Running In Addis

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Editor's Note: I know a lot of you were looking forward to getting Not In Addis: Episode III, but the subtitle was going to be 'David doesn't do much at a couple of lakes', so I decide to summarise it in this much more interesting installment instead. So, here's the summary:

David doesn't do much at a couple of lakes.

Ok, ok, here's a bit more detail:

Trip 1: David goes back to Babugaya for part of a day for the Worship Team retreat. Although not officially a part of the worship team yet, he thought it would be good to meet some of the gang. Unfortunately, the bit he got to was pretty boring, so he ended up wishing he's just stayed home and done some marking instead.

Trip 2: David goes to Lake Langano to relax after a grueling 13-week term. Does as little as possible.

Trip 3: On the way back from Langano, David gets dropped off at Babugaya again for the Faculty retreat. Does as little as possible, although manages to do a bit of marking.

Ok, that's over with. On with today's installment...

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First of all, an update on Danielle Hale. She's the girl who was hit in the eye with an errant hockey stick a few weeks back. She is now back at Bingham with both eyes intact. She was initially diagnosed with having four tears on her retina, which could have lead to the retina detatching, which is never a good thing. So, they headed back to the US to have lazer surgery, but when it was checked by three experts over there, there was no problem to be found. God is good! She calculated that she had people praying for her on 6 continents. Thanks for adding yours.

Today is the 30th of November, 2003. For many people this is a date they have been preparing for for months. I was not one of those people, although in retrospect that probably would have been a good idea. For today was the day of the 2003 Total Great Ethiopian Run. And I was runner number 5627. Out of 18,000. Yes, that's right - 18,000.

The run is 10 kilometres in distance and consists of a couple of loops around the centre of Addis. My preparation for the big event was grueling. I ran about 1 kilometre about three weeks ago. In my defence, that was after playing squash for an hour-and-a-half. I had intended to do more after that, but never quite got the time and/or motivation. So, this morning I woke up at about 7 o'clock, had a quick breakfast, put on my cool souvenir running shirt, laced up my runners, and headed out to Meskel Square.

Brad Adams (another teacher here from Australia) and I caught a taxi in (which, as usual, included a couple of moments where life traditionally flashes before your eyes). The taxi driver took us as close as he could before the roads were closed to cars and we walked in to the starting line. Of the 18,000 runners, I'd estimate that there were probably about 100-200 non-Ethiopians. Unusually, nobody struck up a conversation with us while we waited for the starting gun. Too focused on the task ahead, I suppose.

My goal for the race was to run the whole distance without stopping or walking. I also had in mind an hour as a target time. I can walk 5km in an hour, so 10km/h didn't seem out of reach. A month ago, I was pretty confident. Today, I was much less so. I did some running last year with some friends, but I'm not sure that we ever cracked 10km. It took me a month of running to do 6k without stopping. And that was at sea level, not 8,500 feet above.

Finally, the big moment approached. Brad and I joined the mass of runners, managing to get a position towards the front. The crowd surged forwards, forcing the policemen trying to hold the starting line to retreat. The siren sounded, and we were off. From this point on, time was measured in distance. Especially since I didn't have a watch on.

0m: So far, so good.
50m: Slow going with thousands of people attempting to get to the front at the same time.
100m: The crowd thins a bit. Already there are runners ahead of us as far as we can see.
300m: A guy stops in front of us to retie his shoelaces. We dodge and keep going.
500m: We hit the first hill. The hills in Addis are generally longer but less steap than those in Brisbane.
800m: Top of the first hill. That wasn't so bad.
850m: The crowd of runners starts a chant for a couple of minutes. Soon everyone is running in time. Interesting experience.
900m: First sharp corner. A middle-aged white guy hits a traffic island he couldn't see coming and face-plants. He gets up quickly and keeps going.
1km: Slight downhill. Feeling good. I can do this!
2km: Bottom of the second hill. This one's a bit steaper and a little shorter than the last one. Still doing ok.
2.2km: A group of people from Bingham are waiting to cheer us on.
2.4km: Top of the hill. My legs are starting to complain. Time to slow down a little. I keep jogging, but Brad goes ahead.
3km: Finished the first loop. I am ready to stop now. Legs have signed a petition and contacted their local member. Start chanting "Every single step" in my head.
4km: Finally at the top of the first hill again. The second loop takes a slightly longer route between hills at this point. Still running (albiet slowly) Legs on fire. Now chanting under my breath.
5km: Missed the sign and thought we must have gone at least 6k by now. A friendly Ethiopian passing me corrected that delusion for me. "Every...single...step".
5.2km: About 500 people pass me when they take a short cut through a petrol station instead of going the extra 100m of the hairpin turn.
6km: Around this point an Ethiopian (who's name I can't remember) decides to join me as a running buddy. I'm sure I'm slowing him down.
7km: We hit the second hill for the second time. Legs have given up their protest and decided to try blisters instead.
7.2km: Halfway up the hill, the Bingham crowd misses my passing while chearing for another guy from the school just ahead of me. I barely noticed. "Ev...ry...sin...gle...step".
8km: A thoughtful soul has set up a fire hose and is cooling everyone down. Yay! Blisters multiplying. I'm going to die...
9km: A kid on the sideline puts out his hand for a high-five. I attempt to comply, but the activity saps about 40% of my remaining energy and I miss anyway. Note to self: Don't do that again.
9.3km: Ask my running buddy how long we've been running. "1 hour" he says. Bummer.
9.5km: The crowd picks up pace, and I try to do the same. Burn another 50% of remaining energy in about 50m. Nearly stop and throw up. "EVERY SINGLE STEP!"
9.8km: Round the final corner and see the finish line. Halelujah!!!
9.9km: See the time above the finish line: 59:45. Try to pick up the pace. I can do it!!!
9.97km: 1:00:00. Doh!
10km: Take the final steps over the finish line. 1 hour and 10 seconds.

So, I achieved my goal: I ran it the whole way without stopping. And only 10 seconds over the hour. I'm happy with that. The guy who came in first (an Ethiopian, of course) did it in 29 minutes, 54 seconds, which is a new course record. I'd estimate I came about 5000th, which is not a bad effort.

It came at a cost though - my calves are making me pay. Flights of steps and slight inclines will be a challenge for the next couple of days, I think. But I did get an extremely cool medallion, just for finishing the race.

In other news, we have finally reached the end of first term (the first of three). 13 long weeks. Everyone has found it hard going, not only due to the length of time, but also the fact that most people were hit by a mystery virus that took people down for about a week. I managed to avoid that one somehow (every other Australian on the compund got it), but did get a stomache bug of some sort that knocked me back to about 50% for a day.

