Merry Christmas! Happy Ganna! Or, in Ahmaric: Melkam Yelidet Beaal!
The Ethiopian Christmas known as Ganna is celebrated on January 7th. The word Ganna is used interchangeably with the word Christmas, to mean the birth of Jesus Christ (leddat).
Here is a good article about Christmas traditions in Ethiopia.
Found a great article today that does a nice job summarizing some of the most significant events to happen in Ethiopia in the year 2007 (according to our calendar anyway!)
Check it out here on the Walta Information Centre site.
I love the Ethiopian (coptic) cross - it's such a beautiful symbol, and one that I've been attracted to long before I knew from whence it came...
Among the things I want to buy in Ethiopia is several of these crosses -- I would like to give them as gifts to my family/friends who have supported me on this journey, and of course have one for me(!) and then several left to give to Sproutie over the course of her life...
Anyone who has already traveled and knows of a good place to buy silver, please let me know!
I'm a complete travel whore fan. Given the choice between clothes and travel, or between a new car and travel, or between jewelry and travel, I will choose travel every time. And, if given the choice between mediocre sex and travel, I will choose travel. (Please note the very deliberate use of the word "mediocre". Enuf said.)
I love it - nothing makes me happier than stepping into a culture that is brand new, surrounded by people speaking a language I don't understand, with new smells, new sounds, new foods, etc. And Africa seems to be the place that turns me on the most.
I've been really fortunate in my life, and I've been able to travel quite a bit in Africa. I've been to Kenya, Zimbabwe, Morocco, Botswana, South Africa and Namibia. Would go back to each an every one of these places again in a heartbeat.
But one very IMPORTANT place I have not yet been: Ethiopia!!
So, in anticipation of my trip (someday!) to go pick up the Sproutie, I have started doing some planning. I *love* the planning part... I read travel books, I pore over maps, I google the hell out of it... for me, it's almost as much fun as the actual travel. :-)
One of my favorite resources, Budget Travel, has just published a good story on Ethiopia. You can check it out here.
They also published the fun What $100 Buys in Addis Ababa, which has got me started on shopping planning, too!!
This is a great resource for those traveling - I will be sure to check it out when my time finally comes to travel to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia...
Check out the What's Up Addis website for goings-on in Addis.
(from Nazret.com) - Big news from over the weekend!
BERLIN (AFP) — Double Olympic champion Haile Gebrselassie broke the world marathon record with an official time of 2hr 4min 26sec to win the 34th Berlin Marathon on Sunday [Sept 30, 2007].
The 34-year-old Ethiopian, who won 10,000m gold at Atlanta in 1996 and at Sydney four years later, bettered Kenyan Paul Tergat's record of 2hr 4min and 55sec set in 2003 also in the German capital.
"Don't ask me how proud I am, words can't describe," said the breathless new world record holder who picks up the 50,000 winner's cheque on top of his 250,000 fee for competing. "It's something really special."
And here's another angle on the same story - very nice to see what kind of person he is:
"I am sorry -- this record belonged to Paul Tergat," Gebrselassie told a news conference when asked about the phone call. "Paul is my friend."
Gebrselassie tried to tell Tergat he thought he had better weather conditions this year compared to 2003, when it was sunnier and warmer, although there was less wind. But Tergat responded that records were meant to be broken.
"I really wanted to do this record but I was a little bit worried about it, worried about attacking my friend's record," said Gebrselassie, 34, who fell 61 seconds short a year ago in Berlin in his first attempt to break Tergat's mark of 2:04.55.
"I think Paul understands that. I talked to him and said 'Hi, Paul, I'm sorry.' I said 'You can come here and try to get it back again next year'."
Tomorrow is the first big religious holiday of the new year in Ethiopia: Meskal (or Maskal), which is an Amharic word meaning "the finding of the true cross".
Full description of the history and celebration of this holiday is here.
The short version is this: Saint Helena, mother of Emperor Constantine, went to Jerusalem in the 4th century AD to find the cross on which Jesus was crucified, which had been lost. She burned some incense, and followed the smoke to find the remnants of the cross.
According to legend, several pieces of the cross were later given to Ethiopian Emporer Dawit in thanks for the efforts of the Ethiopian Christian kings in protecting Egyptian Copts against the Egyptian Muslims. The pieces of the cross were carefully guarded on their way to Ethiopia, with torchbearers leading the way. The Ethiopian Church still claims to have a piece of the true cross, buried underneath the remote monastery of Gishen Mariam.
The holiday is marked with celebrations featuring torchbearers and huge community bonfires. The biggest bonfire is in the main square in Addis Ababa, called (natch!) Meskal Square.
**Updated to add a link to this great post over at Firenge Addis, with description of this year's celebration in Addis, complete with a Flickr link with photos!**
OK, it's finally here - the year 2000 has arrived in Ethiopia.
And, here in the U.S. thousands are celebrating the 39th(?) birthday of my FAB sister, Pamplemousse!
(She's the one with the cutey-cute pigtails in this shot. The one who looks like a boy? That's me.)
Happy happy birthday!!
And I'm celebrating both events by nursing a sore throat and generally feeling a bit crappy. How's that for charming?
But I am sure to be all better by tonight, as La Pamp and I are going to one of our favorite spots for a birthday din-din: Sol Food. The food there is Puerto Rican with a bit of a Cuban spin, and it rocks.
They also offer some protein-and-veg combos which is good because I am on a big ol' diet, and trying to avoid the carb thing. Which sucks, as I am ALL ABOUT the carbs. Sigh.
September 11th has a pretty bad association here in the U.S., but in Ethiopia, it's New Year's Eve today.
Tomorrow is the first day of the new millennium in Ethiopia - it will be the year 2000. Woo hoo!
