From noisy to quiet – this aptly describes the roads adjacent to the Bingham compound that we can see from our kitchen window. Gone is the view of the river in its many guises, gone are the young men exercising in the fresh air on the high horizontal bar, and gone are the donkeys that had made the journey down to the water’s edge several times a day for the past year.

On Monday this week a corrugated iron fence was erected preventing folk crossing from the shopping opportunities of Kolfe to their homes on the other side of the river valley. I watched people soon after the fence was in place as they turned a corner to be confronted by the tall metal barrier. Some looked appalled, some threw their hands up in horror. Most paused for a moment or two to comment on their plight to any who were around and would listen. This behavior diminished as the week progressed as word must have been passed around.

Why is the fence there? To try to prevent ‘atet’ and protect the local community. This disease is known in the West as Cholera. Although no government statistics are available, Seble (our house worker) knows of four cases within walking distance of her home. Word on the street is that the water-borne disease Cholera is caused by fruit. Thus it was that when I asked Seble to buy us a couple of mangos recently she wouldn’t, preferring to educate me on the symptoms of this appalling disease caught from - not water (which it is), but fruit (which it isn’t).

Popular perception has a lot to answer for, not least because this week I shared the wonderful news that Theresa, another missionary that Seble works for, had recently given birth to a baby girl. After praising God multiple times, Seble told me confidently that she had known that the baby was a girl. “How?” I asked, intrigued. Seble explained that someone had given her own mother earrings when she was pregnant with Seble, and Seble had had a dream in which she had similarly given earrings to Theresa. Seble related the story to her neighbour who confirmed that a girl would be the definite outcome of Theresa’s pregnancy - without question. There was a fifty/fifty chance I guess!

This could be the end of this week’s blog post except that developments are happening as I type. Having been excluded from the high horizontal bar beside the river, three guys have arrived carrying rough wooden poles and basic tools. They have almost completed a pair of parallel bars this side of the fence. It has not taken long. We have noticed a fascination with the Rio Olympics amongst Ethiopians so maybe a motivational legacy will remain even here.