Here is a quiz about my life in Ethiopia! Send me your answers to the (sometimes random) questions and the person with the best score will receive by mail!


1. Which of these activities can be done on Sundays?

a) Using the toilet

b) Taking a shower

c) Watching TV

d) Doing laundry / Washing dishes



2. Which food did I not get during my stay here?

a) Indian food

b) Chinese food

c) Lebanese food

d) Arabian food



3. What do I like the least with eating injera?

a) Eating with my hands

b) Eating from someone else’s hand

c) Everybody eating from the same plate

d) Training my right hand to do something



4. What do I definitely not want to bring back with me as a souvenir?

a) An Ethiopian baby

b) Shiro powder

c) The Little Prince in Amharic

d) A bracelet with the Ethiopian colors



5. What is usually not a result of a power shortage?

a) A cold shower turning into a freezing shower

b) An increased risk of falling in an open sewer

c) The TV going off

d) The gas stove not working anymore



6. Order the things that disturbed my sleep from the least annoying to the most annoying

1) Church singing

2) Dogs barking

3) Bugs flying around me

4) Itchy bug bites



a) 1234

b) 4321

c) 2143

d) 4132



7. Which song did I not hear the kids in Debre Sina singing?

a) Bad Romance by Lady Gaga

b) Wavin’ Flag by K’naan

c) Boom Boom Pow by The Black Eyed Peas

d) One Love by Bob Marley



8. What product can’t we get on the street in Addis?

a) Lottery tickets

b) French fries

c) Fresh orange juice

d) Peanuts



9. What didn’t happen when the police arrested two guys who wanted to take me to a student party?

a) The guys admitted that they actually wanted to rob me

b) The police asked the guys to sit on the ground and hit them a few times

c) I had to justify for a very long time why I didn’t have my passport on me

d) About fifteen people made a circle around us



10. What have I never been called on the street?

a) You

b) Farenji

c) Habesha

d) Mister



11. Which of these animals would I like to have as a pet the most?

a) A goat

b) A sheep

c) A donkey

d) A horse



12. Based on a true story, what happened to the Ethiopian woman’s kidney?

a) It was taken and sold by her husband to feed their kids

b) It was taken by the doctors without her consent so it would pay for her treatments in the hospital

c) It was gone when she returned from the Candy Mountain

d) It was given to a sick Canadian friend



13. Order those products that we can buy in supermarkets from the cheapest to the most expensive one.

1) A small box of Special K

2) A bag of five apples

3) A bottle of Ethiopian wine

4) A can of condensed milk



a) 1234

b) 2413

c) 4321

d) 3412

PART V – What went wrong? ...and continues? Or Life as a Bumpy Fantasy Road

Spontaneity is the spice of life

Ok... There might be one more entry after this one... So let me tell you the truth about life, the universe and everything... We can’t tell the future... I came here with an objective but no specific expectations... But even if I had no expectations, things were still different than what I was not expecting... So to stay positive, I looked at everything from a funny angle... even when it was not really funny... It is now too late in this trip and it would be too long to explain everything that was and was not achieved – I might make a summary of everything (including some more serious thoughts) in the last entry - so instead, I will share some of my fantasies with you! I hope that if you ever thought I had secrets or that I was mysterious, this will make you change your mind!

My very special skill

I recently discovered that I had the special skill of getting in people’s mind. It happened on a bus – where most of the exciting stuff takes place in this entry – as, as usual, many people kept staring at me. They also always smile at me when I have to stand with my neck bent because the roof is too low or when I lose my balance. I started to concentrate on what the passengers were thinking and I started to hear their thoughts as if they were expressing them out loud. They were all asking themselves if, being on a public bus, I was only visiting or I was out of money.

Then we went on a road where there were ‘street horses’ and something even stranger than the previous happened. Looking at the horses in the eyes, I could read their thoughts as I was scratching one of my numerous flea bites. They thought I was lucky to be able to scratch myself because the only thing they had thought of to get rid of their fleas and get a little relieved of their itchiness was to stand in the street so the wind produced by the cars would make them feel better.

