Self-motivation

As my time in Ethiopia dwindles down, I've been taking a closer look at my service thus far. I was with a friend this past week and due to the events that took place, or should I say lack of events, I came to realize that as PCVs we are constantly having to motivate ourselves and a big chunk of my service has been me motivating myself. Let me explain.

Self motivation as a PCV is constant. How did I come to think about this profoundly? Well this week, my friend and I were all set to get some work done. As COS (Close of Service) approaches most of us are thinking about our next step. It may be graduate school, applying to jobs, working on our resumes/CVs, reaching out to connections back home, etc. Safe to say I have plenty I should be doing. I didn't have any programs scheduled at my school on that particular day, so the two of us were all set to go down to the hotel and get some work done with the hotel's wifi. It was extremely hot, but we faced the heat. Of course the internet wasn't working. With sweat starting to come down my face, we tried the other places in town. Four places later, nothing was working. We then said we'd go ahead and do some errands. I had to go to the post office. It was 2:30pm and closed. I couldn't tell you why. I guess an extra long lunch break? Then we had to go to the bank. The network was down so we couldn't get our money. We thought we'd stop to get a bite to eat. We were craving inkulal siga (scrambled eggs with meat on injera). They didn't have what we wanted so we just went next door and had some avocado juice. Pretty delicious too but it wasn't what we set out wanting. All this is to point out that throughout my service, just because I wake up in the morning all set and ready with a list of tasks to accomplish, no matter how simple the task, such as going to the bank to withdraw funds, there's a good chance I won't get through those tasks. You just have to know that going in. PCVs have to be incredibly flexible. If not we are setting ourselves up to endless disappointments and frustrations.

It gets hard having to always motivate yourself. No one is pushing you. You have to do it all on your own. For the most minute things too, such as going to the post office. On that day when we set out to the hotel, we came back after a two hour excursion with nothing to show for it. I wanted to work. I wanted to get some concrete research done, but because of forces out of my control I couldn't. It can get pretty discouraging because this isn't something that happens once in a while. This happens ALL THE TIME. I've had to learn to be unbelievably patient because nothing ever turns out the way you hope. There's only so much you can do. I can't make the internet work. I was ready to do job research but then I couldn't. So then what's left to do but go home and read a book. You can easily get discouraged. You have to continue to self-motivate. Every day. It's so easy to feel defeated. All this to show that as a PCV you set out to accomplish certain tasks, yet there's a good chance none of it will get done. That's why when something good does happen, when you get a success, no matter how small, you really have to hold on to it and celebrate it.

In the beginning I think I was easily discouraged and frustrated by this. But as the months have gone, I've become pretty flexible and patient and when things don't go the way I planned I just try again the following day and occupy my day by doing something else. It's hard, but I think all of us are learning how to work in all kinds of environments.    

Fasika

This post is a bit late seeing as how Fasika (Ethiopia Easter) was celebrated on April 12th. Better late than never though.

I was super excited about Fasika this year. Maybe because I hadn't had doro wat (chicken stew - the best dish in Ethiopia) in months and I hadn't had any meat in weeks because Ethiopians fast for two months prior to the holiday. But mostly I think I was excited because I knew this was my last major holiday in Ethiopia (that made me sad) and I really wanted to take it all in and be a part of it. So that's what I did.

You know a holiday's coming when chickens and sheep start showing up on your compound. Over a week before Fasika, my landlady had bought three of the biggest chickens I've ever seen in Ethiopia and a pretty decent sized sheep. My landlady kept calling the chickens "ferenje doro" or "foreigner chickens" because of their size. I guess she was calling us foreigners fat. I don’t know but I thought it was funny. So for a week we were woken up super early by the chickens. I was more than ready for their inevitable death at the end of the week.

A couple days prior to Fasika Ethiopians start making the beverages for the holiday. Keneto, a non-alcoholic drink for the children is made with barley. They also make tela, home-made wine. Saturday afternoon my landlady was finishing making these. As I walked past the storage room where she was cooking I asked her how it was coming along. She then handed me a full pitcher of tela to take back into my house and drink. It was 1:30pm. The celebrations were already beginning.

That night, the animals were slaughtered. The men kill the animals. It was pretty gruesome so I didn't take any pictures. They killed the sheep and then hung it upside down to drain all the blood out. Then they killed the chickens. The chickens were brought to my lady in the outdoor kitchen they have at the end of the compound. There she tore the dead chickens apart, all with her bare hands! It's so much work! I'm always so impressed when I see this done. It was a mess of feathers, organs, blood, but she knew exactly what she was doing. She went through the same process with five chickens! Three were for her family and the other two were for her mother (because her mother is older she does it for her). The stew had been cooked earlier and was sitting there in three huge pots. We were going to have enough doro wat for days. As my landlady cleaned the chickens we sat around her and kept her company, talking and drinking more tela. She didn't go to bed until after midnight.

