Field Report To You Oh My God: Part One
SUNDAY, DEC. 11
Wake up at 5:30am. Hop on the college bus to Shishinda at 6am. Why do these buses start so damn early? I ask this question every time I have to wake up in the dark to board these buses. But then the sun rises over a newly dawning Africa and the lush jungle mist creeps through the trees and I remember: Oh yeah, taking buses in Ethiopia is like a spectral morning light show. The admission is an early rise and a seat on the bus.
Arrive in Shishinda at 7:30am. Meet up with Tegagne, a colleague, and he shows me to my room at the Andinet Hotel, literally an eight by eight mud-walled cellblock, with a beaten-to-death foam mattress and questionable sheets. Cost is 25 birr ($1.50USD) a night. The electricity is out, as it will be most of the time in Shishinda. The shintbet is down the path, past the ratty-looking sheep lined up for slaughter and the gawking local family, baffled by my presence in such a modest establishment. After I go to the bathroom the owner asks me several times if everything is OK, as if I was puking in there instead of urinating.
For breakfast I eat ful, a bean/onion/pepper/butter dish, at a lean-to shelter with a tarp-roof, while my colleagues eat dulet, which is finely ground sheep intestine. Take a nap. Listen to Blind Pilot’s “We Are the Tide” album, which is growing on me, then venture out in Shishinda. I have nothing on the agenda today except to relax and wait for Monday, when the local schools are in session.
Shishinda is the equivalent to Ethiopia’s Pleasantville, a place where Superman might have lived, were he to crash-land on the wrong continent. It’s a junction city, with traffic heading straight for Mizan or diverting to Tepi. The road is recently paved, giving this town a luxury not even Bonga or Mizan enjoy. But the real treat is the numerous sidepaths and backroads just out of earshot of the main road.
At 9:30am I drink buna at the bus station, where I meet Mulugeta, a high school chemistry teacher serving his two years of duty in Shishinda after graduating from Bonga College. He and his friend have one pastime on Sundays: they walk aimlessly in the foothills around town. We do simply this, admiring the Catholic kindergarten (it’s nice!) and the cordoned-off section of the market where coffee is taxed and sold. This is my kind of town!
At noon, my colleagues and I walk to Lema’s, a restaurant well away from the main road, near the market, where we are served tibs by China (the sole waitress) and Anna (the drinks lady). My colleagues won’t let me eat with them, as they say I can’t compete with their speed and deft shoveling of food into their mouths. I concur. I like to enjoy my food. I’d rather not feel like I’m a tiny dog sharing a small bowl of chow with a pit bull (which is how I feel when I share a meal with most Ethiopians).
Lema’s is the place to eat, apparently, and we eat lunch and dinner there two days in a row. You know you’re in a small town when patrons don’t clap for service, but simply call out “China! China!” You also know you’re from a small town when you walk through and are obliged to greet and chew the fat with every single person you might have once been acquainted with when you lived here five years ago. This was the preposterous fate of Kebede, who once taught at the local high school for several years before moving on to Bonga. We couldn’t walk more than ten feet without him having to drift off and shoot the shit with someone he barely remembers. “I must give greeting,” he says, “Or else they’ll say, ‘He’s changed…he’s not the same person…” People gossip in small towns, and in gossip-controlled Ethiopia, it can be a fierce social motivator to be on your best behavior at all times.
MONDAY, DEC. 12
I visit Aberayuda primary school. They do not have an English Club, and have near-zero exposure to English except in class. Residents see a lot of Koreans in town (the road-builders basecamp, known informally as simply “South Korea,” is nearby) but the only white people they see zoom past in the passenger seat of Land Rovers, bound for expeditions in the Southwestern fringes of Ethiopia. Far as Shishinda residents are concerned, these “visitors to their country” might as well be blow-up dolls Ethiopian tour guides install in their vehicles so they can drive in the carpool lane.