We are also saying goodbye to three of the teaching staff this week. Tim and Ally Hicks head back tonight (or more accurately, early tomorrow morning). Tim and Katie Strawn and their son Aiden leave later in the week. We have been given the blessing of a replacement teacher for Ally in the 11 Psychology classes she taught though, which is excellent. I'm still not sure who's looking after 5th grade yet, but something will be worked out for the next 3 weeks until their new teacher arrives in January.

Also, we've had rain the last two nights in a row. In the middle of dry season. Woohoo! Hardly ever happens, but it's good that it did. We're already getting power rationing.

Anyway, time for bed. God bless,

David

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Prayer Points

• Praise that Danielle's eye was healed before a finger was laid on it.


• Pray for David Hicks, who is currently on a tour of the UK and USA trying to drum up teacher for the next school year. With 12th grade being added, we're going to need even more than we have now, and several will be departing.


• My calves. Just kidding.

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Director's Commentary

• No, that isn't a grammatical or spelling error. Total is a petroleum company and was the major sponsor of the race. Back to the story.


• The astute among you will have recognised that name. It's the same place as where the giant bonfire happened a month or two back. Back to the story.

Not In Addis: Episode II: David hangs around with 7th and 8th graders near a lake

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Editor's Note: The following email message is viewable in two formats. Those wishing to get through quickly can access the Standard Edition by simply reading through the message directly. For those wishing to access the full text of the Special Extended Edition (including extra scenes and exclusive director's commentary), watch out for the special links to the extra features.

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Previously in 'Not In Addis': David cheats death while riding in a vehicle driven by Dave Hicks across several hundered kilometres of Ethiopian landscape, and nearly doesn't fall off his horse. Now, back to the story...

After returning from the Bale (pronounced 'Bah-lay') mountains, I was confronted by the monster that all teachers aproach with fear and loathing (well at least the latter of the two): student reports. In this case, the ones in question were mid-term reports, and at Bingham they're done by hand. And every student gets one in first term. For those just joining us, I teach Kindergarten to grade 6 for Computer Studies, as well as 7 & 8 for Mathematics. With an average of 20 students per grade, that adds up to around 180 students. Around 120 of which I'm still trying to attach names-to-faces for. Thankfully I was given mercy on several of the elementary grades by their full-time teachers, so it was only around 100 or so I had to write myself. My word, is that a draining job to do. Do you know how hard it is to come up with useful, constructive comments for that many kids? By the end they were becoming less useful (although hopefully not destructive).

Anyway, after that ordeal was over, it was time to face up to the next one - trying to choose two videos that would both appeal to and be appropriate for a bunch of 40 11-14 year olds. Because that weekend (October 17th-19th) was the Grade 7-8 Retreat, and I was responsible for picking the movies. Easy, you would think. Ha! But more on that later...

Friday lunchtime came, and with it the last-minute-mad-rush to get everything and everyone packed and loaded onto the vehicles. Finally everyone and everything was onboard, and we headed off to the Babugaya Guesthouse.

We were headed south again, but this time our destination was only about an hour out of town - much more reasonable than the last trip. We arrived intact, and upon disembarking, I got my first view of the lake. It was not to bad.

Over the weekend, there were lots of things happening, from fun/bonding activites, to swimming to dressing up in toilet paper. A couple of the more memorable events included being tied to each other for 3 hours, the Talent Show, and the councelor hunt, which involved all the teachers hiding in the dark for an hour while the students tried track us down.

As well as all the fun stuff, there were opportunities for more serious discussion. All the teachers had a 'family' group of about 4-6 of the students, and the boys I was responsible for and I had a couple of good discussions over the weekend. There were also three devotion times, given by one of the students' parents, which were also good. They spoke about Joseph and how he used his talents for God, and how he delt with temptations of different sorts.

And then there were the movies. The first night, we made the movie a surprise. The kids didn't seem to appreciate this - the most popular question all day was "What's the movie?" At about 10PM, we started it, showing the 1960's version of "Romeo and Juliet", which the 8th graders have been reading in class. Understandably this wasn't terribly popular, so after a couple of minutes we switched over to the real movie, "Finding Nemo", which was much more appreciated. Some people also went out "Hyena Hunting", which involved going to the tip and attempting to attract hyenas with meat dragged around behind a vehicle. I wouldn't have minded participating in that event, but since I was responsible for the movies, I kind of had to stick around there. The second night, there was another movie scheduled. Unfortunately the short clips I showed before the movie as 'trailers' were more popular than the movie itself, which was "Mystery Men" (which I quite like - apparently my tastes are not shared universally). Anyway, both movies finished around 1AM, so by the time we'd packed everything away afterwards, the other occupants in my cabin were already in bed, and most of them were asleep. Which was better than them playing Monopoly all night, which had been threatened earlier.

At the end of the weekend, we all got a final photo, piled back into the vehicles and headed home. Another weekend successfully accounted for. And I got the opportunity to develop my relationships with a lot of the kids, which was one of the aims of the event. All 'round, a good result.

And now for some important messages from our sponsors. But stay with us for the shocking conculsion of "Not In Addis" in Episode III: David goes back to Babugaya and doesn't do much.

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Director's Commentary

• The Babugaya Guesthouse was established over 50 years ago on the shores of the Bishaftu crater lake. It is owned and run by SIM (Serving In Mission), who also runs Bingham Academy. Back to the story


• I was found by about a third of them, although my quest was not aided by three of the 7th grade girls, the first of which said in a loud voice, "There's someone over there," after which the other two proceeded to scream a the tops of their voices. I didn't think I was that scary... Back to the story


• The clips, for those who have seen my collection, were the "Terry Tate Rebok" ad, "Matrix Pingpong", the "Funny Cats" clip, and the trailers for "Return of the King" (Lord of the Rings 3) and "The Incredibles" (both of which I think everyone on the planet should see). Back to the story

Not In Addis: Episode I: David (mostly) rides a horse in the mountains

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Editor's Note: The following email message is viewable in two formats. Those wishing to get through quickly can access the Standard Edition by simply reading through the message directly. For those wishing to access the full text of the Special Extended Edition (including extra scenes and exclusive director's commentary), watch out for the special links to the extra features.

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Well, three months ago today I headed out to Brisbane International Airport, jumped on a plane, and headed off into the wild blue yonder. Well, it hasn't really been terribly wild so far. And it's really only been blue for about half the time. It was definately yonder though. That means I'm about a quarter of the way through my time here. It really has gone quickly. Anyway, on with the newsletter...

Three weekends ago (circa October 10th) I finally (after being here for about two months) got to see some of the Ethiopian countryside outside of Addis Ababa. About a dozen of us piled into a van (including the Hicks' and Anne Hutton) and headed south. The drive down was full of beautiful landscapes, interesting sights, occasional traffic jams, and local buildings, and took about 6 hours. That's a long time to be cramped into a small space like that, even with breaks along the way. Near the end we stopped and picked up our guide, who lead us to the place where we would switch to horseback. Eventually.

