At last.. a huuuge email from Simon! (have 20 mins spare to read it)

Eventually I tired of luxuriating in Bahir Dar, doing very little despite good intentions, and decided to head south for the final leg to Addis.

Those of you who were getting rather sick of my continuous attempts to coin new superlatives for the magnificence of the scenary here will be glad to note that this part was anything but spectacular. It was gently rolling but with occasional volcanic lumps & bulges, as if a giant had been trapped under England and tried punching his way to freedom. That would be an England full of monkeys, though.

It was nice though because the local tribe was famous for caring for its natural forests, which meant that there was a variety of trees rather than just the standard Eucalyptus. the locals did take this passion quite seriously, and you couldn't walk down a road without seeing someone break off into the forest, snap off a few twigs, and emerge with them stuck behind their ears, ready to fasten them to the fronts of their bikes or vehicles.

It was a nice place to wander round for a couple of days: peaceful, which makes a change for Ethiopia. Perhaps no-one hassled me because no tourists came there, and few people spoke English. I climbed one hill and a shepherd followed me up singing shephardy songs, but then
waved at me and left when I got to the top. Perhaps he was intimidated by the guys throwing Capoiera moves at the top, though again they were friendly enough. Having said that I got the first kids throwing stones at me in ages on the way down - they didn't even ask for money, just launched straight in. Cunts.

The next day was spent in pure tranquility, wandering round a perfect blue crater lake with a monastery amidst the trees, where the monks and worshippers smiled at me whilst carrying out their very chilled out thing, and monkeys leapt from branch to branch. I climbed a few of the volcanic profusions and saw some kind of ibex/tik tik/thingy, which was nice.

It was then time for the final leg, down across the Nile Canyon. Golly. It's big. Really, really big. Apparently it's the second biggest canyon in Africa. Which I'm sure was easy to measure. It's
been pretty good heading up from the sea to the source and seeing how it changes all the way up. Anyway, when you get to the other side (after an hour or so of very low gear bus journey) you're in Oromia, the land of the biggest of the 85 nations who live in Ethiopia. Their language has only recently been written down, and they took the logical step of doubling any letters which they emphasise, which does make them look a bit rreetaarddedd. We stopped for lunch in a small
town, and upon stepping down from the bus all the lepers in town started dragging their bodies across the road towards me. This was a bit much for a day with a half four start.

But then, finally, I made it to Addis. After over 2,000 miles, I've reached my destination for now. It felt good. To be honest, by Ethiopia I've been slowing down, and wanting to settle for a bit, so
it felt good to feel I'd achieved my aim and could have a rest for a bit.

I was initially staying in the Piazza area, at the top of Addis. It's the area with the cheap hotels, though cheap is pretty relative when you consider it was more than 50% more than what I was paying in the most expensive hotels outside the capital. £5.50 a night, and I didn't even get my own bathroom! Mind you, I was staying in a colonial era hotel with balcony bigger than every bedroom I'd had on the trip so far. It was Ethiopia's first hotel, and still had the notice explaining that customers had to pay for whatever they ate and drank.

The Piazza area was pretty cool, in the centre of most of the historical architecture. This varies between Armenian influenced stuff, and a few Art Deco-ish (emphasis on ish) from the Italian
invasion. It's also the main nightlife zone, though I found it all a bit much for when you're on your own, though I did hear my favourite Ghanan 70's funk tune so I felt at home. I did at first wonder why on earth there were a row of bedrooms opposite a loud dance hall, but remembered how most Ethiopians like to finish a good night out.

The problem is that with all the Faranji visitors, it's where all the scam artists hang out. But because it's also the main nightlife area, you get a lot of friendly, slightly pissed Ethiopians who just want to say hello. To be honest though, it's not too hard to outwit the scam artists, as they're just not that good at it. Arabs try hard to take everyone, including other Arabs, whereas Ethiopians just haven't got their hearts in it:

"Hey, my friend, where are you from?"
"Scotland."
"No way! My brother lives in Scotland!"
"Really. Where abouts in Scotland?"
"Umm. T h e c a p i t a l ?"
"Hmm. You mean London?"
"Yes! Yes! Of course! London, how could I forget!"
"So he lives in London."
"Yes."
"In Scotland."
"Yes! Anyway my friend, how would you like to go to a party with
[drops voice dramatically to a hushed whisper] some colledge girls?"
"Why are you whispering?"
"Well, you know what they say about colledge girls?"
"What, they're studious? They're cleverer than you?"

Eventually they get the hint. My ever expanding jewfro has helped: I keep getting people approaching me saying:

"I know you! You're from Israel!"
"No."
"Germany."
"No."
"America."
"No."
"Canada."
"No."
"England."
"No."
"Australia."
"No."
"Sweden."
"No. Look, have we ever actually met?"
"Yeah, I said 'Hi!' to you in the street a few days ago."
"Right, so we're tight then."

In general, though, the people of Addis have a bit more dignity than elsewhere in the country and requests for cash from randoms are lower, though there are quite a lot of legitimate beggars. I did get one middle aged gentleman in an imaculate, pressed, 3 piece suit double take when he saw me and ask for "one Birr." It does seem totally unrelated to financial well-being.

In fact I've read an amazing book out here which has given me some insight into Ethiopian culture. It's called "The Mountain People", and it's about a tribe of people called the Ik living in northern Uganda. Whilst they are pretty extreme, especially as they are basically starving and have been kept off their traditional lands, some of the character traits they show seem to be shared by Ethiopians. For instance, their typical greeting is "Give me tobacco." One guy, returning to his village to discover the mother he hasn't seen for 2 years is dying, goes and stand outside her compound:
"Give me food," he says.
"There is no food," she replies. So he leaves.

