Ethiopia, of saints and scoundrels PART2 04/2011

michnus

22nd July 2011

Back to the future!

The Ethiopian calendar, is called Ge’ez calendar. In short it means the entire world is in 2011 and they are in 2004. Ethiopian_calendar

Addis the capital of Ethiopia is a quirky, eccentric, art deco and seriously vibrant city. People play, wine and dine at night in the brightly lit center of town where row upon row of restaurants and shops flow out onto the packed streets.

Even weirder,” some Ethiopians use a 12-hour clock, with one cycle of 1 to 12 from dawn to dusk, and the other cycle from dusk to dawn. Unlike the convention in most countries, the start of the day is dawn, rather than midnight. Thus, 7:00 AM in East Africa Time corresponds to 1:00 in daylight hours in local Ethiopian time. 12:00 noon EAT is 6:00 in daylight hours, and 6:00 PM EAT is 12:00 in local time”

Got confusing at times when they told us to come back 5’clock the bank will open then.source:Time_in_Ethiopia

Most African cities are a no mercy, blood, sweat and tears fiend where the average person grind away trying to make a living. Not much is on offer other than basic products.

Addis on the other hand is in a different universe. Moreover, it is because of this reason I felt the need to write something about this charismatic city that borders on the exotic. Linda’s feelings of Addis described it well.

In all we had the pleasure of spending nearly 2 weeks in Addis. Not out of will, bikes had to be repaired and other silly stuff.

Walking around Addis you can be forgiven for thinking you are back in the 1970’s. Old Lada taxis rush around like crackbrained zombies, most are rust buckets and barely drivable.

Nothing works, taxi drivers do not use indicators as they don’t work, no lights and bellowing smoke while they race each other at 50km/h with colourful Rosaries and other amulets swinging around the rear view mirror doing their damndest to protect the drivers.

Not much show of road rage there is a sort of organized chaos as taxis, buses and cars jockey for space in the spaghetti-confused streets. In all Addis function with the 3milj odd inhabitants, or as the locals say, all is well in Abyssinia. Bear in mind there’s 87 odd million people in Ethiopia.

As the property boom swept across the world, the wagon also passed Ethiopia, today the skeletons of unfinished projects litter the city since they were the last to get onto the bandwagon.

One blessing, Addis is a big happening place and at some stage in the future these buildings will be filled with the chatter of hopeful Ethiopian workers. Currently the Chinese are the winners from supplying the fittings and materials for the building industry.

It’s the old meet the new, most old buildings and shops have this art deco fittings and style to them, it’s wonderful, we get lost in time. Many new buildings are glass houses and does not seem to really fit into the Addis vibe.