When we got to the location, we all unloaded and repacked our bags so they could be transferred to the pack horses. All was going well up until the point when we were ready to depart. At which point the discovery was made that there were only 3 other horses. For 11 people. Hmm...

About an hour later they had rounded up (quite literally) enough horses for us all and we were off. As some of you know, I had never ridden a horse before. But so that you don't get too concerned, I didn't fall off at all on the way up the mountain. It was quite fun actually. Apart from the fact that I couldn't quite fit my foot into the left stirup, and that my saddle kept slipping, it was fairly comfortable. Definately better than walking. My noble steed (whom I dubbed 'Binky') did a better job than a lot of the horses of avoiding smacking my legs and other body parts into nearby stationary objects (trees, for example).

About three hours later we reached the summit. By then it was about 7PM, and, as a result, quite dark. We all dismounted, rugged up, and tried to regain contact with body parts long lost to feeling. David and Sylvia Hicks, along with Anne Hutton got about cooking dinner and in no time we had lamb stir-fry, ready to consume. Yum!

The next day, we got to sleep in a bit (8:30! Way better than 5:30 the day before). Upon getting up, we discovered a clear blue sky day, giving a great view of everything around. After a bit of breakfast, packing up the bags tents, and reloading the horses, it was time to head back down the mountain. I managed to arrange a saddle exchange, so this time it was my right foot that didn't quite fit in the stirup. It was way better than the other one though. And I only came off once. We even galloped in several places, which was made all the more thrilling by never being sure if your saddle would stay attached to the horse it was on. David Hicks' saddle actually came off right near the end. A long drive later we finally made it back to Bingham on Sunday evening.

But my journeys out of Addis were just beginning. Stay tuned for the next exciting episode: David hangs around with 7th and 8th graders near a lake.

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Director's Commentary

• Addis Ababa literally means "New Flower", which gives a somewhat more picturesque image of the city than reality presents. Back to the story


• Apparently there had been a miscommunication about the number of steeds we would require. David Hicks had asked in advance for 11 horses, 3 of which were bigger. Somehow, the part about 11 in total got lost in the translation. Back to the story


• All Terry Pratchett fans out there, the answer to your question is "yes". Back to the story


• Ok, here's how it happened. We were riding through a well worn path at the time, so the ground was about 5cm below my stirups. Stephanie Hicks had lost her hat along the way, so I had a momentary lapse in good judgement thought I'd pick it up for her. Without getting off. About three-quarters of the way down the saddle slipped, and I took a short trip to ground level. I got the hat though. Back to the story


• One thing which made the drive home a little more exciting (other than the bumps/gaping holes in the road, of course) was not quite being sure whether we'd run out of fuel on the way home. We had less than a quarter of a tank of fuel for the return journey, and the discovery that the local petrol station was out of diesel was not a welcome one. The only other option there was to buy individual 1 litre cans for 20 birr (about AU$4.00). Dave Hicks wasn't impressed with that, so we headed off, hoping to find a place further down the road. Two petrol-stationless towns later, David stopped and asked a local if there was anywhere we could get fuel. He jumped in and led us to a small store that (thankfully) had what we needed - at only 3.85 birr (about 60c) per litre. While we refueled, pretty much the whole town gathered around the van and looked at us. I hope we were entertaining... Back to the story

Exercising in Addis

Well, I've now been out of Australia for a little over two months, and in Ethiopia for about six weeks. Looking back at my last post, I realise it's been a few weeks since my last epistle. There are two main reasons for this. The first is that I've been pretty busy. The second is that it hasn't been terribly interesting busy - mostly just preparing lessons and fixing computer problems. And I know you don't want to hear about that. Oh, and the third reason is that it usually takes a good hour or so to write one of these, so I require some momentum to get it done in one sitting. Anyway, on with the show...

Firstly, addressing the title of this post. I thought I'd pick a topic to talk about with regards to life in Addis for each newsletter. Stay tuned for future issues on food, time and language.

This week though, it's sport and fitness. The main reason for doing this topic now is that yesterday I received my kit for having registered in the Great Ethiopian Run. You get a cool green, red & yellow t-shirt, a Coca-Cola cap/visor/thing, a waterbottle (white and oblong donut-shaped), and a number. Oh, and a small booklet about the benefits of using latex contraceptives (in Amharic, of course) and an advertisement for a brand of said contraceptives which doubles as a calendar (also in Amharic). Handy! Not only that, but if you finish the course, you get a commemorative medal! How cool is that!?!? And all this for the extravagant fee of 30.00 Ethiopian Birr, which converts to about $5.00 Australian.

The run itself is 10km around the hills of Addis Ababa. It is part promotional and part fund-raising, as far as I can tell. Extra funds raised go to a couple of different projects, which last year included famine relief and AIDS victims. I am number 5,627 and they're expecting about double that number to participate. The information sheet says you can run, jog or walk. I am expecting to do all three at some point in the course. It's on the 30th of November, so I've still got about two months to get into shape. I haven't done any running since New Years Day, so I should probably get onto that soon. There are two main places you can train here. You can do the 1km loop around the perimeter of the compound wall, or you can go to an old Cuban airstrip, which is apparently about a kilometre long. Which seems ridiculous to me. I haven't been out there yet, so I can't say one way or the other.

I have been doing other stuff though. David and Tim Hicks are both keen (and talented) squash players, so I've played them several times. There are also a couple of other guys on the compound who are learning the game too, so that's been good exercise. Also, there are sports nights on at the gym we have here that are open to people from outside the school on week nights. There is volleyball on Monday, hockey on Tuesday, soccer on Thursday. I've been playing soccer each week since school started and volleyball when I can. I haven't made it to hockey yet. Volleyball and hockey are mostly ferenji (foreigners), while soccer is mostly locals. Oh, there's also basketball on Saturday afternoon, if you're that way inclined. Which I'm not.

On the topic of sport, last Saturday the Brisbane Lions won the AFL premiership for the third year running! I had been hoping to get live updates on the Internet during the game, but it was not to be. The Internet connection here is flakey at best, and although I managed to get the nail-biting (up to the 4th quarter anyway) semi-final between Sydney and Brisbane the week before, I was almost entirely unsuccessful that day. I managed to get a score at half-time (at which point we were 6 goals ahead), and then gave up and headed off to a bazaar at IEC (the International Evangelical Church), which had lots of interesting local stuff, some of which you may get to see if you ask the right people around Christmas.

