Today was our first full day in Addis Ababa. We started the day by leaving the Kaleb Hotel (which unexpectedly tripled its rates since the last time a W2T group stayed here) and moving next door ino the Beer Garden Inn, a combination microbrewery and hotel established by a couple of expatriot Germans. After breakfast, the ODA (Oromia Development Association) drivers arrived to take us to see three of the wells that are under constuction thanks to W2T. Riding in a vehicle in Addis Ababa is an exciting experience. The only operative traffic law seems to be "blow your horn and keep going." Imagine if all the world is the passenger pickup area at the airport. Cars park two deep anywhere, cut in and out of traffic, and mostly (but not always) drive on the right side of the roads, all as fast as possible. Cows, goats, sheep, donkeys, and fearless pedestrians walk right down the middle or cross at will, sharing the streets with cars, trucks, busses, and vans, many of them spewing black smoke. All of them tap their horns constantly, not so much as a warning, but as public notice of "here I come." We’ve seen three traffic lights; only one of those was working, and not a soul paid a bit of attention to it. Every direction enters the intersection at the same time, and works things out with a combination of gestures and horn honking. We finally left the crowds and traffic of the city, and went out into the country on on a surpisingly modern and well-maintained highway. The driver of the truck I was in was Jihar. I asked him if he had ever heard of NASCAR. He hadn’t, but liked the sound of it. Lane wanted to know if they had speed limits in Ethiopia. Jihar understood the question, but not the concept. (I did later see a "40 kph" sign; we were doing about 90 at the time.) About 20 miles outside Addis Jihar pulled off the road and fastened his seatbelt. We all decided that it must be a REALLY good idea to do likewise, and it turned out to be true. Entering the villages of the Sendafa region, there were only "implied" roads; without being strapped to our seats we would literally have been bouncing off the roof. The "villages" we saw consist of maybe a dozen houses each, small round buildings maybe 20 feet across, made of mud slathered over wooden poles, with a thatched roof. Most of the families get by on subsistence farming of potatoes and grains, although rocks seem to be the biggest crop; it’s ing that they are able to plow their fields at all, especially with only hand tools or ox-drawn plows. They also raise cattle and goats, which roam freely though the pastures and fields. The cows do lead to one small industry that would surprise a lot of Texas ranchers: cow pies. Cow manure is collected and placed in large holes dug in the earh, and allowed to ferment for a few months. When good and ripe, it is taken out and mixed — by hand — with straw, and spread into a flat patty aout the size of a dinner plate. Once dried by the sun (still with hand prints visible in them) the patties are stacked in piles as much as 12 feet high, until they are taken to town and sold for fuel, three for one "bir" (about 2 cents a cow pie.) Some of the housing compounds had ten or twelve of these giant piles outside their fences. We visted three wellsd in various stages of completion. They are placed with the help of a hydrologist, who determines whether there will be sufficient water. Another factor in their placement is to make them relatively convenient to as many of the compounds as possible. Once complete, not only will cleaner water be avilable, but the trip will have been reduced from an hour-long walk (or more) to just a few minutes. The three wells of Sendafa (named for the nearby river) are all hand-dug wells. Mike and Meredith explained that these are much more economical than the bored wells. Also, the people who will take advantage of the newly-available water are able to help more in their construction, digging by hand about 15-20 feet down, until sufficient water is there in the bottom. One of the wells is only a few feet away from one of the present water-collection sites. It’s fed by a spring, and flows into a depression at the bottom of a wash. Cattle and donkeys drink from it, tromp right through it, or "do their business" where it can run right into the water. And this is best source of water the people have; the river was even worse. The wells we saw today are nearly complete, fully dug out and lined with concrete culvert pipes. Two of them had fresh flat pads constructed of concrete and the easily-avialable rocks, but for the third, we helped by gathering rocks out of the field and mixing the concrete with the local men and children (later we heard that most of the women were attending the funeral of one of the village people.) I’m sure they all got a kick out of my "Little Engine That Could" impression as I huffed and puffed. I was going to write it off the being in worse shape than I had thought, but Mike explained that since we’re at a pretty high elevation, it would be a while before we would have any endurance (I like his explanation better.) Eventually I joined Jo and Bobbie, who had decided that "supervising" from under the tree was a better idea. Meanwhile, Lane was the toast of the town. Every time he took a picture of the local boys, they would cluster around him to see the result. Sometimes all you could see of him in the pile of excited boys was his ever-present hat. Nazif, our host, explained that the school is too small to accomodate all the kids at once, so the older ones (5-7th grade) go in the morning, and the smaller ones in the aternoon. It’s about a 45-minute walk each way. In town, the youngest ones would also attend "KG" (kindergarten) but not this far out. We weren’t quite able to finish today, as the owners of some of the tools we needed were also at the funeral, but tomorrow we’ll help set the pumpheads, and construct fences around the wells to keep the animals out. After lunch (and naps) Nazif took us to his favorite coffee shop (passing probably 50 more on the way) where we drank the stiffest coffee I’ve ever had. Espresso is weak by comparison. We then went to the rustic Taitu Hotel, the oldest inn in Ethiopia, built in 1898 and named for the wife of the emperor at that time. Nazif said it’s one of his favorite places to come and think and study (he’s working on his MBA.) Well, I see that the heavy dose of caffeine has led me to write WAAAY too much, so I’ll close for now. We are all falling in love with this country and its beautiful people, and are grateful for the chance to have experienced them. Dohna’hun (good bye), Larry

