Oh, Gosh!

It's been too long, dear readers.  I'm sorry.  The daily little eternities have piled up to an intimidating, mocking height. At this point I can hardly hint at them.  I may try, but probably I'll stick to the here and now, and my  new four walls.  I'm just going to new lief it. 

OK, i should back up.  At the beginning of October I moved across the apartment complex at Hope University to my friends' couch.  It was a nice change of pace actually, and my teacher friends Dawit and Kiburu are just awesome and very generous. So, that said, finding the space and privacy to write, or do anything other than the essentials, the really bare naked essentials, escaped me.  Guarding my own little agendas enough for them to take root and stalk and leaves and fruit is a struggle of mine. Living in a common space filled with distraction, or actually just the possibility of distraction, devoured my sprouting agendas from the root creating a near desert of self motivation.  An agenda Sahara. 

I read books.  Book reading is something important now, a new internet.  And the old internet isn't itself.  Internet in Addis has few western equivalents...maybe the library.  The internet here is like the library, kind of.  It's public, or in public.  Porn is off limits, for example. Self imposed.  Uncouth music videos, most music videos, have me looking over my shoulder for co-workers or neighbors with whom I might want to avoid the exposure.  The understanding that the strangers sitting next to you will continue to sit next to you and perhaps chat and eat with you next week and next month and as long as you live in this neighborhood gives me a gritty determination to sanitize my internet rovings.  And it's more than just online sex abstinence.  Letting photos and articles with 'political' headlines, especially ones suggesting complicity with LGBTQ rights, linger on the screen before scrolling down starts to feel like a statement, given the general dismissal of the existence of gay people here.  Of course, no one looks over your shoulder, or cares, but the possibility, for me, is enough.  

I lost my camera.  Because I'm living in Addis Ababa though, I can say, “my camera was stolen” with more authority.  I don't know what happened to my camera, but without it I feel less motivated to blog somehow. I think that maybe I think I might disappoint you.  You might not believe me without the usual array of unrelated pictures of buildings and street animals that follow my main posts.  I dunno.  Um, I'm sorry.

So now, I'm tapping on my laptop in a new apartment, shared with a couple of other cool guys.  But I have my own room, this time.  A veritable agenda-garden, pictures pending.  One roommate is an Ethiopian 20-something job-hunting graduate of agricultural-management-logistics-vague-business-descriptors.  He also looks and acts oddly similar to a friend from college, Brian Cohen.  (If you're there, Brian, uh, hello!)  The other is a British 30-something published poet-writer-wanderer. Things seems positive.  The transition between places has gone well. I feel like I've moved from Bellevue to Capitol Hill, or from Exec to the Quads, or from some rich, nature-touching suburb to some almost-as-rich urban area.  My richness is sort of indisputable here.  The air is less clean but the smells of exhaust and dust and food and perfume and unnameable things easily make up for it.  The digs are nice.

There's too much else to say.  Merely glancing at the last two months of thoughts and experiences inflates it mountainous.  I'll be back sooner though, hopefully.  

Frightening Encounters with Unfathomable Exotic Mentality--my journey

Provided you're be-nooked, the daily rainstorm offers a pleasant moment for reflection.  Everyday since I arrived in Addis three weeks ago, the day begins with sun and about 75 degrees.  At 2:00 the clouds gather from the north. By 3, heavy rain, lightning and thunder, which peter out by 6.  After dark, twenty-foot puddles and swampy dirt roads challenge any outing.  But there becomes a comfortable rhythm to it.  As I hopped home last night from one mid-puddle rock to another, (a better strategy than guessing the firmness of puddle-rim dirt) I thought of a town in Austria somewhere with especially long-lived town-folk. Their secret to life apparently is the jagged and irregular cobblestones that compose the town's steep mountain streets and demand a life-bestowing set of strong core-muscles.  Maybe rock-hopping will win me some rock-abs too.  A group of women in front of me, like most folks here get around the wetness with umbrellas and beach sandals. Avoiding the balancing act, they slosh through the water and dry off whenever. 

