It’s been too long!

As I said in the last update (the one that didn’t get posted until now) there was a long weekend! We were supposed to go with 3 but Jennifer the Scottish girl told me she wasn’t going when we went for our work permit so it was only Kathleen and I in the end, which wasn’t exactly what we wanted because we are not always on the same wavelength ( to put it friendly). Anyway I had understood from Kath that she was ok with a couple with whom I work joining us so I kept them up to date and got a barking for it because she didn’t want to put up with their 3 year old which she hadn’t told me. We weren’t off to a great start nor was it a splendid ending but we managed ( a lot of patience was involved) and what we saw most definitely helped!

We took the bus early morning ( 5ish) on Saturday to arrive in Arba Mich ( literally 40 springs) at 21:00. A colleague of Kath helped us find the right bus but we had to take a detour seeing as it was a holiday for many people and the direct bus was already packed. He bribed a guy in the queue to get us on and then made the guy in front of us promise he’d help us onto the next bus and with finding a hotel upon arrival.

This guy is called Ibrushe and is really nice he lives in Addis but grew up in Konso! He showed us where we could brunch at a friends restaurant and got us a cheap and clean room in Arba Minch, he even helped negotiating the price for the tour we wanted to do in the Nechisar national park.

Sadly enough the next day when Ibrushe was with his family we got ripped off anyway, such is life I guess. We ended up joining some Irish blokes ( Kath was very happy with that) on their boat-tour and guided walk. It was incredible! We saw zebras, antelopes, albatrosses, flamingos, hippos and lots of crocodiles! Especially the crocodiles are quite scary when you get close to them in your little boat… ( They kill various people every year, not surprising if you see the boats of the fishermen, some people even just walk around in the water to spread their nets) we were in awe.

Actually it is the only time in my life I sulked about being a non-smoker, because our guide bought some fish on the boat and we were supposed to grill it on the shores of the reserve but nobody carried fire so we didn’t.

After returning we took a bike ride to see the 40 springs ( tiny springs really) and to swim in the pond they lead into. The Irish even drunk the water but I was afraid of stomach ache and didn’t. The swimming was really refreshing after baking ( and burning) in the sun all day. No privacy caused me to shock some kids when changing but hey they’ll survive. All of this was supposed to be included but wasn’t in the end.

In the evening we went to a rather posh restaurant to have the grilled fish and almost finished off the money I had taken with me. Kath had left with her mastercard only and I had been lending her. You can imagine the shock when the next day her card ( nor mine which was to be expected) didn’t work!!! We had to call around to try and get people to wire us money so we could continue our trip and not have to abort it then and there. We had a couple of options to solve the problem ( people in Addis amongst others Tony that were gonna help us) so we headed out to our next destination, Ibrushes village, in the afternoon ( supposedly we’d go in the early morning but due to the bank trouble we ran a little late.

In stead of taking a minibus we got a ( paid for) ride in a truck. Really slow uphill, and an unexpected unloading break in the middle but other than that fantastic! When we arrived we found Ibrushe knew the entire village and everybody was thrilled to see him cause he hadn’t been home for 4 years or so… He took us for some kick-ass food ( big juicy chunks of meat) and then dancing in a local tiny pub. It was really authentic and I turned out to be able to do their dances quite well. (The dances down south are somewhat different from the ones we get to see in Addis).

At night Kath woke me up saying there was someone in the room ( her dream= obviously there wasn’t) which caused me to scream my longs out and to be scared for a couple of hours more. What surprised me the most and also freaked me out was that nobody had come to check what the noise was about, especially since the hotel was rather posh ( we got local price thanks to our buddy).

The next morning we paid a friend of our buddy some money to take us to the tribes around Konso. We didn’t have the budget for a car so sadly enough we only got to visit one village near the town. It was fairly cool but it does make you feel a bit as if you’re going to a zoo. I was happy to see the weaving of their traditional colourful skirts there. We also had a meal for that price: a sort of corn dumplings ( that tasted like sand) served with the leaves of some sort of tree and 1 egg. I went wild on the leaves which were very tasty and as a result my intestines are now upset… ( my cold has gone btw)

The south is reall interesting I definitely need to return, the hammer tribe reside there ( the ones that whip their loved women in a ceremony ) ,there’s also a tribe with lip plates, etc.

When we were about to take a minibus back I stopped a jeep with other faranjis (=foreigners or at least white people) wondering if they could take us. Not only did they take us, it turned out they were Flemish freelance TV-producers ( they made ‘ broodje kannibaal’) so I had a wonderful chat!

We arrived back in Arba Mich sooner than expected and thus tried the bank again: Kath’s card miraculously worked! Relieved we decided to meet up with the guy who was gonna borrow us our bus fare and so ( Getinet) anyway partly because his wife is Dutch and is involved in education here and because he sees really interesting. It was a nice evening were it not for Kath’s dislike of the restaurant she send the food back and was too demanding (in my opinion). Some friends of Getinet offered to take us for the bus price half the way ( they had to be there) to Addis meaning we didn’t have to get up at 4 am.

Sadly enough our luck had changed because after the direct bus had left we got a phone call that they weren’t going after all. We ended up having to take 3 buses and no lunch break to get in Addis some 12 hours later… Pfff hell, we were even lucky we made it.

I guess that busride is partly why I am not feeling too good today ( I had to teach) but I’m hopeful tomorrow will be better. Especially now that I made myself a good portion of oats porridge for supper. On that note I’ve noticed it’s 21:00, in other words bedtime!