First Impressions

Hello world.  I’m sitting in my house right now in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia listening to Francisco Mela.  Franciscos’ jazz drumming—featuring what he calls a “Cuban accent”—is providing a nice break from the now not so bustling goings on of the city just outside my door.  Addis is surprisingly quiet now, considering since it’s like 9:30 on Saturday night.  (And 3:30 in Ethiopian time, since Ethiopians offset Western time by six hours.  The time difference can get quite confusing at times).  Today was also some sort of Ethiopian holiday, which I think partially accounts for the quiet.  I asked several locals about the holiday, but I’m still clueless as to what exactly they’re celebrating.  All I know is that a bunch of kids were dancing through the streets in groups, singing a song that repeated the words “hoya, hoya,” in the hopes of being thrown a few birr.  A kind of mid-August, Ethiopian version of Christmas caroling, if you will.  And I will.  Tomorrow is also a Muslim holiday…I think it’s the end of Ramadan, which is called Eid ul-Fitr.  Last night (Friday), people were saying that tomorrow might be a Muslim holiday, but we had to watch the TV to find out.  I guess it depends on the placement of the sun or moon.  Anyway, it turned out that today (Saturday) was not Eid ul-Fitr, so I guess it’s tomorrow.  It’s likely that I have this totally wrong, so if you know better, please leave a bitter comment.  I suppose that’s what people do on blogs.  But Ethiopia has large Christian and Muslim populations (roughly 60% and 30% respectively), so there are lots of holidays going on.  Not to mention Rosh Hodesh Elul, the beginning of the Hebrew month of Elul, which we celebrated last night.

            OKAY!  Sorry for that long-winded last (well, actually first) paragraph, but after four years of being told to keep my writing concise and well-organized—and, in turn, telling tutees to do the same—it felt really good to just vomit out my first thoughts on Ethiopia.  But if you waded through that not-really-a-paragraph, you deserve to know who I am, what I’m doing here, how I’ve liked it thus far, and why I’m pretentious enough to include the phrase “The Life and Times of” in the title of my blog.  I hope to answer those first three questions soon; if you know me, you may be able to answer the fourth yourself.  And if you don’t know me, feel free to speculate and hit me up with your own cockeyed theories.

            Here it goes: My name is Samuel Ry Lewin, but most people just call me Sam.  I play drums, and I like jazz and improvisation, politics, traveling, and ping-pong.  And dogs.  And some other things, too.  I’m in Addis working as a volunteer for the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee’s (JDC) Jewish Service Corps program, and I’ll be here for the next year. I’m working with Dr. Rick Hodes, who has lived in Ethiopia for over 20 years and does incredible work.  As a doctor, Rick is best known for his work with spine diseases, heart diseases, and cancer.  But even more impressive is the compassion he brings to everyday life.  His house is flooded with kids—mostly former patients—who all have incredible stories and have thrived since being treated by and moving in with Rick. 

            While I personally don’t have much medical experience, most of my job here is focused on public relations and raising awareness about Rick’s work.  I’m quickly learning, though, that my job really consists of doing whatever needs to be done, which can be anything from organizing trips to Ghana or India for surgery, to creating brochures to fundraise for those trips, to organizing Rick’s medical records (mostly digital photos of patients, their x-rays, and other information). There is a steep learning curve, but thankfully, my colleague Menachem, another JSC volunteer who has been here for two months, has been helping me learn the ropes. 

Menachem and I are housemates, along with our dog Toby (sp?) who lives outside.  Shaun, a former volunteer, bought Toby off the street about a year ago.  (Shaun was here on “vacation” for the past week, which was great.  He lived here for a year, and I think he’s eaten in 75% of the restaurants in Addis).  It’s great to have a dog around, but Toby can also be frustrating.  He tries to escape every time we open the gate and sometimes succeeds.  I thought chasing my dog Sierra through my neighborhood in Princeton, NJ was difficult, but dog chasing in Addis is a whole different ballgame.  I chased Toby around the block the other day, and I can assure you that it was a spectacle—a lanky white guy chasing a big dog through the bustling streets of Addis Ababa.  Last night, Toby got out in the pouring rain.  Our guard Danny chased him down; I think Toby ended up like two-kilometers down the road.  When he’s not escaping, Toby likes jumping and getting his wet, muddy paws all over your clothes—which isn’t really a big deal.  During the rainy season (and it is certainly the rainy season here), it’s pretty hard to avoid moisture and mud.  But yeah, Toby is a lovable dog who sings with the early morning church calls and eats leftover Ethiopian food.

I’ve been here for a week so far, and it’s been awesome.  Living here is simultaneously chaotic and relaxing: There is always a lot to do, but the pace of life in Addis is not stressful at all.  Things don’t happen on time; they happen when they happen.  This is annoying sometimes, but you quickly learn to go with it and embrace the relaxed pace of things. And just in case, I bring a book wherever I go.

            I’m also trying to slowly learn Amharic.  It’s a pretty difficult language.  The word thank you, for example, amasegenalo, is six syllables long!  I guess when you do manage to say it you really mean it.  There is also some overlap with Hebrew, but this doesn’t help much since my Hebrew is completely awful.  My favorite parts of Amharic are the proverbs.  I’ve gotten a few down so far, my favorite being der biaber anbessa yaser (spider webs united can stop a lion).  And the proverb most pertinent to learning Amharic: kes be kes enkoolal begru yihedal (slowly, slowly, the egg learns to walk).

            There is a lot more to write about—including an absolutely crazy hail storm and the time when we watched Ethiopia win gold and bronze in the women’s 5000m (cars were stopped in the middle of the road, as everyone watched a big screen outside Edna Mall).  But I’ll be here for a year, so you’ll here from me soon enough.