My favorite time of day is when the thunderheads role in and the feeling of the afternoon air changes.  The wind picks up, cools down and the sun angles through the oncoming rain.  The best part is seeing the animals in the street, the cats, dogs, sheep, goats, donkeys, cows and horses all have the same hurried look as their owners—an excited loose-limbed hurry for cover.  The situation is without communication problems. To every living node the message is clear: Get ready!

***************

It shouldn't have been a surprise, but embarrassingly, it was.  I've only been here for a little while, but I didn't expect folks to relate to each other in the ways that I'm so familiar with already.  It may be a cliche in all the worst ways, but things just aren't as different here as I expected. It's like I never went anywhere at all, Todo. 

This observation brings both disappointment as well as a sort of warming self-assurance.

Disappointment because the thought of genuine diversity in terms how people are in the world is an exciting one.  I don't want to discount differences between peoples, but what is different strikes me now as so small. Part of the purpose for my travels, the purpose I hear about from other travelers, is to gain insight into myself by contrasting the relief between me and the people around me.  This is the seed of my frustration: There's not much to contrast.  Or if there is, I have to make an effort to find it.  In some ways, I find myself longing to live in a world more like the Lord of the Rings.  In my fantasy world, dwarves would be dwarves, elfs elfs, hobits hobits, Ethiopians Ethiopian and Americans American.  --Abhorrently other-ing and childish, I know, but there it is.  Disappointment revealed.

 Warmingly self-assured because I've always felt that dominant white American culture, my culture, a sort of bastard, orphan culture.  A rootless, floating collage of image-obsessed corporate agendas and arbitrarily detached strings of other peoples and times.  This may be as true as ever, but I was unsure of how much it affected me.  I was afraid that I was missing an essential part of myself  because of this lack of cultural rooted-ness.  But on a general, basic level, I think that while culture may affect many parts of who we are, it doesn't really affect how we are, collectively at least.  How we are is a colorful but fairly repetitious design on the human fabric.  Placing myself more squarely within this design gives me a feeling of ambivalence.  On one hand I feel free of my assumptions about cultural identities, and on the other, trapped in a predictable Country Buffet of universal being, if you will.  How I am, I realize, is less American and more essentially me.  But how I am is also less myself and more essentially everyone.  So, uh, cool, rite.      

rollinareound

View from little hill top by the school--storm clouds role from the N

Friendly impromptu guide of the hill, and qualified long jumper of the 2008 Olympics, apparently.  I asked he take my photo as well, but I don't like the pic so I'm not posting it... I forget his name as it was a little long.  

Attraction at the top of the hill--house of former Ethiopian "President" from a half century ago.  Emperor?  Which one?  The folks around I asked seemed a little unsure themselves.

Don't get cocky.  No one may live here, but it still has a handful of feisty guard dogs.

A pic out the cab window--A man camped on a lane divider with large box.  my curiosity peeked.

Before coming, I was told Addis was cover in litter and trash.  Not so!

out 09>?>][;,.}{)8///// cold. "}[_[-

Adventure number one.......On Friday I got the runs after supping on some tasty ShiroWat, an Ethiopian bean sauce, as did my sup-mates.  Unlike them, it stayed with me. A day. Two days.  Peeing out of my butt, trying to balance toilet squirts with water gulps. On the morning of day two, my poop was rosy red and the pea was brown, suggesting blood all round.  This worried me.  Then on the evening of the second day, while skyping with my dad at the internet café, I fainted in my chair.  According to him, after mumbling incoherently my eyes rolled back, chin tilted up and I lurched back onto my chair, head flopped behind. What I was told was five seconds later, I opened my eyes to a half dozen faces peering down at me.  It was dream-like.  Someone asked if I was ok.  I said yes.  My headphones were still on, and my dad explained through them, “Noel, you just passed out!”   Then I got up and puked outside the café, partially on the side walk.  People gave me dirty looks, I think, assuming I was drunk, maybe.   Fortunately, one of the frequent torrential rains started a few minutes later and washed it away. So nothing anybody could get too worked up about.  Back in the café, my dad helped me figure out a plan of action.  I would taxi back to the school and then go to a hospital with the help of the teachers.  The woman at the counter graciously offered her help.  I asked for some water, and she hollered at the restaurant next door to get it.  After sipping, I paid the internet bill (a dollar for over two hours), opened my broken umbrella and walked out into the heavy rain.  A guy from the café followed me into the street, introducing himself as a trained psychologist. “Hello, I am a trained psychologist.” And helped me flag a cab.  He must have over heard me talking on skype about the pressures of my situation here because he mentioned something about fainting as a result of stress.   I have a feeling it had more to do with altitude and dehydration, but I’m no trained psychologist. Cab caught, I rode the three blocks back to my apartment.  I must have looked and sounded pretty awful because even the driver asked if I was okay.  Though he may have been prompted by the psychologist who traded words as I got into the cab. With so many dire and unmet needs around,  I’m pretty astounded by how supportive everyone was.  Being a member of the Farengi (foreigner) club may have helped I suppose, but it’s hard to deny that folks here are pretty big hearted.

