Little vacation to ETHIOPIA!!

So I am going to not do some work right now and send you fun things
about my Ethiopia trip! First of all it was soooo much fun and so nice
to experience another culture and country in Africa, if only to see
the crazy similarities and differences between the two. Ethiopia is so
different from Uganda! There is a much more developed feel to it there
and you can tell that it is from a culture of we do it ourselves style
independence rather than a everyone else needs to come and help us do
things that you see in UG. There is a lot of pride and people really
work hard. And it pays off...roads are better, there is more access to
electricity and running water, and cities are booming. Of course there
is still poverty, people living in mud houses, poor nutrition and
health. There is still a huge amount of friendliness and hospitality
just like here. Also, it is was really cool to see such a combination
of traditional and modern cultures...women will walk around with
really modern jeans and jewelry on fancy cell phones, but also be
wearing the traditional cotton wrap around her shoulders and have her
hair done in the traditional style. I was also super surprised about
the lack of English...not from illiteracy but because it is not the
country's national language and people do not seem interested in
making it. Oh and the food is incredible! Soooo much good food, spiced
well (unlike bland UG food) for like 2 dollars. And then there is the
coffee. They are claimed to be the birthplace of coffee and they have
this really cool ritual around it that you can see being done
everywhere from deep in the rural village to a fancy hotel. Women
(always women....a lot of gender inequality there) will sit at a
charcoal stove with the coffee pot and double brew pretty strong
coffee from probably right around the corner. They also set out all
this specific type of long grass to signify the coffee is there. So
delicious and it was about 30 cents per cup.

The coolest part of the trip was traveling in the north...Aksum/Axum
to be specific. This is where the original Axumite Empire was. This
civilization is as old if not older than ancient Egypt and was trading
all over the world thousands of years ago. There was so much exchange
of ideas into Africa from this place, mainly with Egypt and Yemen.
Therefore that is why the language and culture is sooo similar to
Arabic and ancient Hebrew. This area is the site of the Queen of Sheba
and the supposed Balthazar...one of the three wise men to see Hey zues
(jesus haha). They also claim to have the original ark of the covenant
in one of their churches. It was such an experience to see all of
these places. Later when I was in Addis Ababa (a NY like city) I went
to the National museum and saw Lucy! The "missing link" in human
evolution who was found in northern Ethiopia where I climbed the
volcano. Oh yea that was also incredible. We walked 3 hours at night
to see this thing...because it is in the Danakil desert which can get
up to 55 degree C during the day. This is the only permanent lava lake
on earth and it was mesmerizing to just sit and watch lava boiling
away...the earth is so cool! We then camped out on the volcano
overnight and climbed down with wild camels the next morning. Man it
was such a wonderful adventure that I will never forget. And I only
saw like a third or less of the country. It is so beautiful there.
Like a super green Arizona or Nevada. Great Rift Valley is
incredible!!!!