Today was our first full day in Addis Ababa. We started the day by leaving the Kaleb Hotel (which unexpectedly tripled its rates since the last time a W2T group stayed here) and moving next door ino the Beer Garden Inn, a combination microbrewery and hotel established by a couple of expatriot Germans. After breakfast, the ODA (Oromia Development Association) drivers arrived to take us to see three of the wells that are under constuction thanks to W2T. Riding in a vehicle in Addis Ababa is an exciting experience. The only operative traffic law seems to be "blow your horn and keep going." Imagine if all the world is the passenger pickup area at the airport. Cars park two deep anywhere, cut in and out of traffic, and mostly (but not always) drive on the right side of the roads, all as fast as possible. Cows, goats, sheep, donkeys, and fearless pedestrians walk right down the middle or cross at will, sharing the streets with cars, trucks, busses, and vans, many of them spewing black smoke. All of them tap their horns constantly, not so much as a warning, but as public notice of "here I come." We’ve seen three traffic lights; only one of those was working, and not a soul paid a bit of attention to it. Every direction enters the intersection at the same time, and works things out with a combination of gestures and horn honking. We finally left the crowds and traffic of the city, and went out into the country on on a surpisingly modern and well-maintained highway. The driver of the truck I was in was Jihar. I asked him if he had ever heard of NASCAR. He hadn’t, but liked the sound of it. Lane wanted to know if they had speed limits in Ethiopia. Jihar understood the question, but not the concept. (I did later see a "40 kph" sign; we were doing about 90 at the time.) About 20 miles outside Addis Jihar pulled off the road and fastened his seatbelt. We all decided that it must be a REALLY good idea to do likewise, and it turned out to be true. Entering the villages of the Sendafa region, there were only "implied" roads; without being strapped to our seats we would literally have been bouncing off the roof. The "villages" we saw consist of maybe a dozen houses each, small round buildings maybe 20 feet across, made of mud slathered over wooden poles, with a thatched roof. Most of the families get by on subsistence farming of potatoes and grains, although rocks seem to be the biggest crop; it’s ing that they are able to plow their fields at all, especially with only hand tools or ox-drawn plows. They also raise cattle and goats, which roam freely though the pastures and fields. The cows do lead to one small industry that would surprise a lot of Texas ranchers: cow pies. Cow manure is collected and placed in large holes dug in the earh, and allowed to ferment for a few months. When good and ripe, it is taken out and mixed — by hand — with straw, and spread into a flat patty aout the size of a dinner plate. Once dried by the sun (still with hand prints visible in them) the patties are stacked in piles as much as 12 feet high, until they are taken to town and sold for fuel, three for one "bir" (about 2 cents a cow pie.) Some of the housing compounds had ten or twelve of these giant piles outside their fences. We visted three wellsd in various stages of completion. They are placed with the help of a hydrologist, who determines whether there will be sufficient water. Another factor in their placement is to make them relatively convenient to as many of the compounds as possible. Once complete, not only will cleaner water be avilable, but the trip will have been reduced from an hour-long walk (or more) to just a few minutes. The three wells of Sendafa (named for the nearby river) are all hand-dug wells. Mike and Meredith explained that these are much more economical than the bored wells. Also, the people who will take advantage of the newly-available water are able to help more in their construction, digging by hand about 15-20 feet down, until sufficient water is there in the bottom. One of the wells is only a few feet away from one of the present water-collection sites. It’s fed by a spring, and flows into a depression at the bottom of a wash. Cattle and donkeys drink from it, tromp right through it, or "do their business" where it can run right into the water. And this is best source of water the people have; the river was even worse. The wells we saw today are nearly complete, fully dug out and lined with concrete culvert pipes. Two of them had fresh flat pads constructed of concrete and the easily-avialable rocks, but for the third, we helped by gathering rocks out of the field and mixing the concrete with the local men and children (later we heard that most of the women were attending the funeral of one of the village people.) I’m sure they all got a kick out of my "Little Engine That Could" impression as I huffed and puffed. I was going to write it off the being in worse shape than I had thought, but Mike explained that since we’re at a pretty high elevation, it would be a while before we would have any endurance (I like his explanation better.) Eventually I joined Jo and Bobbie, who had decided that "supervising" from under the tree was a better idea. Meanwhile, Lane was the toast of the town. Every time he took a picture of the local boys, they would cluster around him to see the result. Sometimes all you could see of him in the pile of excited boys was his ever-present hat. Nazif, our host, explained that the school is too small to accomodate all the kids at once, so the older ones (5-7th grade) go in the morning, and the smaller ones in the aternoon. It’s about a 45-minute walk each way. In town, the youngest ones would also attend "KG" (kindergarten) but not this far out. We weren’t quite able to finish today, as the owners of some of the tools we needed were also at the funeral, but tomorrow we’ll help set the pumpheads, and construct fences around the wells to keep the animals out. After lunch (and naps) Nazif took us to his favorite coffee shop (passing probably 50 more on the way) where we drank the stiffest coffee I’ve ever had. Espresso is weak by comparison. We then went to the rustic Taitu Hotel, the oldest inn in Ethiopia, built in 1898 and named for the wife of the emperor at that time. Nazif said it’s one of his favorite places to come and think and study (he’s working on his MBA.) Well, I see that the heavy dose of caffeine has led me to write WAAAY too much, so I’ll close for now. We are all falling in love with this country and its beautiful people, and are grateful for the chance to have experienced them. Dohna’hun (good bye), Larry