Later that day, several of us attended the Meskel celebrations in town last Saturday. Meskel (which means Cross) is a local holy day celebrated by the Orthodox church. According to legend, Emperor Constantine's mother found a piece of the true cross of Christ, which made it's way to Ethiopia. Fire was involved in the discovery, so there are two main features of a Meskel celebration: crosses and fire. Anne Hutton and I, along with two other people from the compound went into SIM headquarters and met up with Jamie, an American woman who was the only veteran in the group - she had attended last year's celebration. Along the way, she prepared us for the event: don't put anything of value in your pants pockets, don't stand up too long or you'll get rocks thrown at you by people behind you who's view you are obscuring, if everyone suddenly stands up, get up too and push towards the front to avoid being crushed. As it turned out, this year's event was much more organised, and none of those issues eventuated. Although people were getting rocks thrown at them.

(Aside: Apparently rock throwing is somewhat of a national pastime. You don't see many cyclists in Ethiopia. Apparently the locals see people on two wheels as being a challenge to test their rock-throwing skills on. People who have been cycling across Africa get to Ethiopia and are pelted with rocks everywhere they go. We were driving along behind a flat-bed truck the other day, and one of the guys on the back of it was casually tossing stones at pedestrians as the truck drove past. And these aren't just pebbles either - I've seen rocks the size of billiard balls being tossed.)

It was still quite interesting though. We got there at about 3:30PM and there was a crowd of several thousand (probably at least 60 thousand, and probably more), mostly sitting on a large embankment. On Meskel Square itself there was a large crowd of clerics in in brightly coloured outfits, lots of soldiers, and continuous parades of people doing Meskel-related things (most of which we couldn't see due to the clerics). Oh, and a really, really big bonfire.

The bonfire itself is of course the main event, and it wasn't due to be lit until dusk, so we kept ourselves entertained by trying to photograph clerics who were facing our way (mostly they were trying to see the same stuff as us, and so were looking away) and some of the small horde of kids who emigrated to our area. Jamie and I had digital cameras, and the kids loved us taking photos of them and then showing them the result on the view-finder. One kid in particular (Samuel) ended up sticking around until we left and then followed us most of the way back to SIM headquarters afterwards. He was 'very hungry', which may or may not have been true, but since we didn't have any food (or much money anyway), and generally giving cash is not seen as good practice, he ended up not any better funded for the efforts. A lot of the kids sell little packs of tissues or lollies, and most Bingham people will buy something if they have the right change on hand, since they are at least being somewhat enterprising. But begging isn't usually encouraged. It is difficult knowing what is the right thing to do - we have so much in comparison, but simply giving money isn't necessarily doing them any favours anyway. It's a conundrum.

Anyway, the time of the big event finally arrived. The head-honcho of the Orthodox church (sorry, I can't recall his official title - but he did wear a cool silver/white hat and carry a big silver cross) carried a flaming torch around the bonfire three times and then finally lit it. It went up very quickly, and soon was a huge blaze. Once the fire started, the riot police charged in and started moving people back from the fire. Unfortunately my batteries ran out about then, so you're going to have to imagine the rest.

There are (at least) two superstitions about the bonfire at Meskel. The first is that once the fire collapses, if it falls to the north it will be a good year, and if it's to the south, a bad one. The second is that if it falls north, it then becomes a race (once the embers cool a bit) to get a piece of the bonfire to aid your own good fortune that year. The scene reminded me of what happens at the end of an AFL game at the Gabba. For the uninitiated, the crowd waits until the third siren and then a large portion of it tries to be the first to get to the middle of the field. Imagine that, except that instead of about 100 people doing it, about 5 times that many are going. It wasn't too hectic in our area though, so the event finally being officially over, we headed back to the bus. On the way back the crowd started a rendition of 'Ethiopia' (not the official name) which is roughly their equivalent to 'Watzing Matilda' to Australians.

Prayer Points

There are a couple of things you could pray for, if you are so inclined. Firstly, there have been a few sick or injured people on the compound. I've mentioned before the other computer teacher broke his leg a week before they were supposed to return from the US. He is now off crutches, but still in his inflatable cast, and he's got about 7 pins in his foot holding it together. His son broke his arm about three or four months ago (a compound fracture - not pretty, apparently), and one of the bones has still not grafted properly. And several of the other staff have been battling various stomach bugs on and off. Aly Hicks, Tims's wife, has also had a bout of pneumonia, which has knocked her out for the past week or so. So health is definately a prayer point. I've been pretty well so far, but I've still got pleanty of time.

Secondly, we still need more teachers. We currently have one English teacher for the whole of the high school (7-11) which means he's taking 28 lessons a week. Other teachers have a pretty heavy load too, particuarly David Hicks, who is doubling as director and taking about 10 lessons a week on top of that. Also, we are loosing three teachers in December - a 5th grade teacher, a music and psychology teacher, and our art teacher. We are hopefully getting a new art teacher, but we're basically two teacher short of optimal as it is, so we can use anyone that can come, even if it's only for a few months. And then there's the next school year...

Anyway, it's now past midnight here, which means that most of you (in Australia anyway) will be getting out of bed soon. Well, unless you're one of my brothers, in which case you probably won't be up for several hours. But for me, it's time to hit the hay. Until next time...

The Brisbane Lions are in the Grand Final!

Woohoo! After being only 3 points ahead of the Sydney Swans at three-quarter-time, the Lions restricted them to only a single point in the final quarter, while at the same time increasing their own lead to win by 44 points. This sets up a replay of last year's grand final against Collingwood, who defeated Port Adelaide earlier today, also by 44 points.

Go the Lions!!!

Happy New Year!

To all the Ethiopians out there reading this, Happy New Year!

To all the Australians out there, the Lions are into the semi-finals after a strong victory over the Adelaide Crows at the Gabba. Woohoo!!! If only they'd show the games here...

Teaching in Addis

I am now a veteran of two weeks of classes at Bingham Academy, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Two weeks you say? But it's only Thursday? The answer to the conundrum is quite simple. Tomorrow is the Ethiopian New Year. Ok, fair enough, I hear you mutter, but why aren't you teaching today then? The answer to that is a little more complicated (but only a little).

The Ethiopian calendar works differently to our Gregorian calendar. For one thing, when the new year starts it will be 1996. Which is fantastic if you have started to feel you're getting a bit old - care to shed 7 years off your life? Secondly, their new year starts on the 1st of September each year. The astute amongst the audience will have noted that the 1st of September was in fact almost two weeks ago. The 1st of September (Ethiopian) usually falls on the 11th of September (Gregorian). So, there are usually 10 days difference between their calendar and ours. However, this year is a leap year, which means that the 13th month of the year has 6 days in it instead of 5, which means that Ethiopian New Year falls on the 12th of September this year. Yes, there are 13 months in the year. All of the other months have exactly 30 days.

