Things I miss/don't miss about Ethiopia

While only a week away from my former home in Bole can't give me proper perspepctive, here are some things I notice that I miss and don't miss about being away from Ethiopia:

MISS:
• my Habesha and Fefenge Ethiopian friends
• the weather (well, nine months of the year anyway)
• ubiquitous hawazi
• household help
• home-made dog food [item added by Toby]
• the best meal in town, washed down with the best wine in the house, for $30.
• The best coffee in the world, everywhere, so cheap it's almost free.
• Home-cooked gomen, misera wot, red-tef injera, and shiro

NOT MISS:
• ETC
• The bellowing
• The internet, 1998 style, and censored
• 100% import extortion/duty
• Thinking about journalists still in prison before I post something on my blog
• dust in the dry season and mud in the rainy season
• Ferenge! Ferenge! Ferenge! Gimme one birr!
• ETC (repeated for emphasis)

Comments

[Jody]

gomen? hawazi? misera rot? shiro? probably had some of these things but don't remember waht they are ...

[Matt]

alllooo allloooo mistah mistah hungree hungree

[Marc Luoma]

mother dead father dead very hungry

[mimi]

well, i'll miss your posts. For a while there catching up on your posts, i thought janet and toby were your wife and kid. didn't you have one of each? am i making this up?
anyway, welcome back to your home. Thanks for the interesting commentary from addis.

[Tade]

idiot mimi,

The guy is an agent. He had to cover up his mission by pretending to be married with a kid there in Ethiopia to do some "humanitarian work".

[Marc Luoma]

Everybody knows I love my commenters. And it says something about the range of comments I've gotten over the months that I can't tell for sure whether Mimi's comment is tongue-in-cheek or not. Hah!

[Alem]

Welcome to your "one minute microwave" life. Speed was your top of the many complain lists you had, so you're down with one complain. Oh, also welcome to a "beggar free society", yeah right! Go to any American metro areas and tell us your findings. At least, we're very poor and the circumstances made us to beg. Your country is the "richest" country in the world and What's your excuse for the poor homeless and the high tech beggers? Shame on you! you're making fun of those poor people.

I'm surprised you missed a few things about Ethiopia. You seem very disconnected,cluless with the Ethiopian society culture, custom and i always thought you were forced to go or you were in mandatory work assignments. For your next life, stay where you belong or do some research, please read before you step your foot somewhere you're not familiar.

[reader]

we, Ethiopian readers that came to his blog have been enlightened, educated and love his blogs! we love Marc!! leave him alone!

[mike]

Wait, he did have a picture of a woman and a young girl and did talk about them. Whether he took them off for privacy (Keep their faces away from the gov agents, who regularly monitor and spam this blog)or his wife packed up and left, it is none of our business.

Welcome home Marc.

[SZ]

Welcome home Stateside. ...certainly wikk miss your entries from your previous station! Here at the farm, we may have some difficulty finding a replacement agent to slip back in country. Your highly perceptive remarks will be soely missed!!!
Bloody hell, ...first Andrew, and now you!!!!
You young'uns gonna be the death of me!!!
- END -

Will find you on facebook.

[SZ]

Dust off your codebook, young chap!
....Encrypted above are details of your next mission!

Pay close attention to the typos!
Wikk wikk ;-)

Your Control Agent

[Tade]

Reader,

You are not Ethiopian. You are one filthy Eritrean/shabia. I can smell your stench from miles away.

[stew]

OH Marc, how in the world can you leave this hilarious commentary??

[Alem]

Was he an agent? If so, the orgnization must be in real trouble recruiting or desperate. Oh God! our security is in the hands of Marc!

[Marc Luoma]

I aspire to Don-Knotts-style spay status.

(Tade, I tried to e-mail you but it bounced. I had to hide one of your comments and wanted to explain.)

[007]

Why cannt the Ethiopian govt privatise ETC and other state owned enterprises? They could have been an engine of growth being run by tough enterpeneurs.

I love your posts and sure will miss that ubiqutous Hawze too.

You seem to have been in the employment of USAID, if so why cannt the Agency use its influence to stir the Addis Regime to pursue viable economic policy like in Sudan or Tanzania. Ship those major pundits of the govt for a month long , all expense paid, stay in those places ( Zanzibar, Kharotum etc) where the internet connection was fast and the mobile service private and extremely efficient. That will be worthwhile investment, both for your relentless efforts and the economic advancement of Ethiopia.
Btw, the govt should ban aggressive begging and nagging by the Natives if it wants to attract tourists and investors alike. This culture is flourishing because Ethiopia was never colonised and it was encouraged by the dominant religious structures as a way to wash sins.