The next morning Abigail, their daughter, came to wake me up for breakfast. Ethiopians start eating doro wat bright and early in the morning. Doro wat has tons of onions (we're talking several kilos) and is full of berbere (hot spice) so it can be a lot to take in that early, but I think I'm used to it by now. I love it. So I went to my landlady's home and we all ate chicken and drank tela, again! She also had prepared tibs (chopped up sheep meat) that morning and I got to eat that. After the meal my landlord pulled out the gin and poured us all a shot. And then another. It was 9:30am! I was so full and exhausted when I got back to my house and had to take a little nap. Because at noon I was invited to my neighbor's home for round 2. It was the same routine there. More doro wat and tela. I was so full and could only eat a little bit. At 3pm I was invited to one of my teacher's homes for another meal. That last one was rough. I didn't think I could eat another bite. If you don't eat it's considered rude so I tried and did my best, but that night I was not feeling well. When your body isn't used to eating meat, it's quite a lot of meat to take in all in one day. It was all worth it though. My last holiday in Ethiopia was wonderful. It's unbelievable to me that this was the last one. I remember my first one in Ethiopia. I celebrated Ethiopian New Year, September 11th, with my host family back during pre-service training. That feels like a different time. I remember feeling lost and so unsure back then. I'm so much more comfortable now. I feel at home. I definitely felt at home for Fasika this time around. I've come a long way and being able to see that progress is pretty great. When you first arrive here you have no idea if you'll make it and how it will all turn out. I'm so grateful that I've come this far and I've become comfortable here. I've made Ethiopia my home.

Malaria Awareness

If you remember from last year around this time I had written a blog post about malaria. April 25th is World Malaria Month so Peace Corps has turned April into Malaria month. I thought I'd use this post to refresh your minds and share more about the disease.

Malaria continues to be a crisis throughout much of Africa. Every 45 seconds a child dies from the disease. What's worse, malaria is completely preventable and curable if people would sleep under mosquito nets. If you do contract malaria you can go to a health center or hospital and it can be easily treated. Because malaria feels like the flu, many do not know they have malaria or they wait to long before going to visit a doctor. Malaria has been eradicated throughout many regions outside this continent with the use of insecticides, medicines, and mosquito nets. This disease is transmitted only by a special kind of mosquito- called the Anopheles mosquito- which primarily bites at night.

Compared to the rest of Africa, the percentage of people who get malaria in Ethiopia is low. Still, malaria can be found in 75% of Ethiopia. Now we're trying to completely eliminate the disease from the country. Hopefully this becomes a reality sooner than later. Much of Ethiopia has a high elevation making malaria non existent in those areas. Mosquitos can't get above a certain altitude. In the last few years however, as a consequence of global warming, cases of malaria have been reported at higher elevations than normal. Living in the South malaria is a bigger concern because the elevation is lower here. Addis Ababa for example, the third highest city in the world, lies at 2,400 meters, whereas Hawassa, the capital city of the South and an area that I frequent often has an altitude of 1,685 meters. It may not seem like quite a difference, but when I first arrived in Ethiopia I definitely felt the change in altitude and it took a few days for the altitude sickness to go away. There's no malaria in Addis while in Hawassa it is quite prevalent. Because I often go to Hawassa I do my best to remember to take my malaria pills. I always sleep under the mosquito nets the hotels provide and I always spray insect repellant on. The government is working to make malaria a disease of the past. Health clinics throughout the country pass out mosquito nets to communities in rural areas. Without the proper training, though, and the lack of information, many people don't know how to use the nets and use them for other purposes that won't help them against malaria. One use I've seen is using the netting as a chicken coop.

What are Peace Corps Volunteers doing? One of the goals for health volunteers is to work on malaria awareness. These volunteers work closely with the health centers in their communities. There is also an Africa-wide initiative known as STOMP. In Ethiopia, we have regional coordinators that work closely with STOMP to spread the latest news about malaria throughout their region and keep their volunteers updated on the latest malaria activities they can do in their communities.

This month I used my English clubs to spread awareness about malaria. Even though there have been very few cases of malaria in Butajira, it is still possible to get it. I want my students to know what causes malaria, what they can do to prevent it, and what they should do if they start to get symptoms. Hopefully, by giving people information about the deadly consequences of not using a mosquito net and other prevention methods, malaria can be eradicated in Ethiopia and the rest of Africa.