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One morning a rooster woke me up and an annoying noice that sounded like bongo drums. Half asleep I told Sanna that the Ethiopians have a very bad taste in music! Waking up the noice turned out to be constructorbuilders hammering on steal. Sorry Ethiopians for my mistake. We ate a bad tasting breakfast yet again; dry bread with smelly cheese, mayo and ketchup. Sorry for sounding perky, but it wasn't nice. Back at the hotel a cat followed us, screaming. And I mean really screaming. Finally he gave up and growled "you greedy b******s".
We checked out from Mr Martin's cozy place around 12 and called Beniam; our cab driver to pick us up. After a little discussion with Johannes, a little boy, about whether women can play football or not Beniam arrived. I never got to show him...
Beniam took us to out new home; Entoto guesthouse, which is runned by Swedish missionars. There we met an Australian lady; Maureen, who told us everything about Africa. She has been traveling through the Moder Theresa fund for 6 months and we more than happy to hear about her experiences. We met a man who worked there (who wore a Swedish Sweather even) and we arranged a good price to stay there for 5 days. We realised quite soon that it would be impossible for us to go to Aira, because there are no buses and our contact person is in Sweden at the moment. But the people who work at Entoto guesthouse know them and said that they could take care of the blanket.
Outside the g.h. (guest house) is a market; Sheromeda. We went there with Maureen and bought some bread etc to make our own food in the shared kitchen. Coming back we met Rosa; an Ethiopian girl from Awasa who cooked lunch for us. It tasted wonderful. Now, after making a few simple meals on our own we realise that we deffinitely need some practice in the kitchen! Rosa is here to get a VISA to go to London and visit her Ethiopian boyfriend after 6 years of not seeing eachother. It is so amazing that that kind of love still exists. She asked us about our religion and I have noticed that many people do. The religion is very important here and I feel a bit bad when I say that we barely have knowledge about our own religion; even less act upon it. It's like we are too fortunate to need our religion. We have had so many discussions whether the religion have destroyed more than helped in this world. I guess it's a question that never will be solved.
Anyways, we like our new g.h. and the people are very friendly. Closeby is the mountain Entoto. We climbed it yesterday and it took us appr. 1 hour, but it was an asphalted road so it wasn't too hard. On the way we saw women carrying timber twice their size and donkeys so fully packed we could barely see them. Thank God the timber had to be freighted Downhill! The men just walked beside the donkeys with a whip... We walked througha beautiful green landscape with a view of Addis Ababa. Or at least it would have been a nice view if it wasn't rain season and fog over the whole city. A shame really.
At the top we hired a guide who showed us around in the village that once used to be the city before Addis was founded. Today 2-3000 people live up here and support themselves from their own farms. We saw the old palace of king Menelek II, the st Mary church, the Raquel church from the 14th century and tried the local honey wine. The churches weren't that much to see, but the walk was worth the effort. It was a very nice view over the landscape and we saw some so far exciting animals like donkeys and goats! Oh yeah and a cow head that a man carried like a hand bag.
When we tried the wine we sat in a room next o a butcher and when the guide asked if we eat meat, we pretended to be vegetarian just to make sure we wouldn't have to try it. It wasn't a pretty sight. The guide told us on the way back that the reason why all the kids run after us with their hands open is because the tourists usually give them sweets. It's terrible how much we destroy here. They all expect something everytime they see "faranjis" white people. We have made ourselves "the people that gives things for free" and it brings no good for the future.
in general we are getting more confident here even if we notise quite clearly that we are not welcome here. They try to trick us all the time to get our money and we have to be alert not to spend too much money that neccesary. But we are getting quite good at it and can even take the bus instead of taxis now. In the evenings we read books together. Right now we read "Bridges over Madison county". Oh yeah and my new near-death-experience was when I almost got ran over by a donkey on the way down the mountain, but otherwise we're both fine!
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