Here in Addis Ababa, our world continues to feel dominated by those things out of our control. American politics (if you can call it that) seems to be driving our work, our conversations, our life in more ways than we’d like or expect or even admit some times. The weather, or more specifically a drought in the Horn of Africa, is the driver of work and emotion in Ethiopia. It seems like lots of people are feeling the weight of the sheer arbitrary nature of how lives are determined by where we are born. For us perhaps, it has never been more clear than the last ten months being here in Ethiopia. Ethiopia is a brutal country in terms of coming to grips with the unfairness of the world.
Strangely (it’s usually quite easy to disconnect a bit with the political happenings at home) being here has drawn us closer, and almost to an unhealthy level, to what we see happening in the US…and other parts of the world. Thinking about our group of friends and people that play critical roles in our lives, that you could slap a label on — siblings, parents, teachers, students, doctors, therapists, professionals, humanitarians, activists, lawyers, politicians, athletes, artists… And when we think about them all and what they advise those who matter to them, none of them champion cruelty, bigotry, hostility, bullying, discrimination, power over decency, turning a blind eye to injustice. We can’t imagine a single person in our lives telling their child or niece or friend or student the following: ‘Hey, you see that guy over there that needs help? Yeah, well, ignore him’…But that’s what this world feels like at the moment.
Despite that, we don’t stop having moments of seeing those bright, stinging even, rays of light that the world continues to deposit in the every day and the extraordinary.
There is an oft-cited Prayer of St. Francis that is quite nice in it’s simplicity of what it asks. (Interestingly enough, recently we discovered that it’s origins do not date back to St. Francis of Assisi. The first appearance of the prayer occurred in France in 1912 in a small spiritual magazine called La Clochette.’)
Là où il y a les ténèbres, que je mette votre lumière.
OR
where there is darkness, light
I’m not sure if this is a good way to reflect on our lives here, but when does it not make sense to look for or ask for light? So, to stick with the pattern of our first post, here are some examples of where we’ve found light in Ethiopia and beyond in the recent months.
- In Lalibela, we saw some of the most breath-taking churches and mystifying devotion, both historically speaking and in present day commitment of people there.
2. Lots of ways to seem small. We saw a ridiculous moon rise and looked out over the world…or at least it felt like that when we weren’t thinking about plunging down a mountain.
3. Today is World Refugee Day. Of all the really awfully sad things there are in this world, one of them that just makes you sick-to-your-stomach sad, is the plight of refugees around the world today (60 million world-wide!! nothing like it in a looong time, if ever). Some better words than ours here (some of you have probably seen this):
Home, by Warsan Shire (British-Somali poet) [full text here]
no one leaves home unless
home is the mouth of a shark
you only run for the border
when you see the whole city running as well
your neighbors running faster than you
breath bloody in their throats
the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factory
is holding a gun bigger than his body
you only leave home
when home won’t let you stay.
_______________
So, even then, some smiles and games and short moments of peace.
4. Nice scenery + baby elephants + ballerinas = Highlights
Thanks for reading this and if possible, let us know what you’re up to. Lots of great catch-ups after the last post. We hope everyone is doing well.
JC, A, N, E
