Ethiopians for Ethiopians

I made a trip to Borena two weeks ago and on the way we visited the towns of Negele, Arero and Yabello. The scenery is striking while driving through Sidamo on the way, making it worth to endure the bumpy roads and the long rides in the dusty car. We spent the nights in the kind of accommodation that is usual in the countryside; not very luxury in other words. One hotel had a most peculiar design. The bedrooms seemed self contained when entering and indeed, when glancing through the door next to where the bed stood, I saw a sink and a shower. What a relief after a day of biting the dust and holding nature’s calls. The surprise came however when I entered the bathroom. There was a sink and a shower with running water alright but no toilet! How odd. When I asked one of the workers where the toilet was she pointed in the direction of a distant structure and my heart sank, you know what I mean. Who could ever think of designing self contained hotel rooms without a toilet? Somehow in Ethiopia we seem to deny that there is a need for the most basic hygiene. Another hotel where we spent the night a few days later didn’t have any bathroom facilities or running water at all! For all rooms there was a dark filthy place at the back with a hole that smelled awful and looked like a snake pit. Just getting near would turn anyone off. How do such places ever get a license to operate as hotel, I fail to understand. The only sort of decent hotel in town was fully booked and always seems to be. With no competition to speak of that is actually no surprise.
So what has all this to do with the title of the article “Ethiopians for Ethiopians”, you will wonder. Nothing to be frank but I just cannot resist to address the poor hygiene standards in most hotels in this country, which is about to enter a new millennium and hopes to welcome thousands of visitors, many of whom will be disappointed because of this.
Otherwise, our visits to several communities and projects were very interesting and moving, to say the least. People who live in such dry areas face a much worse challenge when it comes to water. They simple don’t have access to water anywhere near. While discussing with a group of community representatives, some women arrived with their donkeys. The elders explained that the women had left home at dawn to go and fetch water. It was 2pm when they returned. The next day, a few other women will do the same, taking along the donkeys of their neighbours, allowing them to attend to other tasks. During a drought many families loose their donkeys and so the daily task of collecting water becomes very difficult indeed, signalling the beginning of a downward spiral into disaster.
We were sitting under a tree next to a school and I noticed that the children leaving school held on to an empty plastic bottle, the kind that visitors like us dispose of, while those coming to school for the afternoon shift carried a similar bottle filled with water, even if it wasn’t very clear. Again the elders explained that every child has to come to school, bringing a bottle of water every day. The water thus collected by the school is used to cook lunch for the children, which is part of the WFP school feeding program. This is a great program as it keeps the children in school during difficult times and helps them to be strong enough to withstand the harsh living conditions. If a child doesn’t bring water it misses lunch and will go home hungry, still having to walk a long distance through the heat.
I felt humbled as the challenges we face to educate our children are quite different, like the traffic and private school fees. Our children may even come home with leftovers and splash each other with their water, just for fun. And they don’t realise that other children face quite different and more difficult circumstances.
The projects we visited are trying to address the water shortages in one way or another. Water tanks are provided to schools for example to store rainwater that runs off the school’s roof. Or underground water tanks are built in which the water is collected that runs down the slopes of a hill. Some of these underground tanks hold 100,000 litres of water, which could mean three months of water during a drought.
Great projects that do a great deal to ease the harsh living conditions that people face in these areas. Most projects are implemented by local NGO’s and supported by international donor organizations, while the communities participate in cash and kind and are involved in making decisions over their priority needs.
I very much appreciate all staff of the NGO’s and also government offices, who work in these areas and try and make a difference for the people who live there: Ethiopians working for and with Ethiopians.
After coming home again I shared my experiences with my family and friends and we began thinking about ways for better off people like us to make a contribution to better the lives of those who regularly suffer disasters like droughts, famine and floods.
We came up with the idea that the schools, which our children attend and our churches could involve themselves and try and develop a kind of twin relationship with a school or church in the countryside and provide support to them for their water projects. Not for us to feel good but to take responsibility and share some of what we have, in a true spirit of “Ethiopians for Ethiopians”.
With all the millennium hype buzzing around and motivating many of us to show the rest of the world what this country is all about, we might as well take the opportunity to demonstrate that we truly care about this great land and each other.