Boom. Flash. We were eating dinner at what is known as the
nicest hotel in Nekemte and the rainy season had finally made its exuberant
debut.
I will admit: my colleague and I definitely jumped. Nekemte,
a vibrant city, 350 km to the West of Addis, is true Africa. It is the open
markets and the dirt. It is the young and old and people moving, walking
anywhere and everywhere. It rises out of nowhere, from the mountains and the
lush green fields of teff, maize and sorghum. It is jumping and bustling, a
sharp descent from another trip through God’s country.
Unlike my colleague who has traveled through Rwanda and
Uganda and professes the road West of Addis to resemble her previous trips, I,
myself, had never known such a journey. If I had to compare what I have seen in
Ethiopia, Lalibela would be the dry peaks of the American southwest, while the
mountain road West of Addis is the lush, green mountains I’d seen in parts of
South Africa. But I hate to make a comparison that isn’t comparable.
The dirt is the perfect red-brown, and the people are poised
to traverse the steep cliffs above and the muddy rivers below. They are tall
and lean, with skin made to absorb the sun, the rain, and the dirt that only
makes them seem more a part of the Earth. The green is tremendous and
overwhelming. It feels as if the Earth has to be endlessly fertile and that the
space around you will never end. It calms those aching, compulsive anxieties,
and allows you to imagine a place where humankind could be born. This green
universe could give birth to anything and everything, forever. It is only
logical that the fertility rate remains high and many Ethiopians, despite their
circumstance, continue and continue to procreate.
This natural wonder is punctuated, for the better and for
the worse, by development. The road, the entire way from Addis to Nekemte is
paved, which made the drive more pleasant, but also allowed for the easy passage
of large trucks. They carry goods and materials, maybe to further the
development of Addis. They dash precariously past, sometimes on the correct
side of the road and sometimes almost not, their fumes lingering long after
their descent down the mountain. Small- and medium-size villages arise every
now and again, with the open-front storefronts and the same types of scenes
that tend to characterize developing countries: animals wandering aimlessly; the
shoeless, the shirtless, and the extraordinarily thin coupled with the young
men and women in Western clothes who could be meandering down a street in
Washington, DC. Many of them look at you in your ominous white SUV and you feel
like a big gaping sore thumb invading what isn’t yours. At the same time,
pastoralists with their herds block the road, some more accustomed to the
passing traffic than others.
It was the new with
the old: the heart of Africa, of the Earth, being pulled very slowly from
itself.
When we finally arrived in Nekemte, seven hours later, we were ready
to rest and eat. We walked into the hotel and were greeted by a strange smell.
It was the mix of the ancient sauna on the lower levels (and the sweaty men
using it), the Ethiopian meat being broiled in the restaurant, and the wet,
humid air quickly moving in. Always sensitive to smells and still suffering from
the nausea acquired in Lalibela, I shamelessly breathed conscious, shallow
breaths. When I got to my room on the
third floor, I was met with at least 50 huge black moths that had entered the
open window above the shower. Horrified at the sight of the insect tsunami, I
asked for a room change.
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