Not easy to be an Idol

I secretly always wished to be an idol and I did become very famous here... People come to me to shake my hand and even though they don’t ask, I know that they secretly want pictures with me or that they would pay to have my phone number... The same thing happened to Aliez and a boy had the guts to ask her phone number and she gave it to him... This guy has been constantly calling on our phone nonstop for more than a week... We sometimes turn the phone off for a few hours and when we turn it back on we have something like sixty missed calls... This boy became scarily obsessed... but what can we do? All this because we were on TV... I can’t even describe how it was when I got to Debre Sina as almost every kid had seen me too... It felt great to be that famous... If you don’t know what I was doing on Ethiopian TV, you could go back to the first entry or you could read the following... In my first week here, I attended the filming of an Ethiopian Idol episode (I swear I didn’t know what it was going to be - it is as popular as BBB in Brasil... or hockey in Montreal)... And because the producers think that showing foreigners is good for the image of the show, they showed me and the people I was with... I don’t know how many times I appeared during the show, but I know that in the only few minutes of the only episode I ever watched, I saw the same sequence of the same white woman (probably also pretending to understand the show) very often...

My ticklish zone

I’ve never been especially ticklish... but one night, on a mini-bus on my way back home, I felt something on my right leg... I couldn’t see what it was because it was dark and the mini-bus was crowded as usual... but after some people got off and I could see what it was, I saw a little mouse going up and down my leg... actually, it wanted to go up but every time I moved my leg to show the mouse to Aliez, the cute little thing went down... The same thing went on a few times until a guy on the bus saw the mouse and got really scared and then everybody knew about it and my new little friend also got scared and went to its hole...

Policewoman

Many organizations here work on gender issues. Many of them work on empowering women. Still, there are women that got empowered too much. I was on my way to Debre Sina on a bus that seemed to be in good shape... The seats were fixed to the floor and the doors closed. Everything was going normally – the bumpy road, the loud music, the people jumping, the kids laughing, some people getting sick, the chickens panicking, people staring at me... everything was just being normal... Until there were problems with the bus transmission – which got fixed the first few times – but it could only get worse and it did.

We got on a new bus and a few minutes later, a policewoman came on to check if we had tickets but no one did even though we had paid... There had never been tickets before – it seems to be a new system they want the drivers to implement and this woman was taking it seriously... She had a long argument with the employees and I could say that the driver had good arguments... well... not really but still... she forced the driver do drive back to a city we had just passed – to get in the bus station – and to pay a fine... Finally, the 190km distance between Addis and Debre Sina took us about seven hours and I thought it could never be longer.

Intense nights in Debre Sina

The previous time I had been to Debre Sina, I had taken the books so I had no more room for my sleeping bag and I had forgotten my precious lavender oil. So I used the blankets that were there and literally got eaten alive by fleas. I am sure that if all the fleas went under the blanket and jumped at the same time, I could have levitated. I told myself that the next time I would take my sleeping bag and remove both the blankets and the mattress so the fleas would never notice me... and I could sleep peacefully without being attacked... The thing is that without a mattress, a bed is not comfortable (just try it if you don’t believe me) and during the day and on the bus, I had gotten many new bites so I was itchy all night as I couldn’t really sleep because of the cold and the hard surface... The day after, my back was sore and I couldn’t move normally... It was worth the try though!

Getting closer and closer

After getting up at 5am and waiting and fighting for two freezing hours to catch a bus back to Addis, I was picked among a crowd to have the last seat on one big bus – I was then given a ticket but asked to get off right away so the passengers could go get some food somewhere... Half an hour later, we left and we had to take the sketchy alternative road that goes in the forest and along high cliffs... I was wondering how such a big bus would manage to do it... It seemed to go fine – slowly but fine – until we got face to face with a truck in a very tight 180 degree curve... So we had to go backward for a while... No one looked too confident about it (actually, the other passengers kept smiling at my very sceptical face – because the shape of my head was going from an exclamation point to a question mark and back to an exclamation point every second...) but we made it...

The first time

I had in mind the seven hour long ride to Debre Sina so after we reached the top of the mountain, I was confident that this one would go faster... but a few minutes later, a tire exploded... The driver managed to stop safely and we had to get off so they would change the flat tire for the spare one. It is always in this kind of situation that the people get to talk more to each other. I already had the chance to talk to a few people – among which an Eritrean refugee who described me the life he was having in an Ethiopian refugee camp.

Golden shower

During the wheel was being changed, some passengers went to wander to see if there was something interesting they could get from the farmers. One man came back with a big bottle of whiskey. So when the wheel was finally changed, we continued our way on the bumpy road and if people don’t mind bouncing on their seats, bottles do. So the bottle broke and I got soaked with whiskey. It was about 8am and the smell was very strong. Some people sacrificed themselves to drink what was left in the bottom of the broken bottle – whiskey and pieces of glass.

