Ethiopia - Addis Ababa

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Organised / laid back / stupid * as ever (*please delete as appropriate), we landed in Addis Ababa with no Ethiopian currency and no visa. Most visitors would be completely terrified arriving in such a state of utter disorganisation but there were bigger concerns to worry about. Namely Chris launching into a Stato style monolgue about the airport - when it was built, how much it cost and what facilities there were. It could be a long year!

We settled ourselves in to a sedate taxi ride across the city and got an early insight into how differently we would perceive our experiences over the coming months. Whilst I sat in a state close to what can only be described as rigor mortis on the front seat, Chris was lounged out on the back seat seemingly entranced as the '12 months holiday' mantra went through his head. Where I saw a gang of youths in army fatigues blockading a street, Chris would see some lads on their way home after a night out. Where I saw a man with an absolutely huge . . . rifle on full display, Chris saw a man embarking on a night's fishing trip. Needless to say we arrived at the Baro Hotel with me completely terrified and Chris in holiday heaven.

True to my fears, we did indeed have a rather scary incident that night. Our room was right next to a nightclub which was banging out the tunes as if there was no tomorrow. No sooner had we inserted the vital earplugs (thanks to James for those!) than I realised that things were starting to go horribly wrong. Instead of the thumping tunes I could now hear an eery (eary?) rattling coming from, well coming from my ear actually and I realised that half of the earplug had come loose and was now making its way down to my brain.

As the fear of our first visit to the hospital set in, Chris set to action with a pair of tweezers and a head torch and set about removing the offending alien object. As I fell asleep to the strains of (appropriately) 'when the going get tough' I kind of wished it had been permanently lodged there.

Although our first foray into daylight Addis was a bit daunting, we have taken to the place already. After reading recent reports about civil strife in the capital and some recent explosions (sorry Mum, we somehow forgot to tell you about these) we had expected to find the city tense. Instead, it is relaxed and quite orderly and without the chaotic driving conditions that you find in places like Delhi.

In actual fact the only explosions have been from Becs on the throne in the morning.

There is certainly a lot of poverty here but you really don't get hassled like we thought you would and not even much staring, as some people had led us to believe. A few people stare at Chris but that's understandable considering and we did get approached by a scientist today when we went to see Lucy (the most complete skeleton of our early ancestors) asking if he could have a DNA sample from Chris as he thought he might be the missing link - he has quite a beard now!

You do get quite a few approaches from kids asking for money or for food. This can be quite saddening, but the pleas of too young girls today was still not enough for me to part with my 'Laughing cow' triangles - they got a banana to share instead. Ah, the benevolence of it all!

Food on the whole has been lovely, although can best be described as curry on a pancake. Tonight we were even treated to our dinner by some lovely Ethiopians we got talking to in a restaurant (see rating diligently done by Chris) and it's the small things like this that really start to make you enjoy your travels - free food puts a smile on anyone's face.

Time to sign off now as we need to be up at 5am to travel north to Bahar Dar and the Blue Nile Falls.

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Beer ratings (1 - 5 *'s)

St Georges = *** - 4.5% alcohol, refreshing but a little gassy.