The millennium celebrations planned in Addis Ababa incorporate both the western tradition of midnight and fireworks and the Ethiopian tradition of gift giving and feasting on Engutatash (New Year's Day). Here's a great article on the goings-on in Ethiopia today and tomorrow.
1999 was a leap year in Ethiopia so today (Sept 11th) is the 6th day of Pugami (the 13th month) in the Ethiopian calendar, the leap year extra day.
**Updated to add a link to a great video on Haze's blog!**
A very good article on Ethiopia as it approaches the Millennium appeared in The Observer over the weekend.
Plus the photo that accompanied the article (reproduced here) is stunning.
Check it out.
Listed among the "The 10 Best Places You've Never Heard Of", according to Budget Travel, is Yirgalem, Ethiopia!
See the article here.
This is a tough minute and a half, but worth watching.
Want to do something?
One - The Campaign to Make Poverty History
AMREF
An excellent article on Ethiopian adoptions:
A couple of people commented/asked if I really, truly meant it when I said in yesterday's post that I won't actually see Sprout in person until after the Ethiopian adoption is finalized.
The answer is: Yes.
In the Ethiopian adoption programs, you get a referral, then (if you accept the child) while you remain here in the U.S., an Ethiopian attorney goes to court on your behalf and shepherds the adoption through the court process in Addis Ababa.
The adoption is finalized in your absence.
So, by the time I travel to Ethiopia, and first lay eyes on my prize, Sprout will already legally be my very own.
CARSON, California (AP): Olympic champion Meseret Defar of Ethiopia broke the world record in the women's 2-mile run Sunday at the Adidas Track Classic.
Defar won in 9 minutes, 10.47 seconds, lowering the mark of 9:11.97 set by American Regina Jacobs in 1999.
The crowd at Home Depot Center roared as the 23-year-old runner cruised toward the finish line, leaving her rivals far behind. Defar grabbed the green, gold and red Ethiopian flag and jogged around the track, stopping to greet well-wishers.
Defar won a gold medal in the 5,000 meters at the 2004 Athens Olympics and Sunday's effort was her fourth world mark.
Frommer's publishes a monthly Global Price Index.
And, on this month's version, Addis Ababa tops the list as the spot where your dollar will get you the most!
Here's what they report:
So, yeah, adoption is the new black. It's hip, it's trendy, it's popular with celebrities. But it's not nearly popular enough.
The current rate of adoption is so small that's its like a raindrop of the hurricane of the orphan crisis. According to a study by the United Nations, it would require 60 times the number of adoptions now taking place to absorb all the orphans needing homes in the world. (thanks to Kate for posting about the study.)
Africa has it the worst. Africa has more "double" orphans - children who have lost both parents - than anywhere else in the world. According to the UN study, in many sub-Saharan African countries, double orphans make up 3 percent or more of the under-18 population.
It would take 2,000 times the current number of adoptions to find families for the 7.7 million children in Africa who have no parents.
These data make me especially appalled at those people who argue against international adoptions on the basis that the children of the third world are being ripped away by imperialistic Americans who are depriving the children of their heritage. What a load of crap.
It is indisputable that children would be better served by an adoption within their own culture and country. It is also indisputable that there are not enough people in Ethiopia to adopt all these kids. In the meantime, the majority of Ethiopian orphans will die, or will survive for some time in poverty, disease, and hunger.
A tiny fraction of these orphans will get adopted by people from other countries, and will miss out on their Ethiopian culture. This is indeed a significant loss, and a life away from one's homeland and biological family is definitely a life compromised.
But it's a whole lot better than no life at all.
Every year in Ethiopia, the courts close for some period. The timing of this closure varies, as does the duration. Usually it's a six-eight week period, which generally falls during our August & September.
Not this year.
I spoke to the coordinator at my agency yesterday, and she told me that this year's closures will be a doozy. We're talking about a looooong time. Like [maybe] up to 3 months.
This year, the Ethiopian courts are expected to close sometime near the end of July, and stay closed until mid- to late October, because of the millenium celebration.
(Yes, you read that right - it's 1999 right now in Ethiopia. They use an entirely different calendar. And according to the Ethiopian calendar, the first day of the year 2000 is our September 11 (or 12?), 2007.)
I don't have my dossier complete yet, so I think the only way this will adversly affect me is when my case (probably) lands in the big ol' logjam of cases that will be lined up for the courts to hear once they do open up again.
So that makes it much more likely that I'm looking at travel the very end of this year, or perhaps early next year, to bring Sprout home. (But I'm still hoping for Christmas - reasonable or not!)
Over at her excellent Thinking About Adopting website, Robin Bartko has posted a podcast of special interest to those of us adopting from Ethiopia.
It's an interview with a prominent adoption doctor, Laurie Miller, recorded during the recent Joint Council on International Children's Services (JCICS) Conference in San Antonio, Texas:
"Health of Children Adopted from Ethiopia - An Interview with Dr. Laurie C. Miller at the 2007 JCICS Conference".
Check it out.
Yesterday, I was just plain beat. Hard week overall. Work is overwhelming. I'm not sleeping enough, or exercising enough. I have an eye infection. In BOTH eyes. Which isn't one of those gross ones, but it makes my eyes bloodshot and they hurt. And it was Friday the 13th. General mood index: 2.5 outta 10.
But then! I got home, and there was a little package on my front doorstep.
And I opened it up, and found these lovely gifts from my fabulous Secret Blog Pal.
I just want you to know, SBP, you *completely* made my day!!!
The adorable onesie has the outline of the African continent and some Amharic writing on it (Amharic is the language for the majority of the population in Ethiopia).
And the sticker says "superman was adopted". Love that!!
Thank you so much, SBP!!!
(Now if someone who reads Amharic would please tell me what this onesie says, that would be good...)