Once is not enough

A few minutes later, another explosion... louder than the previous one... Our driver was actually driving quite fast which made everything and everyone more vulnerable. The same men, went to wander to find something to replace the whiskey and they found a hut where the people were making homemade hareke... which contains about 75% of alcohol... They wanted to make me try their culture (Ethiopians like using the word ‘culture’ when they want to make us try something so we’d feel bad not to do it...) so they offered me a bottle... I had tried this thing before and I just couldn’t take it... Still, they offered me a shot of it... It was the way to say good morning to my stomach and to wake up my liver as well... And to make the rest feel like it was burning or about to melt...

Eating each other

As some people were working to change the wheel, there were farmers walking on the road with donkeys... They use donkeys to carry their stuff by the way... They obviously saw the bus and stopped to stare at us. Meanwhile, the kinky donkeys that were carrying grass – used for religious ceremonies – began to eat each other’s... grass... in a standing 69 position...They probably knew that they would be whipped very hard for having such an inappropriate behaviour in public and they were... So anyway, I arrived in Addis – I took a bus home - about ten hours after I had left the compound in Debre Sina... I sometimes wonder if Ethiopians are good at running because it can go faster than taking a bus...

Pink and soft or Rose scented and soft too

I got an Ethiopian cold lately and because I am such a perfect host for everything in Ethiopia, I had a running nose for much longer than a normal Canadian cold... Most of the people here can’t really afford buying tissues... I still got some because blowing my nose without tissues doesn’t inspire me. Toilet paper comes a little cheaper and it is called ‘Soft’ (after a brand) and we can choose the color so I got pink Soft. Once I bought some real tissues and instead of being pink, they were rose scented. They were soft too.

What really happened and how I really feel about it all

To be coming...

PART III – Oli in Wonderlands

A miniature talking donkey came to me and offered me something to drink. I was so surprised that I am not exactly sure what he gave me. It could have been orange neon soft drink called Mirinda that makes your stomach glow in the dark but you don’t know it because your stomach is inside your body. Maybe it was this Addis tea (knowing that ‘Addis’ means ‘new’, it doesn’t tell you a lot about the tea) or a delicious radioactive looking avocado juice. Maybe it was one of the two most popular beers – one has the same name than a bank ‘Dashen’ and it makes me wonder which came first – the beer or the bank? The other beer – which never tastes the same – has the name of the saint of Ethiopia – St-Georges. So I don’t know what kind of powers were involved, chemical, spiritual or simply magical, the only thing I know is that it made me shrink and then the donkey told me to follow him in a hole. Ethiopians say that sharing is caring - actually I heard it from one Ethiopian only but my guess is that he heard it from another Ethiopian so there are at least two people who say that - so maybe drinking is shrinking...

We walked for a while in a cave and the donkey stopped to give me an advice. He told me that I now had a magical toe. That it could go through the colors of the Ethiopian flag. In case you’ve never seen it, it’s Colombia + green or Brazil + red - white. Then he told me to be very careful – that my toe could be very helpful in many situations. I found out that when it’s red, it’s because I ran for too long. When it’s yellow, it’s because I had too much of this chemically colored drink called Mirinda – so I should stop drinking it for a while. When it’s blue, it’s because I’m cold or I’ve been walking on a cold floor for too long – or I just had a shower. When it’s green – it means that I should look for a toilet. It’s usually because I am getting sick for having eaten raw meat. And he made me make my friends promise that if they ever come to Ethiopia and go to the restaurant across the street after the sunset and they can’t really see what they are eating and they have a doubt that the meat is well cooked – they shall not eat it. In those cases, it’s not only your little toe that turns green, but you whole body. So, promise me that you won’t eat raw meat. The donkey didn’t mention anything about my toe turning black – which . I found out, means that it’s dirty or that it’s dead and about to fall off. Every time I washed it so far, it went back to its normal color.

We walked for I don’t know how long and we arrived in a small room that was probably used as a kitchen. There was a table with two chairs and a gas stove but no other food than bread and peanut butter. It was very dark and the donkey showed me two Band-Aids on the wall in the shape of a cross. He told me to put my hand on them – which I did and a blinding white light went on. Then the donkey got scared of something and told me to remove my hand. I asked him what was wrong and with tears in his eyes, he told me that he doesn’t have many people over and that since the last time it had happened, he had completely forgotten how funky the peanut butter looks like. It’s the same peanut butter he uses for peanut tea, peanut macchiato, with bread like jam or separately - 1 to 2 spoons recommended daily. So we ate in the dark and enjoyed the funky tasting (but not funky looking) peanut butter.