At the school I woke up Ellen and Jen for help.  After, describing my symptoms, Jen reminded me that we had eaten beets for dinner the night before, which explained my red and brown excretions.  This relieved me greatly as did it Ellen, who had apparently freaked out in secret as well.  Frankly, I should have realized it sooner.  Maybe I can pin it on the dehydration.  With a call, Jen woke up our regular cabby B’rook, who graciously came over and drove us across town to the reputed Korean Hospital.   It was a long drive as he carefully navigated the car through periodic floodings across the road.   Finally we rolled up to the Emergency room door.  The inside of the hospital was sparse, cavernous and poorly lit.  There were maybe six other people sitting around.   Almost on arrival, a lone, plain-clothed receptionist/nurse sat me down in a chair by his desk and took my vitals.  To draw blood, he cleaned a razor and cut into my middle finger a couple times.  No painless blood draws here.  I was told to go into a small room next to the desk and wait for the doctor.  A minute later, a quiet, intense and unblinking young doc came in.  He asked about everything, patiently responded to my questions and gently prodded my stomach.  After a 15 minute visit, his thoroughness and professionalism averted my near-culture shock.  He sent me home with instructions to take a Cipro antibiotic that I had brought with me from Seattle.  All and all, the visit was many times faster than any American hospital emergency room visit I’ve ever had.  Still, it was one of the growing handful of moments I’ve brushed against culture shock.  Usually I'm pretty flexible in negotiating differences between places and cultures, and pride myself in needing little to get by with little.  This is especially true when traveling and packing light.  But in moments of dehydration, exhaustion and vulnerability, little differences can have a bigger impact.  I felt annoyed by superfluous things like the lack of office furnishings, or the plain clothes of the nurse.  I felt entitled to a well-furnished shiny hospital waiting room and a pin-prick blood draw. Also I’m noticing a difference between making a home in a place and traveling through it.  Somehow, it’s easier to expect more when I intend to stay for a while.  I’m sure I’ll adjust soon enough. Today I took it easy but continued to feel nauseous.  At least the Cipro has relieved the cramps.  Patience, Noel, patience.

Donkies chompin road side.  No Donk-herd in sight.  "Donkey" in Amharic: "AhHEEya."  An onomatopoeia if I ever heard un!

Stray dog finds a morsel. 

the cheap three-wheel cabs of Addis.  About a dollar to ride the distance from North Beacon hill to Broadway--few miles

the internet cafe I'm in presently and the same I passed out in is the door at the end of the brick pathway upon which Mr. red-pants stands.

The large nameless street which leads to the ILAE.  There's probably more than a hundred of those massive tan apartment buildings around here.  All recently built government housing awarded to lucky or connected families, from what I understand.  I'm unclear about this though.  The be-trunked satellite dish is one of many thousands that adorn said buildings, and everything else.     

Tripping Abroad, Ambien

For me, this is new. It is my first blog, my platform debut.  A brave and trembling step into the light.  With it I hope to make a salty stew of personal reflection, documentation and art projects.  It should be fairly unedited and raw, more of an online composite/compost of my life in Addis Ababa than anything else.  Friends, family, some longing future-self, welcome.  If I’m to be a regular contributor here, I musn’t fret good writing or work, so expect little.  The first step is taken.  Watch me scamper away.

