by Dr. Tariku Teshale
This journey was a journey in celestial dreams, a dream journey and a journey through dreams into real Primary Schools, for real children, in real, rural Ethiopia.
Preparations for the excursion to the roof of Africa involved many ups and downs but at last I felt I had enough information and advice. I even gathered some information from a friend born there, now living in the US.
I told Mikael Ali, a friend, that we are going to Meqdela for the weekend. He thought I was joking!
You should be lucky if your car gets you to the nearest town the same day – i.e. no flat tyres, no overheated motor, and no collision with a cow… then you have to hire a good horse or a mule … a good guide and fix a pair of strong legs for the steep walk up to the plateau. Which adds up to maybe, at least five days or so?
I adjusted my holster loaded with weapons of mass mosquito destruction- including some 10 mg pink bullets and deadly hypodermic shots against other creatures!
A thought crossed my mind – trying an outfit with a British helmet/hat, a khaki jacket with lots of square pockets with huge flaps, shorts held by a wide belt with buckles the size of a bull’s forehead …and people would ask: Dr Livingston, I presume? Imagine me in the pathetic uniform, in gemballes, a pitch hat and a pipe in the corner of the mouth, with a nasal, supercilious accent to go with the stereotype!
Anyway, the very idea of leaving behind us the cockroaches, the taxis of Addis, the crowded streets with dozens of pedestrians who believe they are immortal, trespassers and thoughtless cattle competing with mad kamikaze drivers with their deafening horns…all competing for the same spot in the middle of the road; the reeking exhaust pipes with odors of gasoline from the 20s – it felt a huge relief!
I knew the scary picture depicted by Texas resident, Meqdela-born Mikael was bogus. He was born half a century ago but still believed he had an objective picture of his village, now a town. (You know, even a second becomes ancient if it doesn’t move, and change is the only constant that is real – which Mikael missed in his calculation.) Our team leader knew the area better. He has walked, ridden and driven through thick and thin to get some schools constructed there. ..
In fact, I think he said he has been there eighteen times? Kudos! I lift my hat for you! My co-passengers were my better half and a friend of ours, a young man, a jack of all trades, who fed us with facts and figures: the number of “left-over” Italians living as indigenous peasants in Gojjam since the Second World War …or the true conspiracy theory behind the Kennedy assassination.
He delved into deep contemplations, all while simultaneously cracking jokes from this world and the next! (I wonder if there was abisho mixed in the qolo we fed him with!) We laughed until our bellies ached! He started for example, a game: what would you do if you were ….Hot discussions ensued when he took upon himself the mantle of Mayor of Addis!
From the flow of the wuyiyit and the smart suggestions that popped up, I was sure they would come up with a neat formula to solve the stench of the urine flood in the streets of Addis. But the nearest we came to was a crazy idea: One has to create a satellite-controlled LASER that detects Urine & Co wherever it touches open air and converts it into vapors of antiretroviral.
Driving on the gravel road was like struggling with a differential calculus but the operator was outstanding, the vehicle strong: a fact not to be taken for granted, as I have nauseating childhood memories of the long bus journeys on these roads. In those days your ribs were as loose as the bolts holding the wheels, when you arrived at your destination-and ribs were the only strong things I had as a little boy!
This road from Dessie to Meqdela was no match for our deft driver whose face lit with joy whenever he conquered the potentially lethal curves that ambushed us every few meters. Some rocks jumped out of a curve like a jack- in- the- box. The car doors shook, the gear gnawed its teeth, but the brakes stood their ground. Excitement at its zenith, all eyes were fixed on the abysmal nadir…
Then a welcome break! At last! We had a short reunion with our friends from the other car at this fantastic road-side resort menafesha called Fontanina! Clean and delicious fruit was served in the open air- under a thin and grossly perforated grass-thatched roof, the purpose of which I am still looking for!
We ate … and no, no stomach ache followed. When we arrived at Tenta, dusk had fallen and I caught a glimpse of the setting sun through the side window. I jumped out of the car, ran west to shoot the sunset, but in a matter of minutes, the brilliant sky sheriff was no more! Nightfall had replaced the crimson veil of the sky bereaving me of my favorite blush of the heavens.
Well, I ran back to our hotel; I was afraid our guide would eat all of Woizero Roman’s famous shiro alone. He talked about it all the way here. Roman, her white scarf on her loosely braided jet black hair, poured the steaming shiro and we watched it fill the eyes of the injera one by one; the steam rose in a hurry, eager to cool itself on the naked, corrugated iron roof.
Delicious, it was! And as an icing on the cake, coffee completed the treat; a ritual I realize has seen a renaissance!
This concluded the escapades of the day and, as I said, night fell audibly like a deflated, heavy kemenedari, covering the Tenta plateau with a pile of damp blankets, while the Ethiopian sky leisurely organized its twinkling stars. I got pain in my rusty neck; head tilted and locked staring at the immensely wide, deep, starry African sky, forgetting time, swallowed by space. ..but then Something told me; it was cold (old)!