I wasn’t aware of the secondary effects of this funky brown stuff until I saw different characters that I associated to play cards walking in my direction and yelling at each other. I went under the table so they wouldn’t see me. As they were coming closer, I figured that they were speaking French and that they had just had a big revolution in their kingdom. The Dames getting educated and studying English learned that in an English card decks, they are called Queens – so they wanted to be called Reines in French. They had been in front of a judge who didn’t see any reason why they couldn’t be called Reines. So they changed the letter D for the letter R. So the Reines had the same letter than the Rois. At this point everybody was happy and no one anticipated that it would degenerate in a big fight after a game of Poker in which some players argued that the Reines could be Rois dressed as women and the Rois could be Reines dressed as men – that nowadays, this was something very possible and that some players were discriminating them. So they were all blaming each other for all the cheating that was going on.

The secondary effects of the peanut butter eventually stopped and the cards disappeared and the kitchen became quiet again. I had not noticed that the donkey had left the kitchen and he came back with a cake with 22 candles on it. I was confused because the day before, I was 28 but the donkey who had never traveled had only looked at my birthday in my passport and made the deduction that because Ethiopia is in 2003, I was turning 22 – which means that I could enjoy the second floor party for seven more years if I stay here but it might get creepy.

I blew the candles out all at once after making a wish. The donkey and I ate the cake and then I started to worry how I would get back home. He told me about Marie. He showed me in which direction I should go. I arrived in a very busy place with many people calling different names. I went to a first person and asked ‘Marie? and this person showed me where to go. I asked ‘Marie?’ again and the same thing happened. After a few times I found what I was looking for and found the entrance of the hole. I had wished getting back to my normal size after getting out of the hole – which happened and I got home to tell Aliez about my most recent adventures.

Oli in real life – Part I - Irrelevant information

Aliez says I’m shrinking. I might have lost a few pounds since I really slowed down on my consumption of beer. I probably have one every... two weeks... But the main reason why I might look smaller is that all the clothe washing is made by hand... I boil water, add detergent to it, let my clothes soak for a while, shake, shake, shake, rinse and... tear them to remove as much water as possible... I hope you didn’t forget that it’s kind of cold and rainy here so the ‘13 months of sunshine’ slogan is a lie. (I say that even though the last few days were actually quite hot and dry.) So tearing my clothes stretches them and also hanging for millions hours make them bigger...

I know I annoyed a lot of people with this story, but my toe really hurt – all summer long – and still hurts. Sometimes. I actually broke it at the beginning of the summer and later, just to make sure I wasn’t making it up, I stepped on it in a pool and heard it crack like I hear people here calling me You! or Farenji! or Mister! So when I wike too much or use my toes to keep my balance on a crowded bus, it does hurt. I also feel it while running in the gym. But what helps me is that the power often goes out so the treadmill goes off. And my toe thanks Ethiopia. People say that there is nothing to do – that broken toes get fixed by themselves – but not mine. It’s my forever broken left little toe.

I told you we had a problem with the lights in the house. They got fixed but something else happened. The kitchen light switch broke. So Aliez found a genius way to fix it – using two Band-Aids so it stays in the ON position. The thing is that Band-Aids are not very strong so it gives her about 15 seconds each time – to run and to do one thing but this quickly goes from funny to frustrating. She wanted to spread peanut butter on a rice cake. But to spread the peanut butter she asked me to come in the kitchen and hold the switch in ON position which I did and as if she saw for the first time, realized that the peanut butter didn’t only taste funky but also looked funky. It also is the fasting peanut butter – which is what some people use instead of milk on fasting days – every Wednesdays and Fridays.

And as I mentioned earlier, Addis can be a confusing city. But all you actually have to know is the names of the different neighbourhoods you want to go to. Megenagna is a major bus station where we always have to switch bus. On our way back home, because we live in the Marie neighbourhood, we have to find the bus that goes there and it is definitely not the easiest one to find.

Oli in real life – Part II – The birthday

In case you don’t already know, I spent my birthday alone in Ethiopia. I mean ‘alone’ because Aliez, the person that knows me the most here – and by super far – had to leave the country because of a problem with her visa. Still, it turned out to be memorable. So here is what I did. Breakfast, shower, bus, bus, walk around a very animated area, Alliance Éthio-Française to get the cultural calendar, lunch, bookstores, bus, bus, supermarket, home, burnt brigadeiros, movie and sleep. You might be wondering what made my birthday memorable... It’s kind of obvious... I just didn’t do anything that would make me forget what happened on this day... Not that this is what I did last year, but... well... Is it what I did last year? This and the wishes which I’m very thankful for!