Ethiopia! Part 4--The Tourism

Over the weekend, the group got to go explore the country. They saw one of Ethiopia's most popular tourist attractions, the Blue Nile falls.
Went on a boat cruise of Lake Tana.
Where they saw wild hippos.
They visited an Ethiopian Monastery that housed beautiful Christian paintings from the fourteenth century. Look how touristy Blake looks.
Blake even got to touch (Am I the only one who thinks it's crazy they let everyone touch this?) this Bible from the 14th century printed on goat skin. I think it's so pretty.
And then there were my favorite Blake things. While the bus was taking the group back to the city it broke down. I love that everyone is pushing the bus, except Blake, who is taking a picture.
These are the taxis that took the group around town. It cost about $.40 to go three miles from the hotel to the hospital. Blake paid one of the drivers $5 to let him drive the taxi around town. Both guys were in heaven.
And speaking of hotels, here's a picture of Blake in his deluxe accommodations. Even with the mosquito net, you should see all the bites he came home with.
Ethiopia even has beautiful sunsets.

Ethiopia! Part 3--The Food

Look at #56. Ha--I love it!
But really, for the 4 of my blog readers who have actually been to the Ethiopian restaurant with us, look at this picture. Apparently the restaurant is right on!
They eat this for every meal. Every meal. For those of you who haven't sampled the goodness, it's a basically a thick stew served on top of a large sourdough flat bread, injera. You break off a piece of the bread to pick up the meat and eat it all in one big yummy bite. In Blake's first email he was geting sick of it, but a week later, he admitted that he liked it; as long as there were a lot of rolls to go with it.
For Thanksgiving, they celebrated with a pretty good cake.

Ethiopia! Part 2--The People

The people in Ethiopia were so generous. Even though they have nothing, many of the souvenirs Blake brought home were given to him to thank him. Blake did such a good job taking pictures of the people in Ethiopia, that now I officially give my permission for Max and Jack to choose Ethiopia for their country report.
Some homes outside the city
The men typically wore shoes, the women did not. The women carried their babies in slings on their backs.
Many men wore this traditional head dress.A traditional tea ceremony. Or maybe it was coffee. They roasted the beans for over 6 hours. Everyone else said it was really good! :) The ceremony is a very big deal and there were paintings of it everywhere.
Of course Blake was chosen to get up and dance. He always gets chosen. He was chosen both times we've been to Hawaii and also on the Galapagos Islands. I don't know what it is about him, probably that terrified look on his face--Please don't pick me! Please don't pick me!--that singles him out. He said by the time they had the going away party, he got smart. He sat on the back row and always kept a drink in his hand. Even if it was empty, he kept sipping on it.Most people in Ethiopia are very religious. Apparently Ethiopia is the second oldest Christian nation in the world. At first I thought this picture was of Blake with a flock of birds, but it's really a religious congregation.
Very religious Ethiopians come and put their bodies down this hole, with their arms in the slots to the sides and hang for hours to reenact Christ's crucifixion.
In his off time, Blake mostly hung out with members of the Ethiopian Rotaract, a Rotarian service group for people under 30. Members of the Rotaract were the interpreters for the mission. Ethiopians who have graduated from high school can speak English. So, mostly everyone who lives in the city can speak English, or at least broken English. People from the more rural areas speak Amharic.
Blake especially got close with these two, Martha and Bereket. They spent an entire afternoon discussing religion and Blake has already received emails from them. I think it's pretty cool to have pen pals in Ethiopia.
And last, but not least, Ethiopians LOVE Obama. There was pictures of him everywhere!

Blake even gave Obama a thumbs up for Vaughn!

Ethiopia! Part 1--The Mission

As predicted, here is a cut and paste of Blake's emails from Ethiopia along with my recount of stories and pictures he shared with me. But Blake wants me to let everyone know, that if you'd like to hear more, you are more than welcome to call him for the details. Seriously, the trip of a lifetime.

November 19, 2007
Hallo (Ethiopian for hello),
Internet at the hotel doesn't work, so this is the first chance I've had. Things are going well--it's been a rollercoaster emotionally..but luckily it's gotten better each day and everyday should be like today from now on. First day we went and toured the hospital and it is the worst hospital anyone has seen in the 30 plus missions they've been on and some even lived in Africa for years and never saw anything as bad. Patients that had just had surgery were lying in hallways on foam pads on the ground, there are blood spots everywhere on the ground, they use biogas made from fermented feces to power a lot of things in the hospital and that combined with the bodies they roll out every 20 minutes or so makes for a pleasant smell. They weren't even sure if we'd be able to do surgeries because the conditions were so bad. Then the second day we did screenings on about 200 patients and started surgeries today--I was hoping to send a few pictures but the connection is so slow they won't upload. It is the best feeling to take the patient in to surgery and then see the parents' reactions right after the surgery is finished, and the worst feeling to have to turn away so many patients that arrived today after traveling for 16 hours by bus and foot because our schedule is full. The food was really good the first couple days but we've had the same thing at every meal, so it's getting a little old. We had a welcoming party the first night and I was lucky enough to be able to join in the native Ethiopian dances.

The hospital. Kind of like lots of very, very old, rundown portables.
The operating room, with a man holding a rifle standing guard.
The line of people waiting to be screened.
Blake's office for screenings. By the middle of the day, the gutter behind the chair was filled with sewage.
Waiting to hear if they'd been selected for surgery. Many people were turned away because there weren't healthy enough to undergo the anesthesia.
Doing exams.
Blake mostly extracted teeth and also made obturators (retainers) to cover the palate for several of the patients they could only fix the lip on and some to expand the palate before surgery.
Some Ethiopian dental students came to observe. They only thing they learn in school is how to extract teeth.Happy!

Traveling to Ethiopia

I don't think this picture does justice to exactly how handsome my traveler looked on his way to Ethiopia. Let me try to explain in a little more detail. He was told to wear tan or grey pants and a blue blazer so the group would look professional traveling together. At the airport they would hand out white shirts with the logo of the organization to also wear. Well, Blake decided on wearing his grey dress Wranglers (Yes, he has dress Wranglers. That's a story in itself.), blue blazer, black crocks, and this red t-shirt until he could get his white shirt. Well, when he got to the airport everyone else already had a white shirt from previous missions and things were so busy that no one gave one to Blake. So this is how "professional" he looked. I think it's funny and SO Blake.

It took over 36 hours to get there; and in between all the sleeping and movies (He watched so many movies he can't even remember them all. But he does remember that he did NOT watch Mama Mia! Which is probably the movie I would have chose to watch first. I think he was waiting for me.), Blake had a very nice tour of Europe. And since Blake is such a sweet talker, he convinced the airline to change his ticket to a window seat so he could enjoy it all. Here it is--
Sunrise in London
Paris
Geneva
Swiss Alps
Rome
Egypt--I'm pretty sure the pyramids are hidden right behind those clouds.
Sudan
And finally, arriving in Ethiopia. In the middle of the night.
Then taking off the next morning for their final Ethiopian destination.And somewhere in the midst of those 36 hours, someone gave Blake a white shirt. So, when he finally arrived, he definitely looked professional.
I hope you enjoyed Blake's flight as much as I did. I love that he took all these pictures. And yes, despite much pleading and begging, I will be the one giving the review of Ethiopia.