just outside of Addis in a large three bedroom house. They moved in 2 months ago but only received their shipping container last week and are in the middle of unpacking. Alex had only finished installing their "kitchen" this week - prior to their container arrived they were living sans fridge stove and running water in the kitchen. Their son Marcus (15) lives with them, together with Günter, their 6 week old German Shepherd Rottweiler mix puppy. As you can see from the photos we spent the evening passing Günter around from lap to lap. Little Günter, not myself – the big Günter….
It was wonderful to enjoy a home cooked non- injera meal; our first in over two months. Alex took great delight in sharing his extensive music collection with us including tapes, CD, LPs and singles. After a few beers, the sing along commenced with the great hits of the past such as "We are the champions", "Roxanne', etc. Brigitte was really sweet and showed us her collection of porcelain dolls. Some of these dolls were incredibly detailed and life-like and apparently worth thousands of Euros. After eight months of uncertainty and struggle in getting their possessions and setting up their bakery they are finally on track in their lives and it was really nice to see people so excited about their future.
Day 49 - 12th August
Today we had a morning to ourselves. This was the longest time we have had to ourselves in over eight weeks. It was also the latest I have slept in that time – 8:30am! I repacked my suitcase in an effort to determine if it all fitted back in together with my souvenirs and gifts. I was happy as I saw it did fit and that there was even room for more shoppong…
Samson had very kindly invited us to Sunday lunch at his house. His brother Israel picked us up at our hotel and drove us to Samson's new house. He had just moved into his first owned home when we arrived in Ethiopia and has been telling us stories every day about his hard work on his pride and joy. The house is about 30 minutes outside of Addis, including a full 5 minute drive down a rocky unfinished road. The house is brand new with three rooms, an external kitchen a back garden and nice views of the mountains. Samson has four daughters between the ages of 5 and 15. The four girls sleep in one small room in one bunk bed, together with their housekeeper. The girls seem close and no wonder given how closely they sleep! Samson and his wife have a separate bedroom, with a quite advanced Western bathroom. The other room is a combination dining/living room.
Samson's brother, Israel, is a radiologist and he explained to us how the education system works in Ethiopia and how doctors are identified. Broadly, the children with the highest grades are sent to medical school; there is very little discussion about whether the child wants to be a doctor or would indeed be a good doctor. The key seems to be attendance at a private school vs. a public government school. Israel is able to send his children, two boys and a girl, to a private school and believes that the difference in education is astronomical. The cost for one child is about € 320 per year. Being able to finance that would make an incredible difference to one of these children's lives.
Samson and his family were very generous to us; it was wonderful to see the level of engagement between Samson and his wife and his children, and with his brothers and sister in law. There is an incredible sense of pride and joy in their accomplishments and peace and contentment in their relationships. We really enjoyed our time with them.
At night we went again to the Serenade – a Restaurant we visited also in the first week and enjoyed again the atmosphere in this lovely place.
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