Jan 23/13                 




Ethiopia--a country in central Africa that has intrigued me since I was a young child.  Seventy-two hours from now, a work colleague and I will be on the last leg of our work trip to Ethiopia.

The trip is now moving from the surreal to real. As a cancer survivor, living almost three years with no evidence of disease, the trip is a gift to experience and a dream come true.

My boss asked me in early December if I would like to visit some of hunger relief projects in Ethiopia with some of our members and partners. Then, the end of January seemed so far away. The time is now very near. The need to finalize my schedule, accommodations, and visits has made this trip real.

While I am away, I will spend two weeks in the field in southern Ethiopia. My stops will include visiting projects in Kucha Woreda, Woliata Soddo, and Zeway.   Some of the time we will be in hotels, other days we will stay in primitive guest houses. At one project, I will meet with international colleagues from the United Kingdom who will be visiting at the same time.

I am having a hard time comprehending how far it is from Winnipeg to the capital of Addis Ababa. The trip of 7,590 miles (12,211 km’s) will take about 16 hours with a stop in Toronto to transfer, wait for a connection, and then fly directly to Addis Ababa.

I am eager to soak in the experience of Ethiopia.

It is the birthplace of coffee, to be enjoyed in a land where coffee ceremonies have you partake in coffee being roasted, ground, brewed and served with popcorn. The international city of Addis Ababa holds much to see. There will be the beauty of rural Ethiopia to savor. And, with some luck perhaps, sightings of wild animals in their natural habitat.

Ethiopia is also the home of a World Heritage site and some say the 8th wonder of the world—the stone churches of Lalibela. I am told that once you have visited the 11 churches all connected underground by tunnels and hand hewn out of mountains centuries ago, the experience stays with you for the rest of your life. I have my flight booked to spend a weekend there.

What I am most looking forward to, is being amongst the people whom we are helping to end hunger. All of the projects we will visit involve some form of food security in helping local citizens to become self sufficient in feeding their families.

The language we will hear spoken is Amharic, although English will be heard in Addis Ababa and Lalibela. We will have field staff and interpreters with us at each site that we will visit. I will have a sense of what it feels like to be a visible minority in a foreign country.

I am going with an open mind and an adventurous spirit. I eagerly await this trip of a lifetime and will joyfully be present with Strength, Courage and Determination.