What I learned from Africa

Now that I’ve had a few weeks to reflect on my trip to Central/Eastern Africa (Burundi, Rwanda, and Uganda) and Ethiopia, I thought I’d share some of the lessons I learned. Here’s my top 10 list of the things that will always stay with me from Africa, indelibly etched in my memory: Don’t like coffee?…

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Day 14 – Last day in Ethiopia

I had a nice sleep and woke up at a leisurely pace for one of the first times on the trip. After taking a much needed shower (you have no idea how dusty it was this time of year), I joined Mesele and Mercy in the kitchen for a breakfast of scrambled eggs and a…

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Day 12 – The Magic of Lalibela

I woke up around 730 and had breakfast – fried eggs, toast, and papaya juice – in time for my 0830 meeting with Kassa to begin our drive to the Monastery on the Mountain – Asheton Maryam Monastery. It was about an hour car ride crawling up a windy and steep mountain that began right around…

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Day 11 – Gondar to Lalibela, Ethiopia

This morning I had an 0830 flight to catch from Gondar to Lalibela. I scheduled the hotel shuttle to pick me up at 0700 the night before, and had an early buffet breakfast at the Taye Belay Hotel around 0630. As suspected the hotel shuttle was not there at 0700 (Ethiopian time, after all) –…

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Day 10 – Addis to Gondar, Ethiopia

Gondar, not Gonder. Although I still can’t stop thinking about Lord of the Rings, and hoping that Gondar, Ethiopia will fill me with just as much wonder and inspiration. An early morning Ethiopian Airlines flight whisked me away from the bustling capital city to the more-rural North, and formal (Medieval) capital of Ethopia, Gondar…

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