Fendika....What a Day......

The last few days have been interesting. Our students had exams last week and vacation this week before they start second semester. Liz and I have had quite a bit of free time. We toured Axum and Lalibela last week, which was amazing.  Really great pictures. Personally, I thought that Axum was just ok but Lalibela was really wonderful.

Something really interesting happened to us today. Liz and I are going to Addis until Sunday to relax a bit and get some stuff for the house. Yesterday when we woke up, Liz was looking out of our balcony window and commented that it looked like a snowstorm. It was a complete white out. We couldn’t see any of the surrounding landscape outside of our neighborhood - very weird. So today we went to the airport for our flight. As usual it was delayed, but the reasoning behind this delay was unique. It is dust that is covering the sky and really everything around us. Dust from Sudan is blowing into Ethiopia and causing airports to shut down. One of our coworkers told us that it could sometimes take up to two days for the dust to clear. I was really looking forward to going to Addis but we had to put that plan on hold for another day. Hopefully, we will be able to get out of here tomorrow morning.

For the last couple of days a group has been in town from New York. We got a chance to hang out with and meet some great people. These trips are really fun for us and are a nice change from our normal schedule. This one though was particularly special. One of the participants in this trip was a woman, who together with her son, raised and donated money to build a schoolhouse and well in a rural area outside of Gondar. The school is called Fendika. I had the pleasure of visiting this school with the University of Maryland trip and interacting with the students two weeks ago.

The history of this school is great. Three years ago our program director visited the area and found a first and second grade class. First grade was learning under a tree that is now directly behind the new building and second grade was a bit further away under another group of trees. These students and teachers now have classrooms, desks, benches and chalkboards. They also have a clean water source about 50 yards from the building. Really a remarkable story.

Now back to yesterday – it’s even more remarkable that one of the donors traveled from America to Ethiopia to see it. Although students are on vacation now about 50 students showed up to welcome her. A makeshift plaque was hung on the wall and uncovered to show this donor’s family name. The children were singing, “Welcome, welcome, welcome!!” when we arrived. It was really powerful. As if this wasn’t enough she brought soccer balls, volley balls, jump ropes and arts and crafts for the students. The chairman of the village had us in his home for some injera with milk and berbere (a first for me and absolutely delicious although, yes, it sounds gross). The whole experience couldn’t have been better. We all had a lot of fun. We finished up with a traditional coffee ceremony before we left.

As often happens in these situations, specifically when you come to rural areas bearing gifts/donations, the kids start to get a little riled up and it can get chaotic. A lot of the kids started asking for money, which can get really annoying really fast. When we started to leave the kids followed us. It was a crowd of about 30-40 kids at this point. I lagged behind a bit to talk to a few of the kids as we walked. As we were walking along I felt something hit my backpack. I thought nothing of it. Then I saw something fly over my head and break on the ground a few feet in front of me. Then something hit me in the shoulder. I turned back to see a bunch of kids throwing rocks and clumps of dirt at me. This made me angry. This was one of the few times here that I was fuming mad. We just spent two hours dedicating a school and giving out fun stuff for the students and this is how they react? Throwing rocks at us, at me, as we leave? I was shocked. Who would act like that? How did the mood degenerate so much as to make some young kids think it was ok to throw rocks at people visiting their school and their village – one of these visitors being the person that made that school and well possible? It took me a few hours to get over this and I had to literally tell myself over and over again to not let the end of our visit cloud the great experience that we all just had.

This is a microcosm of how life is here. You have incredible highs and unbelievable lows. You have to take the good with the bad. It’s difficult to keep your cool sometimes but you have to no matter the circumstance. This place is different. People here act differently. I have to understand and accept that. I also realize that every day isn’t going to be a cakewalk. My patience is tested often and it keeps me grounded. So what do I choose to remember about that day? I remember someone traveling from America to see the results of her donation to a tiny village in Gondar, Ethiopia. I remember the look on this amazing woman’s face when we arrived and the children were clapping and singing. I remember the exact words that the chairman of the village said to this woman and how caring they were. I remember having a wonderful experience….and that’s all I remember.