The upshot of this is that when the school calendar was made, the leap year was not taken into consideration, so Thursday (the 11th) was marked as a day off, and Friday with it, since getting people back for 1 day is a bit pointless. By the time the leap year was discovered, it was too late to change it. So, we had a 3 day week. No complaints from anyone on staff, as far as I know.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand. As you know, I came over here primarily as a computer teacher. For the past two years, a guy by the name of Tom Hale has been teaching computers, and towards the middle of the year he and his family decided to stay for another year. This is great, because computers are taught to every student in the school, from Kindergarten up to grade 10. So, the fact that there are now two teachers means that we both had a bit more spare time than in previous years. This is good, because in addition to teaching the kids, we are also responsible for making sure every computer in the place is running (not always an easy challenge), as well as the network and internet connections and the like. I don't know how Tom has done it the past two years. Apparently he doesn't get much sleep.

As a result of this extra time we now have, we've both been given and extra class or two. In addition to the 7-10 computer classes, Tom looks after the Homeroom/Bible class for the 8th graders (1st period every day). I look after K-6 computers, and also have 7 and 8 Maths. This was not a total shock to me when I found out, and so far I've enjoyed it for the most part. In fact, I think trying to teach Kindergarteners and 1st graders will be more of a challenge than the maths. The kids are all pretty well behaved (although the 8th graders like to talk a lot), and they generally follow instructions and participate well in class.

One slight detour occurred about a week before school started. We received word that Tom Hale, who was back in the US with his family raising support for the next year, had broken his leg. As a result, they would not be getting back until the end of the first week of school. As a result, myself and Binyam (an Ethiopian guy who helps us out in the Computer Lab - he's been here for about 4 years now, so he's the real veteran) would be looking after his classes for the first week. This turned out ok in the end, because the K-6ers didn't start computer lessons until the second week. But it did make for an interesting week, and gave me an opportunity to meet some of the upper high school kids which was good.

On the night of Monday the 1st, however, we had a very sad event happen. At about 9:30 in the evening I received a call via the prayer chain we have on the compound. One of the couples who live here were expecting their second child towards the end of the year. That evening the wife had started having contractions, so they rushed to the hospital. At about 11PM, their daughter was born, but she died soon afterwards. She was burried in a private ceremony on Wednesday, and there was a memorial service last Saturday for her. The parents are doing okay under the circumstances, but I think they still have decisions to make about their future in many regards.

Life started getting back to normal towards the end of the week, and on Thursday night (or rather early Friday morning), a few of us headed out to the airport to pick up the Hales. Their plane was due to arrive at 1:40AM, so we left Bingham at about 1. It was quite odd driving through town at that time of night. Streets that were usually jammed full of people, animals and a wide assortment of vehicles were completely empty. It was a very strange sensation.

Anyway, we got to the airport, and after paying for our tickets into the terminal (1 birr, or about 20 cents each), we approached the doors, only to be stopped by the security guard. Apparently photo ID is required to enter the International Terminal in Addis Ababa. There were four of us there - Binyam (the computer lab assistant), Tim Hicks (brother of David Hicks), Marcia (one of the students who boards on the compound) and myself. Tim and Binyam both had their driver's licenses (since they had driven there), but Marcia and myself had nothing. I hadn't even brought my wallet. After about 15 minutes of negotiation in Amharic (the main language here) the guard said he would let one of us (Marcia or me) in, but not both of us. So, Tim and Marcia eventually headed inside and Binyam kept me company in the car park. We passed the time by reading signs written in Amharic. I've been teaching myself the Amharic alphabet (called the Fidel), so it was good practice. It was pretty cold though, and I was glad when they finally emerged at about 3AM. Their plane landed about 40 minutes late in the end. It was good to finally meet the 'other computer guy' though. They are a nice family.

This week although short, has been very busy. On Monday our computers contracted a virus. Or more precisely, we downloaded an update and detected a virus. So, we ended up reinstalling all the machines from scratch. So far, we've pretty much finished getting about 17 of the 24 computers back on their feet. As you can imagine, this has made teaching computers quite challenging. Spending so much time in the lab has also meant that my lesson planning has suffered somewhat also. So I am glad that we've got this next couple of days off, to give us time to get the lab going and to give me time to actually do some planning for my computer classes.

Well, that's brought you pretty much up to the minute. I have to go to the lab and see if we can get a couple more computers going. Until next time...

D-Day Approaches

Hi all,

While not as terrifying as the subject title may imply, the big day is now just hours away. The First Day Back At School. It has been relatively quiet here for the 12 or so days I have been in Bingham Academy, with just the staff, their families and the workers around. Tomorrow we will be invaded by about 220 children, ranging from about age 5 to age 16. Am I prepared? I really don't know. I have a plan, but how will it actually go? You'll have to wait until the next episode to find out. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself.

On a technical note, I have been notified that people receiving this letter through a Hotmail account have been getting blank messages. This one should be ok. Please let me know if it isn't. One other note is that this one won't be posted on the web site immediately. Internet access other than for email has been very intermittent so far. Apparently TeleCom (the one and only Internet provider in the country) has been hit by the virus plaguing the rest of the world, thus making their service very (very) flakey. But email generally gets through once or twice a day (on average).

Departure from London was fairly smooth, if somewhat more involved than I had been hoping. My flight was scheduled to depart at about 5:20PM, so I gave myself about 5 hours to get to the airport. The plan was to take the train from St Albans to Kings Cross Station, and then change to the underground, catching a Piccadilly line service to Heathrow (Terminal 4). Those familiar with London will know what I mean. For the rest of you, just play along...

After dragging my 40 kilos of luggage the 2-3 kilometres to the train station, I finally boarded a train destined for Kings Cross Station at about 12:45. One station short of Kings Cross, the train stopped progressing. Apparently there had been a 'serious problem' further down the line, resulting in long delays and imminent cancelations. Hmm, I thought. I wasn't keen on dragging my luggage around London, so I waited for about 15 minutes. With no progress in sight, I and a fellow traveler (an Englishman bound for France via the Eurostar train service) headed out and discovered that we could catch the Underground from here. He helped me with my suitcase and a few minutes later I was on a Northern Line service headed for Leicester Square station. Hopping off there, I trundled to the Westbound Piccadilly Line platform where 1 minute later, a service bound for Heathrow arrived. Fantastic, I thought. About 10 minutes later, we were informed that the service would (for some reason I couldn't understand) be terminating at an earlier station - about 5 stops too short. Thankfully, once we all got off, another train came by about 10 minutes later, and I finally got to Heathrow. Once off the train service, there were no further problems. I had finally arrived, just outside the recommended 2 hours before departure. From London it was a quick (55 minute) flight to Amsterdam, where I got off, walked the 25 minutes or so from one end of the airport to the other, and boarded my flight to Kenya. The flight there was quite pleasant (as far as an Economy flight to anywhere is pleasant), and 8 hours later we had landed in Nairobi.

