Getting Out of Town

  Last Saturday, Tiffany and I hired a driver to take us outside of Addis.  The plan was to visit a cave church and a couple of ancient sites.
  We left very early, so we actually had time to kill on our way to the 1st stop.  We left the car a few times to snap scenic pictures of the mountains.  Have I mentioned that Addis is in the mountains?  It's very pretty here.
  We also visited the big Saturday market in a small town called Awash Melka.  We were the main attraction there.  As soon as we left the car, a group of children attached themselves to us.  They would say hello very shyly, and when I replied, "Selam"(hello), the whole group broke into a fit of giggles.  The market was packed with people.  Donkeys and cows stood in large groups waiting to be sold.  Teff, the grain used to make injera, was piled high on dirty old tarps.  It was a bit strange not seeing it in a container.  Everything seemed to be available here, from various spices to Obama shirts (Obama is HUGE here).
  The 3 sites we visited are not really worth writing home about.  The 1st one, Melka Kunture, is an old site where lots of fossils and stone age tools wee found.  It could be a really cool place, but the archaeologists abandoned it before it was fully excavated.  Adadi Mariam, a 12th Century cave church was the next destination.  This was the best site that we saw.  The church was not all that pretty, but it is very old and was carved out of rock.  The last place, Tiya, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  It is eerily similar to Stone Henge in England.
  While the main attractions of the day were less than thrilling, seeing the country side was certainly the day's highlight.  There are 5 roads leading away from Addis.  Ours was a paved 2 land street that stretched over picturesque rolling hills.  The land is yellow and dry right now, but as the rainy season is beginning, soon everything will be a vibrant green.  Just a few minutes outside of the city, beautiful straw huts begin to appear outside our windows.  Children spot our car and wave to us, shouting "Fereng! Fereng!" (foreigner).  When we wave to them, big smiles beam back at us.  As we near a small town, we pass a slow moving donkey taxi.  Donkeys seem to be the national form of transportation. Some people ride them along the road, while others use them to pull carts full of straw or wood.  The most common thing we see is donkeys with big yellow buckets strapped to their backs.  "They are carrying water", our guide tells us.  Water is not widely available in rural Ethiopia, so people must travel long distances in order to find this scarce resource.  At one point, I see a girl collecting dirty water from a pothole.  Not everyone uses a donkey for transportation, however.  We pass many people simply walking along this road that appears to lead to nowhere.  Many older women struggle with heavy bundles of wood that are strapped to their backs.  Their burden is so heavy that their bodies are bent at a 90 degree angle.  Sometimes, the piles look bigger than the woman carrying them.  As we pass them in our comfortable vehicle, I glance back at them.  Their tired eyes stare straight ahead, while dirt and dust cakes their weathered faces.  These women are much stronger than I will ever be.  Both physically and mentally. 
  After briefly seeing life outside of the city, I have an even greater appreciation for the people of Ethiopia.  I hope to gain even a tiny bit of their strength before I return home.