Maybe We Should Have Taken the Nyala

Endemna Arderachu, Endemna Wallu, weyass Deunah Deru!

So I decided to go ahead and write my next exciting update from the
Cradle of Humanity (I'm sure there's a pun I could make on that)
before my life got extraordinarily busy again with school and other
work. In fact, I'm supposed to be at a teacher's meeting right now,
but since the entire meeting is in Amharic and I'm still limited to
about 30 words, I decided you all were more important.

My fellow American, Erin, and I took our first real retreat this past
week during our end of semester break. We decided to head to the Bale
Mountains in the south for one of my favorite activities, a good ol'
bit of hiking and backpacking. Before we can get to the exciting
part, I have to lament about work. We had to give exams to finish out
the semester, and between reviewing other teacher's exams for English
mistakes, writing and grading my own exams, and invigilating
(--proctoring exams, for anyone else who is confused by this word) I
got very little sleep the week before my vacation. Unfortunately, I
had to fail most of my Grade 12 students because for some reason they
think I'm an easy teacher and clearly did not take notes or even try
in my class. Hopefully, they'll get the message and try a bit harder
next semester so they can pass. It does come with a bit of
satisfaction to fail some students because they are very lazy, but I
also wonder what I can do to be a better teacher to them. I decided
they need to do a lot more work next semester to force some knowledge
into their head. They're going to hate me.

Onto the more exciting bits--Bale Mountains were beautiful and Erin
and I were able to see so many indigenous and endangered animals at
very close distance. We camped for 3 nights and hiked for two days.
The first night we had a warthog we nicknamed Pumba running through
our campsite. I kept on thinking about bacon, but the people in the
region are mainly Muslim or Orthodox and both religions consider pigs
unclean and wont eat them. Just pepper the hog and throw it in a
frying pan and I think I can change their minds. We also saw the
elusive Mountain Nyala. This is like a big deer and apparently its
rarely photographed which is strange because herds of them were all
over the place. Maybe the animals think Erin is Snow White and she
just attracts all the animals with her forest prancing.
Our guide seemed to be extremely experienced and he helped us
identify different species of eagles by markings and informed us about
the Afro-Alpine terrain which we were hiking in. To us, it looked
like a high rocky desert because it was the dry season, but he told us
for 8 months of the year its actually pretty green. Daniel The Guide
also told us that he had just led a 48 day trek for National
Geographic to search for the endangered Ethiopian Cabbarro (Wolf). We
love National Geographic here because its something easy to read and
Erin got about a dozen of them in a Christmas package. I think he
could tell we were excited, so we met with his friend who works with
the researchers and tracks the wolves. He's self-taught and can
probably identify all 200 wolves in the region by sight. So after a
night of frost, we packed and went wolf tracking. We saw seven wolves
altogether including a mother and her two cubs. They're smaller than
the American wolf, I think, and they're a reddish-light brown to blend
into the sandy grasses and light colored rocks of the terrain. One
even started posing for our camera.
Unfortunately, our guide turned an unsavory side on us, and we
decided not to continue with him for a third day of hiking as planned.
Instead of helping the two firengi women anymore, he told us to stand
by the side of the only road for a hundred kilometres and wait for
someone to pick us up to head back north. In addition, he and his
cohorts tried to compete with us for a ride for all passing vehicles.
Erin and I decided to start walking the road north to get away from
them and we eventually got picked up by a bus and stayed for a lovely
night in Dodolla and then met up with other volunteers in Ziway. They
were traveling south with 30 teenagers from the oratory to another
compound in Dilla for the feast weekend. I joined the group to Dilla
and Erin, who was a bit travel worn by then, continued north to Addis.
On the bus to Dilla, 5 of our 30 leggosch (children) did not vomit.
We were very proud of the the five. In Dilla, they took as many
showers in the house as they could, climbed the mango trees and got
sick off of unripe mangoes, and nearly drowned trying to swim. I was
lifeguard on duty at the pool, and I encouraged the drowning by making
the boys who couldn't swim (nearly all of them) do cannonballs at the
deep end of the pool and I promised I would bring them up from the
bottom. That part was fine. I did forget to tell them not to breathe
in once they were in the water, so quite a few became water-logged.
But saving peoples' lives appears to be a really good bonding method,
unless you are the one to have caused the near-death experience. Oh,
the things I learn as a missioner.
I also ran my very first race in Ethiopia. It was only a 5km race,
but I had 14 year-old-girls kick my butt so hard, my friend was
embarrassed to say hello to me. My excuse is that I was holding hands
and pulling along two other little girls the entire way, but really I
wouldn't have done much better without them. No doubt, Ethiopians are
fast. And none of the girls were wearing shoes. I'm such an
embarrassment.
Sorry if this is a bit long, but I feel I won't have time to write an
email for a while. Being a good teacher takes a lot of time and
effort, and hopefully I'll also start Amharic lessons soon so I
understand more than "Anchi. Gobez." ("You. Good") Please keep on
sending letters as its a bit easier for me to respond to those.
Anyone who is inspired to send a package (don't feel pressured), I
have most common goods here, but new music, especially hiphop and good
Christian music for the kids is always appreciated as well as spare
flash drives (filled with music might be nice), pictures are good, and
of course, chocolate. Since Orthodox Lent has started, I think I've
decided to give up kolo (roasted and spiced barley), which is
basically my crack here. Chocolate is too rare to actually be given
up. Love and good thoughts to all of you. Hope you're thawing out
from the shell of winter and your Spring looks as bright as everyday
here. Jealous? I thought so.

Warmest regards,

Virginia/Va/Van