After hanging around in the departure lounge for an hour-and-a half, I was greeted by Geoff Weston, a fellow Australian heading to Addis Ababa who I had met through Stuart and Lucy Bradley a couple of months ago. He is teaching Kindergarten at another school here in Addis for a year or so. Anyway, we finally headed out to the plane, stopping to identify our luggage so that it wouldn't be left in Nairobi and started the 2 hour flight back north to Addis Ababa. The plane wasn't too crowded, so after takeoff we sat together. The other passenger in our row turned out to be a Kenyan Christian named Rose, who was also going to Addis for the first time. She's doing about 7 months worth of aid work as a nutritionalist for the Catholic Relief Fund(?). She's a protestant though, so we may meet at church occasionally. It depends what churches we all end up going to.

Anyway, the flight was pretty much on-time, and I got through customs remarkably quickly. The only slight holdup was the luggage carousel breaking down, resulting in about 75% of the luggage being sent out on the next-carousel down. Welcome to Africa.

Upon exiting, I was greeted by a small crowd - David Hicks, who was the only person there who'd actually seen me in the flesh before, Krisha and Brad Adams (fellow Australians) and Binyam, an Ethiopian guy about my age who I'll be working with in the computer lab at the school. The drive home was...interesting. Defensive driving takes on a whole new meaning in this country. Lane markings are regarded as a guide, usually as the line the centre of the vehicle travels down. Cars (and there are quite a few of them) either drive slowly in the middle of the road, or suddenly zip past you on the inside lane, or both, at random. Pedestrians, donkeys and herds of sheep may attempt to cross the road at any time. Pedestrian crossings exist in a few places, but if you stop to let people cross at them, you are likely to be involved in an accident. The only reason they exist at all is because we have them in the West. They mean nothing. The best policy is to beep your horn at regular intervals and pray a lot.

Addis Ababa (pronounced Ah-dis Ab-be-bah) officially has a population of about 3-4 million. Some of the locals guess that is probably about half the actual amount. People lie, run away or dodge the census here because the results are used to calculate the taxes each house should pay. So the official numbers are unreliable. Either way, it is quite crowded. Because it is the rainy season at the moment, where there is vegitation it is green, and there are regular mud puddles about the place. In the dry season (which goes from September until July) it becomes much browner. Water is a resource that must be used with some care here. During the dry season they have rostered power cuts (hydroelectricity accounts for 98% of the country's electricity). That isn't the case at the moment, although we've had a couple of power outages since I got here. This will probably make teaching computers somewhat challenging at times. We do have a generator and backup batteries, but they can't power the whole compound.

Anyway, after picking up some milk (which is fresh and comes in 1/2 litre packets) we finally arrived at Bingham. I've put pictures up of the main building, and of the inside of my appartment (which is on the bottom floor of the building on the right, if you're looking at the picture). New people are looked after with regards to lunch and dinner for the first week or so, which not only saved me from having to find and cook food, but also gave me a chance to meet some of my co-workers. There are about 14 other appartments on the compound, with a variety of singles, couples and families occupying them. I'd be the youngest expat (or Ferenji in Amharic) working here, with the next closest being about 4 years older (at a guess).

There has been lots of work going on here over the rainy season holidays. With a new year level being added on, there has been a need to create some new classrooms. Previously, each of the teachers had their own classroom and the students came to them. This year, each class gets their own classroom, and the teachers come to them (except for special subjects like computers, art and science, where there is too much equipment to move around). So, for the first time in Bingham history, we have a teacher staff room, where most of the highschool teacher have a desk. It's currently still having curtains and locks fitted, but it's functional. Although, as we discovered, with the corugated tin roof, it gets quite noisy in there during heavy rain or hail storms. The new classrooms have been created by subdividing some other rooms in existing buildings, and the staff room was created from a space what previously was used for hanging out clothes to dry. The new building that Russ Sweetman designed is yet to be started, with the process being bogged down in getting permission from the appropriate government department. That permission could be anything from 1 month to a year away. We are all hoping it won't take too long, but it's fairly comfortable here for this year.

Anyway, this email has already gone on for too long. This past week has mostly been taken up with orientation (which all the teachers have been involved in) and preparation for classes. I will be teaching Kindergarten through to 6th grade for Computers, as well as years 7 and 8 mathematics. Each of the computer classes is two lessons a week, and the maths are 5 lessons each, making a total of 24 lessons each week. Should keep me busy. I've played squash 3 times so far, and although the altitude does affect me, I think I'm getting used to it. I've played at least 6 games each time, although I haven't beaten Tim or David Hicks yet. I'll get there...

For now, however, it is time to go. Lesson plans beckon to be written. God bless.

Arrived in Addis

This is just a quick post to let you all know I've arrived in Addis Ababa. I'll probably do a longer post in the next day or two - maybe with some photos of my new pad. Stay tuned...

Scooting around Scotland

I've been informed that people getting these posts via Hotmail are getting blank messages. I can't fix the problem at the moment, but once I'm in Addis I'll change my delivery mechanism which will hopefully fix the problem. In the meantime, hopefully you're reading this on the web. On with the update...

Upon landing in Glasgow on Friday, I met up with Rachel McLellan, who was kindly providing a roof over my head for the next couple of days. We headed off to a Glasgow pub with her flatmate Nicky to meet a bunch of other Aussies living up that way (Suzie King, sister of Jeff, among them). We went around to one of the couple's place for desert and beverages. I had Milo. Yes, they have Milo here. And Vegimite. You can even find Tim Tams, if you look hard enough.

Anyway, the next day (Saturday) Rach, Nicky and I headed out of Glasgow to the Island of Bute (pronounced 'Beaute', as in 'Beaute mate! Slap another one on the barbie.'). After a lovely drive through the Scotish Highlands (only slightly dampened by cloud setting in), we caught a quick ferry to the island. A short drive, some lunch, and £6 later, we were riding across the island for some seal spotting and a 'wee dip in the ocean'. I was reluctant at first, but the water turned out to be fantastic. Not too cold at all - very refreshing. Plus, I taught Rach how to skim sea shells.

Sunday was very sunny. We headed down to The Rock, which is the church Rach goes to in the mornings. There I met Smidy, a very cool guy who also happens to belong to a kayaking club. As a consequence of this, we headed out onto Loch Lomond, with only a thin fibreglass shell separating me from the deep. We puttered around on the Loch for a couple of hours and then headed back to the barn. After a quick shower, the three of us headed off to St. Silas Episcopal church (I think - correct me if I'm wrong Rach), which is basically the Church of England (Anglican) when not in England. It was actually remarkably similar in style to Ashgrove, except for the use of litergy. I even knew a few of the songs.

