Phil and Chris in Ethiopia

During the last two weeks my classroom notice boards were due to be painted. The American guy who was tasked with this ran out of time before his return to the States so left me the paint and brushes. It took two days and four coats of paint to achieve that goal. The paint had a tendency to be absorbed by the very old pin board so needed to be ‘worked in’. One thing I learnt the hard way. It is advisable to ensure that you have enough to finish an entire board before you ask for a refill of paint. I discovered the paint room.

While on holiday in the UK someone asked me if it rains in Addis. It does - look:

(To get maximum enjoyment from these 36 seconds, and for us to get maximum sympathy points, view it full screen and change the quality to 1080p so you can see the individual hailstones)

Have you seen the makeover programmes that transform a house or room in a short time frame? Well that has been my challenge during the last two weeks. I needed to get to know everything in my classroom and the outside store and organize it in a way that would be useable by both adults and children alike.

Second go at writing this. Five minutes ago I’d settled down, typed the title, and bang the power went off. Only twenty four minutes of battery left, so hasty switch to my work laptop (which hasn’t quite made it all the way to work yet…) which has 90% battery for three hours or so. Welcome back to Addis. Now I’m on a timescale…

The Welcome

School's out. it was the last day on Friday and on Thursday next week we will be heading for the UK for 20 days of madness driving/flying around the country to visit St Albans, Chelmsford, Wetheringsett, Dereham, Edinburgh, Kettering, Cheltenham and Southampton. We're both in need of a holiday - the school year here has only two terms and four breaks so we've both worked longer than we are used to and are looking forward to a change and (as far as I am concerned) eating as many pork products as possible.

Along with a couple of other teachers I visited Interlakes International School which is about 40km south of Addis. It was set up and is run by Dutch Christians.

The new library space was finally prepared and carpeted, so a move from the old library (located on top of the gym accessed by concrete and metal steps) could begin.

Cake

Someone who knows him well said Haile would be far more than a taxi driver if I needed help with anything. Well I needed help on Chris’s birthday – where on earth do you get a birthday cake in Addis? I had seen some cakes in a coffee shop chain, and also in the Hilton. However “I’m just popping out to get a cake” is not something you can say to your staff at lunch time here, because popping anywhere is almost impossible, and cakes are few and far between. Cake is a western introduction to Ethiopia, so the Amharic word for “cake” is … “cake” (or “ኬክ” as they say here).

To mark the culmination of Yetesfye Birhan for this academic year the girls were invited to a Gibsha. This they understand as being an injera and wat meal. They were encouraged also to bring their Mums if they wished.

Last week I told you about my trip to Nazaret to see the Tear Fund Charity at work. There was another aspect to our busy day. We were taken to see a kindergarten. It was started by Senait (the lady who was so proud of her government licence).