Also, the Ik always try and help people for the sole reason of getting an obligation out of people. They always try and do work in secret, so their neighbours won't find out and come and 'help' them. I think this is one of the reasons that Ethiopians have such problems with capitalism - they just don't understand the concept of providing services that people want; instead they will try desperately to provide some 'help' you little want or care for, which may actually hinder you, then ask for money.

In fact, I've realised I'm more of a capitalist than I thought. Whilst I've accepted the fact that Faranjis pay more for most things, I get upset when prices aren't what they say on menus.

"Ah, you're looking at the old menu."
"Oh fine, where's the new menu."
"There isn't one."
"!!!"
"But it's only one Birr more, why do you care?"

Why indeed do I care? I think it's down to the fact that it's been inculcated into me that without correct information the economy can't function. Which is something that Ethiopia prehaps demonstrates.
'When is the bus/how many are there?','How much is the national park?', any such questions will generate any number of answers. They also have the African habit of not wanting to do the dis-service of answering no to any of your questions.

"Are you serving Tibs?"
"Yes."
"Can I have some?"
"Mmmm. Maybe you want something else. We don't actually have any Tibs."

Still, I'm enjoying my life here in Addis. Thanks to a guy I met for 10 minutes in Lalibella, who said he'd send an e-mail round on my behalf, within a couple of days of arriving I had moved into a beautiful villa in the hills, where I had my own guards, maid & cook. And it's free. And so beautiful. Lovely gardens (with giant lettuce patch). Brilliant view from the balcony. Two pet turtles, and two lovely dogs.

Basically, the guy who lives there was flying to Germany and motorbiking back, and wanted someone to look after the dogs whilst he was away. Despite my generally negative views of dogs in abstract (not helped by being kept awake by barking dogs EVERYWHERE on this trip), these dogs are actually lovely, and I have enjoyed taking them on walks in the surrounding hills - though the locals seem generally petrefied by them, for some reason. Other duties have included
helping the cooks son with his homework, which I really got into, especially the science bit, surprisingly. Doing lots of experiments, trying to remember the difference between the endocrine & exocrine system, etc.

I'm not sure if I'll be staying here when he comes back this Sunday, but he was dropping some hints about how the place was too big for one person, and we get on pretty well. Even if I have to move out, it's been 6 weeks in an amazing place rent free. Even with the general expensiveness of Addis, I'm living on less than a fiver a day.

I also got dropped in with a big group of cool 20-something 30-somethings, which was cool. On the first Sunday I went to a Barbecue, and despite it being my first time on red wine for a long
time I managed to stay the right side of the charming/shouty line. I think.

Unfortunately, after about a week soaking up life in paradise, I fell into a Faranji trap. Every second day in Ethiopia there's no power - they call it load sharing. On the days the electricity is meant to be on there's often a brief outage or two. On one of the evenings when there wasn't any lights I went out to my favourite local restaurant. What I couldn't know was that someone had dug a five foot hole just in front of it, which I promptly fell into. It was quite a shock, and was wet (smell tests later confirmed my hope it wasn't a sewer).

It was, however, about the most painful thing that had ever happened to me. I'd just been reading Zola's 'Joie de Vivre', not his best but maybe one of his key books, where he articulates clearly his most important concerns - namely, given life is almost perpetual pain, why do we carry on? I was just thinking how lucky I was to be in generally good health and not have any particular pain in my memory. Well, that's changed.

For days I was in agony, and couldn't put any weight on my ankle at all. I spent a lot of time lying on the couch reading or watching bad TV - I was astonished by how poor the film of The Avengers was. After a week I could consider walking, but progress was way too slow. Luckily Tez recommended some tips and excersises (knows what he's talking about shock!), and slowly but surely I've improved. It wasn't helped by the fact that my laptop took a Long time to get over here, twice as long as the Post Office suggested, and that I'd hobble down there to see if it had arrived almost every day.

It also wasn't helped by the fact that the rainy season had begun. It's not the most violent rain I've seen, not like the Central American rain forest, nor does the rain particularly last that long.
but there's thunder and lightning every day, and the rain is dense: it's like watching a bucket of water fall outside the window. There just doesn't seem to be much space between the drops, which fall in a constant flood.

But finally, with my ankle feeling significantly better, I headed into the main Post Office in town, and deep within the vaults they found my package. Oh wondrous day! It feels like the jounrey has finally begun. It's been really exciting to get stuck into the novel, which is coming along pretty well, I think. There's loads of mini-crises, but they all seem to get resolved, and I'm making fair progress. It's definitely still only a first draft, but on the other hand, I'm focussing on character and story now so that I can get it all out. Once that's done, I can go back and improve the aesthetics.

On the days without power, once I've run out of battery, I come into a posh hotel's lobby which has wi-fi and good coffee. It's full of Faranjis on laptops - I've met some of my friends here.

So life is pretty sweet, now. My ankle's good. My novel is under way. I'm generally pretty excited that I'm actually doing what I've always wanted to do. Watching all that crap TV and doing A Lot Of Reading has meant that I'm less tempted by distractions. It's all good. except the powers that be only gave me a 3 month visa extension so it looks like I'm going to have to go to Somaliland during Ramadan and get a new one. Bah.

Anyway, send me all your news - what are your summer plans? Are you feeling the green shoots of recovery? Tell me all.

Ciao,

Simon