On Monday morning, Rach dropped me at the train station and I headed into the city to catch a scenic bus trip to an island on the western coast of Scotland called Mull. In Oban I caught another ferry to Mull Island. Somebody later told me that 'Mull' means 'island' in Gaelic. Hmm... On the ferry ride over we went past a castle which was apparently Sean Connery's hideout in a movie called 'Entrapment'.

Tobermory is the biggest town on Mull. I stayed there for the night at a Youth Hostel there, but before that I decided that after the fun I'd had on Mull, I'd hire another bike and go for a ride in the countryside. The bike guy pointed me onto 16km loop track, and I headed off. Mull is a very hilly island. The highest peak is over 3,000 feet high! After a lot of ups and downs, and several photos of the spectacular scenery, I had finally gotten to the far end of the loop and started heading home. It was at this point that the chain on my bike decided it had going around in circles and getting nowhere and call it a day. This turned out to be not as bad as it might have, since about 300 metres down the road I came across a nice couple with a car who kindly gave me a lift back into town. The bike hire guys were nice enough to give me half my money back, which is fair enough, since the bike did get me half way on my journey...

The next day, it was back on the bus. Leaving Tobermory at 9:45 in the morning, I finally arrived in Edinburgh at about 5:30 that afternoon. Once I got to the Bed & Breakfast I would be staying at that night, I tried to get in contact with my aunt and uncle, Rod and Kay Bullpitt. After finally getting hold of them and trying to arrange a place to meet the next day, we finally came to the realisation that our B&B's were just down the road from each other. So, we met up and headed into town. They had tickets to the Edinburgh Tattoo. I didn't. But I'd heard that left-over tickets are sold an hour before the event starts, so I hung around and was fortunate enough to pick one up. They turned out to be pretty good. I spotted my aunt & uncle, and then settled in to enjoy the show. It rocked! If you ever get the chance, see it! Definately one of the highlights of the trip. If you see it on TV later in the year, see if you can spot me, but especially watch for the Top Secret Drum Corp. They are the most coordinated percussionists I have ever seen.

The next day the three of us headed back into town and checked out the Holyrood Palace (the Queen's residence in Scotland) and then they headed off to Aberdeen and I went up to the Edinburgh Castle. After seeing a few castles now, I think I can say that, although they often have a good view, I wouldn't want to live in one. You tend to have a pretty short life-span, from what I've seen. Plus, there are way to many stairs.

From there, I headed off to the airport and was back in St. Albens that evening. My next update will be the final one from the UK on this trip. I'll most likely be in Ethiopia next time you hear from me. See you on the other side...

Cycling in Canterbury

It's been a while since my last post, so I'm breaking this report up into two sections. This one will cover what I did before heading to Scotland. You can guess what the next one will have...

On Tuesday night, I finally got in touch with my uncle, David Knight, who was in the UK enroute to the United States to see his son (Christopher) and daughter (Katie). We decided to try and meet in London the next day around 6PM. I also decided to head out to Canterbury to check out the Cathederal and other local historical monuments. Not that I knew about anything else that was there.

So, the next day, I headed out to the train station at St. Albens. It was about 10AM when I got there and bought my ticket to Canterbury. All week, the trains have been running slow and/or being canceled, apparently due to the heat. It's been about 30-35 degrees over here most of the time. Anyway, I finally got on a train at about quarter to 11, and started the journey to London Bridge station. After waiting there for about half an hour, I finally got on a train at around 12:30, destination Canterbury West station. By the time I got there, it was about 2PM. Working backwards, I figured I'd have to allow 2 hours to get back to London, which meant that in order to meet my uncle at 6PM, I'd have to leave at around 4PM. Leaving me a bit less than 2 hours in Canterbury. At this point, I decided that hiring a bike might be a good idea. And it was! I have rediscovered the coolness of riding bikes around on this trip. They're more flexible than driving or public transport, and way faster than walking. Unless they break down, of course. But more on that in the next post...

Anyway, I got a bike and a map, and headed to Canterbury Cathederal. It's pretty nice, as such things go. Pretty old, too. Not as old as Westminster Abbey, but it's mostly from around the 1600's. Some (small) parts are from the 1200's. It's most famous residents would probably be the Black Prince and Thomas a'Beckett. Can't tell you much about the Black Prince, other than he has a cool tomb, but a'Beckett was a martyr for his faith during the Protestant rebellions way back when. There's a memorial altar in the cathederal in his honour.

From the cathederal, I headed down to St Augustine's abbey, which is basically just a ruin now, and then rode through town, passing a couple of old buildings, including a Roman Guardhouse which now spans a road and is tall enough for double-decker busses to pass under.

About then I decided it was time to head back to the big smoke. Catching a train at about 4:25, the train seemed to be stopping at every station on the way to London. I finally got there at about 6:30, and gave my uncle a call. He was probably in the underground at the time, and his phone was out of range, so I just left a message saying I'd meet him at Picadilly Circus (where he'd done a lot of open-air evangelism in the past) and hoped he'd get the message. Sure enough, when I got there, he was waiting. We got a picture together in front of the Eros statue and then wandered around inner London for a few hours, just catching up and talking about various landmarks. A good time all 'round.

The next day (Thursday), I headed back into town. By this time, I'd seen most of the better known attractions in London itself, so I decided I would get a ticket to a West End production and check out the last museum I was interested in - the Natural History Museum. After standing in a queue for about 40 minutes to get half-price tickets for that evening, I headed off. The Natural History Museum houses tonnes of exhibits about the natural world. Things such as stuffed animals, skeletons, minerals, meteorites, plants, and (of course) dinosours. I checked out the dinos first, seeing such beasts as the triceratops, iguanadon and other big fellas. Unfortunately, the T-Rex had been moved to an exhibit where you had to pay to get in, and since I'd just paid for my plane tickets to Scotland, I wasn't feeling very generous at the time so I skipped it.

After that I headed back to Leicester Square and at about 7PM, I headed into the Albery theatre to see 'The Master Builder', starring Patrick Stewart (better known to Star Trek and X-Men fans as Captain Jean Luc Piccard or Professor Xavier, respectively). It was a drama, and a fairly small cast, but it was good to see Stewart in the flesh, and the production was good to boot. A good night out all 'round.

The next day, I got up early, repacked my smaller bags and headed of to Luton Airport to catch my plane to Glasgow. The details of my Scotish journeys I will leave until the next post. Stay tuned for the next exciting installment...

New Photos!

Hi all. Just a short one to let you know that new photos are up on the Yahoo Groups site. I'll write another entry in a day or two with more details about what they are photos of, but for now, enjoy...