Hence, I am mobbed. I try to talk to some of the college students at the school, to see how their practicum is going, and notice that I’m surrounded by at least 100 students who invariably scream something offensive and impolite as desired. I duck into the School Director’s office, and we sit awkwardly for a few minutes. I’m not sure anyone understands what kind of distress I’m in…that I can’t just walk around the school and take a gander, as it’s like Lady Gaga trying to walk through an Orange Country high school and not be noticed. I take a tactic from sharks and keep moving. If I stop and talk to anyone, inevitably a crowd of hundreds gathers to listen in, and I’m drowned in claustrophobia. If I keep moving, quickly moving, then usually its manageable.
I sit-in on two English lessons: one at Aberayuda and one at Dingera primary school. Both are handled by adept English speakers, definitely schooled in Active Learning Methods, but perhaps need to chill out a little bit. Maybe it’s my presence that makes them nervous, but when they spew out English as 120rpms nobody, not even I, can understand what the lesson’s about.
It must be frustrating to be a teacher of English in Ethiopia. The students lack confidence and even the will to try, because if they’re wrong they’ll be ridiculed. So trying to get students to practice English, even in English class, is like trying to pull wisdom teeth out of a toddler’s upper jaw, practically impossible/definitely excruciating.
TUESDAY, DEC. 13
It’s 8am and the bus to Chenna is pulling stupid tricks this morning. It circles around town before coming back to rest just outside the bus station. The passengers all get out. I’m confused. Apparently 80 percent capacity was not full enough to make the 15km journey to Chenna. The bus drivers get greedy and would rather have all the passengers disembark and think the bus isn’t going to Chenna, but then when a minivan pulls up yelling “Chenna! Chenna! Chenna!” and people rush to get on, suddenly the bus revs up and pulls away and Ethiopian, never ones to be wise about such things, frantically try to climb into a quickly speeding bus. Kebede, my colleague, turns to me and explains it as “simple jealousy.” The bus passengers run and jump back onto the bus once it stops a block away, but I walk as slowly as I can. The bus won’t leave town without my patronage. It knows where I want to go, and I know it will do everything short of murder its kid sister to get my 10 birr bus fare for the day. And so I wait, outside the bus, for it to take off, disappear in the distance, reappear, drive to the other side of town, disappear, reappear on the horizon and come to a stop right in front of me. OK, time to get on. This time the bus is sufficiently full to make the long, long 15 km journey to Chenna, and so departs, but then makes a stop every kilometer on the way to load up gear/passengers who only need a lift a few blocks.
In Ethiopia, it’s the shorter distance journeys that are most distressing. I will just leave it at that, as I have another bus story to tell later.
10:30am and I finally arrive in Chenna. The main road is still being worked on, and it rained last night, so it’s a mud-ugly town on first inspection. I’m staying at the Sheraton, a ritzy place with more cell-block rooms behind a restaurant/bar, but at least the sheets are freshly laundered. Teshome, Zelalem, and I walk to Qocha Wacha primary school to continue my study of English Clubs and the Practicum experience. When we arrive, the college students are doing a service project, installing markers for students to line up at in the morning when they salute the flag and sing the allegiance. I talk with the Director and one of the English teachers. They lack many resources and qualified English teachers, whatever that means.
The school has dramatic views. Chenna is essentially a hilltown in the Toscana sense of the word, with downright chilly temps and steep drops on either side of town. At Chenna primary school, the college students (who have converted classrooms into makeshift dormitories) whip up a coffee ceremony to mark the beginning of practicum. Coffee, orange soda, popcorn, and bread is served. I mark the occasion by giving an inspirational speech and then cutting the bread. Since the students come from different parts of SW Ethiopia, they present each of their unique dances. I did not bring anything warmer than a scarf and, by the end of the performances, am shivering. My colleagues and I retreat back to the Sheraton, where we put on several more layers, eat dinner, and then drink some Supermint, guaranteed to keep you warm on a cold night, and give you fresh breath, too.
