My Journey and Weekly ruminations

This last week I was on site visit. I was placed in the Illubabor region within Oromia; my hub town,which is the main city in my Area is Metu. It is truly a beautiful piece of country. My permanent site is atop a mountain in the Yayo Forrest which is a UNESCO site. I was shocked at how beautiful the land was the first time I got up there. There is only one other volunteer in my area and he’s in my Group, I feel super lucky to have him near me because he’s only a couple towns over. However there are 8 of us from Group 21 in the region. My town is a Warreda town which means there are government offices in the town for the Ethiopian equivalent of a county. Therefore my town is fairly large all things considered. I can buy most things I need within my town but Metu is only a relatively quick ride away (about 2 hours). My school is great too and my fellow teachers are very open to having me in their school and apart of their staff. I also met my director who is just the nicest guy and has h

Life makes no sense sometimes. Here especially. People go on living their lives like they know nothing else and that’s because that’s exactly the case. Most people I know back in the states would cringe at the life most people live here, and yetEthiopians carry on with some of the purest smiles in the world. Some things are the same though, after many summers as a camp counselor, I’ve grown sensitive to the way children act; children are the same here. Always playing, always laughing, always smiling. However I see a connection with the kidshere that I didn’t see in the states. These kids rely on eachother with a capacity for a sort of guarded trust that isn’t even seen in most adults in America let alone the children. They also round up the gang the moment a couple of white guys (myself and my coworker) roll up on the block - fist bumps and high fives are given and a never ending stream of “chow!” And “bye-bye” is heard until we are both out of site. At the end of the day, it’s this ex