************************    

Last week was a rewarding blend of old passings and new comings.  I said goodbye to everybody in Seattle and America and caught up with them some too.  Memorable moments include the block party, where I re-proved my briefly embarrassed muffin-man routine, gave past and future rememberings to the strange new building next to my parent’s house and met kexp’s Derek Mizoni, who offered to hook me up with some band in Addis.  Nan’s impromptu company there was also greatly appreciated.  It was a treat seeing and talking with everyone.  Also, for what may be the first time, my family’s Lapush-ing really rejuvenated me.  It was short and sweet and somehow encompassed the best parts from outings past, as did well-wishing from and with beloved friends.  Returning from the beach, I danced and jangled in a farewell-hitting-of-clubs at Neighbors with the Slanderites.  On Friday, a flock of Chartiers flew over for a very warm send off.   I feel many times reborn—crawling through and out of the warm inner chambers of my collective families and homes, and emerging afresh.  It was official around 11:30 am on 8/17/13 when I said farewell to a pair of ardently adoring parents at the security check-in at Seatac.  Damnit, I’m spoiled with love. 

I remember seeing a show at ACT back in like 2008 called The Ugly American by Mike Daisy.   Daisy told me that every culture has a coming of age ceremony, and that middle class America is no exception.  The threshold of our adulthood lies far away.  Anywhere far away.  Preferably poor and brown, nevermind those folks down the street.  Because once you’ve been somewhere really poor and really brown, you have experienced real, raw, meaningfulness.  And from this towering vantage point you can say things like, yeah I’ve really seen the shit. Or, I’ve seen real babies covered in shit dying at my feet.  Or, my shitty dead baby jokes are from my own shitty personal experience.  Or, when I look at you I just see a big healthy, not-dying shitless baby.  You know so little about anything you big shitless baby.  You don’t know shit.  This is what I hope to cultivate in myself.   I deep and abiding appreciation for real shit. 

But, why am I doing this?  Pheonix told me to write a mission statement for my time here.  This will be an initial stab. 

Naively, I want to go to get away. Somehow I’ve maintained a stupid belief in the art of disappearing.  Getting away from dusty corner U.S.A. is a goal that’s endured since at least 5^th grade when I yearned for a life of globetrotting journalism.  Why Ethiopia?  There is an allure of the exotic other which colors most of the world.  But also a host of personal connections, such as dad’s trip, folks I’ve known, a cuisine hankering and an interest in the history.  It’s a challenge.  It demands a lot to be tested within me.  It asks me to grow into the role of co-worker, teacher and leader.  But this is the trip as it stands.  But what do I want out of it?    

Long term... I want insight into myself.  I want to isolate whatever prevents me from connecting with others, and overcome it.  I want an opportunity to be other oriented, to commit myself.  I want to grow through this commitment.   I want to work on taking risks of showing affection.  I want to deepen my capacity to love myself and everyone else.  (I’ll just leave this here.)

************************

Below is the haunted writings from an unsuccessful dosage of Ambien on my flight to Frankfurt.  I took the drug after a yawn, but then felt a rush of energy that merged with the chemicals into a nightmarish wakefulness.  From beginning to end I’ve calculated these short scribbles having took about three hours. Whatever words seem legible was the fruit of my telescoped and paranoid focus.

Dear reader, I am  have a purpose t odecied my puurp9oose!that will write AGAini am writing throuhfg the trviaoitises of /////////////////////wow that machine justw orjk……e                    repose just a reprsethe hanf of the woman BESIDE Em===me look like more likre s little puuppett/I princedss ]

,pmoments agao I thoighyt I was in the mooddle of hot wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwcaudren   lots of strange sounds and feelingas stone crevasses to my sdidesimpossible to say                                                                                                                                                        

Everymovrmrnt around mr has quick rebuttleswhy sh0oulnt I read you work and the dispeeaar. 

Everty shape arounf my poookds like  Fce to lear smear and ugerreeeear,            I forgot thr orders of prople on a plane.  2mbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooofweelllldedump    \Jus t one last thought ;ott;e wprdiies… just stay togetrthreeehrthertehrethre. Uyouu safer togrthethehthter