The aeroplane was brand new and according to the inflight magazine it was on loan from Ryan Air and there were hardly any passengers. It's hard to imagine how they would make any money.
We checked into a guesthouse near the Piazza, which is the old part of Addis city. John found a reference for it online. Most of the reviews that he read for accommodation in the city were about dirty, run down places so we were happy to find the Ankober a spotless place, albeit a bit cold after Nairobi.
It was so cold that we had to get extra blankets and John got out his sleeping bag as he had a terrible fever. Addis is around 2,000 metres above sea level so the nights were pretty cool while the days were pretty hot.
There are not many sites to visit in the city and with John's fever not responding to panadol and rest we didn't venture far. During the week we had to visit the Djibouti Embassy and the Somaliland Liason office for visas.
When John was up to it we walked around the city and as his fever didn't subside we decided to get a blood test done for malaria. Fortunately it was negative so we decided to take a course of antibiotics that we had brought with us. This cleared up his throat and nose infection that had developed.
In the 1970s there was a civil war in Ethiopia and the government was supported by the Soviet Union which supplied it with weaponry. At the end of the Cold War the support disappeared but these monuments still stand to show the influence of that time. A military person told us not to photograph the monument but we had already taken the shot.
In the centre of the city is Meskal Square, which looks like others we have seen in other Soviet countries. It is used for parades and presidential addresses to the people. The building at the centre of the photo is where the president sits in a glass box.
Ethiopia is country number 111 for us.
In 1995, it became the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. We saw areas where the Italians had lived and when we walked down the streets in these parts the old men greeted us in Italian. The locals were not allowed to live in the Italian area or go to their schools and the community was segregated. There are still influences from this time, with cafes having outdoor seating and selling coffee made with big old Italian coffee machines, as well as numerous Italian dishes on every restaurant menu.
We met several travellers at the hotel across from our guesthouse and were able to get information on places to visit in the country and places to stay. There is no tourist office so it was impossible to get information from any official source. Even the local minibuses that commute between the major cities have no main office. You have to talk to the locals, who have a contact, or staff at the accommodation places who have a contact. It all felt a bit uncoordinated and you never knew if a bus was going to materialise at all.
To get about the city there were overcrowded minivans in dilapidated states and old blue Russian Lada taxis. The yellow taxis were more expensive than the blue ones as they seemed to belong to some kind of transport union but they were often in a worse state than the cheaper blue ones. The yellow taxis drivers always warned us about the unsafe blue taxis but we had no problems in the blue ones. All the taxis had doors that didn't have handles or windows that were cracked but they were always scrubbed clean by the young street kids.
The Amharic language is difficult to read as it has its own script and translations to English vary in their spelling. Only 12% of the children make it to high school so there are a lot of children begging on the streets or selling packets of tissues, chewing gum, and cigarettes to get money. Whenever there was a school holiday the number of children sellers increased as the school kids spent their time trying to make some money as well. The tourists are always fair game!
There are often rows and rows of shoe shine boys outside office buildings or bus stops. We only ever saw one woman shining shoes. The streets maybe filthy but it seems important to have clean shiny shoes.
On our first trip into the city a group of three men tried to get into John's day bag. One stepped back into John and then put his arm around his back in the pretence of apologising while a second guy tried to unzip a pocket. The third man distracted me by asking for food so I would look away and not see what the other two men were doing. They didn't get anything and we don't carry anything valuable in our day bags anyway. In the Piazza a tissue seller pushed his tray of tissues into John while his fingers went into John's pocket at the same time. This is the first time in all our travels that we have ever had any experience with pickpockets!
In 1935 there were 15 million people and now there are 80 million. Altogether there are 83 languages and 200 dialects! 90% of the population survive on subsistence farming; goats, sheep, donkeys, camels, grains and vegetables.
The streets are crowded with disabled people, blind people, and beggars. We have even seen naked men mumbling to themselves as they wander the streets. People urinate whereever and whenever they want so the dusty streets stink. The stray cats and dogs also wander scavenging through rubble and piles of rubbish. It can be an obstacle course just to cross the street at times.
We ate the traditional dishes that were always accompanied with injera. This flat fermented spongy pancake like starchy base is served rolled up or laid flat on a dish. The stewed goat, fried beef, minced spinach, or raw meat, gets poured over the top and you eat by tearing some injera up and wrapping it around the meat. The etiquette is to use the fingers of your right hand and they never use any cutlery.
From here we plan to head north to some of the historic sites and return a few times back to Addis.