Greetings from St. Albans

I'm sitting in an Internet Cafe in a town called St. Albans, about 50km north of downtown London. Paul & Jane, the couple I'm staying with here, moved here on Saturday from their flat in Notting Hill. It's a pretty nice little place (3 bedroom, lounge, dining, etc), although they're planning on repainting most of the rooms.

Before that though, on Thursday, I visited the British Museum, which houses artifacts from all around the world, from Egyptian, to British, to Aztec, but to name a few. It also houses the famous Rosetta Stone which was key to translating Egyptian hyroglyphs. That took up about 3 hours just wondering around. Then I wondered over to St. Paul's Cathederal, which was quite impressive. I came back later for their daily 'Evensong', which is a 45 minute service mostly in song. They had a boys/mens choir and the pipe organ leading the worship. Quite interesting.

The next day I went to the Science Museum, but most of the photos of that didn't turn out well due to bad light and poor cameramanship. It has lots of exhibits of science and technology over the centuries, from ploughs to Stevenson's 'Rocket', to space travel.

Saturday was mostly spent moving, but we did wonder around St. Albans afterwards. It's a fairly historic town, with a large Abbey (which reportedly has the largest Nave in England - I'll leave finding out what a Nave is as an exercise to the reader), an old clock tower, and several old Roman ruins which I haven't had a chance to see yet.

Then, on Sunday, Paul & Jane headed off to Copenhagen and Amsterdam for a week-long holiday. It's the first one they've had by themselves (without pesky visitors like me hanging around), so hopefully they'll enjoy themselves. They've kindly let me stay in their place while they're away, though. After dropping off the car they hired to move their stuff to St. Albans, they headed to the airport, and I headed to the Tower of London. It's a pretty cool place - lots and lots of history there. Although not a royal residence any more, it was for several hundred years from its construction in the 11th century. The tower itself, called the White Tower is the oldest structure on the site. One of it's most infamous occupants was probably King Henry the VIII, who is best known for having executed 5 of his six wives (the 6th being married to him for four years before his death). After checking out the Crown Jewels and many other interesting buildings in the Tower, I headed out and walked across the Tower Bridge (who's towers I found to be more impressive than the Tower of London - less historical though). A short walk down the south bank of the Thames brought me to London Bridge, which was very unimpressive and not looking like falling down at all.

Anyway, that's pretty much brought you all up-to-date on my excursions thus far. I'm planning on heading a bit further afield in the next few days, so we'll see what my next entry reports. Until then...

Landed in London

Well, I've made it to London. This photo was taken by Jane Hatch about 1 minute after we got to her and her husband Paul's flat located in Notting Hill. Considering this was after an 8 hour flight to Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), followed by a 12 hour flight to Amsterdam (The Netherlands) and a 1 hour flight from there to Heathrow, as well as another hour of dragging my 40kg of luggage around London, I think I look prety perky.

Anyway, after having a shower, some lunch and a quick call to family to let them know I arrived in one piece, Jane took me on a tour of downtown London. Well, some of it anyway. I was quite surprised at how many of the landmarks we saw in about five hours. We walked from their flat towards town, first going to Kensington Palace where Diana used to live after she and Charles parted ways. Very big, but not terribly impressive for a building that is called a palace. Then we walked through Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park (which are enormous), visiting the Albert Memorial and Royal Albert Hall on the way.

Buckingham Palace was next, complete with Beefeaters. There was no changing of the guard ceremony that day, though. From there we headed down to Whitehall, which has more national monuments than you can poke a stick at - Big Ben (which I learned is actually the name of the bell, not the clock itself), the Houses of Lords and Commons, and Westminster Abbey, but to hame a few. Westminster Abbey was quite impressive. It has been the coronation and burial site of England's monarchs since the 1300's, and it contains the tombs or memorials of many other famous English men and women (mostly men though), including Shakespeare, Oliver Cromwell, and David Livingstone.

From there, we wondered up past Downing St (it's completely blocked off and guarded by police), past the Horse Guard's Parade to Trafalga Square. The National Gallery is right next to Trafalga Square, and we spent about 15 minutes trying to find an artist we'd heard of. We finally found an unfinished piece by Michaelangelo and a portrait of one of the Popes by Raphael. We couldn't find anything by Leonardo or Donatello though, unfortunately.

From there, we meandered up to Lichester Square where we sat down for about 20 minutes while we waited for Paul to finish work. His building overlooks Lichester Square. There are also several cinemas in that block, and they apparently have a lot of the premiers there. He's seen Patrick Stewart (of Star Trek fame) and last week he nearly got to shake hands with Arnold Schwartzenegger at the premiere of of Terminator 3. He was about two arm's lengths away when he stopped, apparently. Bummer.

Several close calls with pidgeon poop later, Paul finally emerged, and we headed up to Picadilly Circus, then wondered up through Soho and caught one of the famous red double-decker busses back to their flat.

All that in about five hours and at a cost of £9 (£3 for water and and icecream, £4 for Westminster Abbey, £1 for some sketches of London monuments, £1 for the bus trip)! How cheap is that?

Anyway, that's about it for this entry. I've got to go and figure out what I can see today...hmm...

Touchdown!

Well, I made it to London in one piece. I'm off to fight jet-lag and do some sight-seeing, so I'll put some more detail in the next post.

Doggon it!

The Brisbane Lions just lost to Port Adelaide by 1 point! Not happy...

Counting down...

Well, less than a week to go now. Thanks to everyone who has been supporting me in many ways over the past few weeks and months. The 6 'Dinners for 10' that were hosted by various people to help raise interest and funds were excellent! I met a lot of interesting people and everybody seemed to enjoy the opportunity to chat and meet new people. Thanks to Bec and Scott in particular for instigating that effort, as well as to all those who hosted and attended them.

Also, for those who are interested in catching up with me before I go, here are some scheduled events:

Farewell Gathering - 3:00PM-5:30PM Sunday, July 27, 2003
Location: Walton Bridge Park, The Gap (on Waterworks Rd, near the Gap Shopping Villiage)
Please bring some food to share. Drinks will be provided.

Commissioning Service - 6:30PM Sunday, July 27, 2003
Location: Ashgrove Baptist Church, 7 Firhill St, Ashgrove

Departure - 3:50PM Tuesday, July 29, 2003
Location: Brisbane International Airport
Flight: KL4220
I will be at the airport from around 1PM, since we are required to be there two hours in advance of departure.

Individual appointments may be made if desired, time permitting :)

Welcome!

This is an experiment in journaling. I've never been any good at keeping a regular diary, but two factors may increase the lifespan of this one: 1) It's on the web, and that's cool; and 2) I might actually have something interesting to write about. We'll see...

In any case, I will be endevouring to make regular entries here documenting my time in Ethiopia. If you want to be notified when a new entry has been made, go to the associated mailing list web site and sign up. Alternately, you can sign up directly.