Just not feeling up to writing today. Ethiopia is a juxtaposition of opposites. Here are some photos.
The Mundane
Part of the field that they cut
I keep getting lots of questions about day to day life and I want to take a post to tell you what my life is like now. To give you an idea, while I was working on lesson plans in my apartment while the deluge of rain, thunder, and lightening was happening, I watched three Ethiopian men cut an entire field of grass around one of the buildings on campus with a sickle. It took several days. It is a big enough area that I would have wanted a riding lawn mower or tractor and it could have been done in an hour. The concept of time is just a different thing here than it is in the U.S.
Dryer controls
I live in a two bedroom apartment (see pictures below) that I share with an Ethiopian teacher, Dawit. It is pretty minimal by U.S. standards, but it is comparable to an apartment I had when I was in college. There are challenges here in construction standards. There are no OSHA regulations. You will see workers hundreds of feet up in the air on construction projects with scaffolding made from eucalyptus branches. They aren’t wearing harnesses or taking any safety measures. It is very dangerous. The building standards are also nonexistent. I have open wiring in my bathroom near the shower. And I had to laugh in the kitchen when, although there is space for the refrigerator, they neglected to put a power source so the refrigerator is in the living room where there is a plug. The kitchen has a cooktop and I have a convection microwave for baking but the directions for it are in Dutch so I stick with microwaving when I need to heat something up. The communal washer/dryer for the complex is also in Dutch so I just randomly push some buttons until it works and hope for the best.
Breakfast foods
When I get up in the morning, Dawit and I might go for a run or I might do some yoga. Running three miles at 8300 ft altitude is definitely good for my body and my lungs. After my workout, I stretch and then have some breakfast which usually consists of a hunk of bread with honey or peanut butter and a piece of fruit. When I need a pick-me-up, I switch to the Ethiopian version of Nutella in place of the honey or peanut butter. Lunch is noodles or rice with some vegetables. Dinner is whatever someone cooks which may be Ethiopian food or western food or we might go out to eat. We eat a lot of pasta. My favorite thing so far has been the shiro. The local beer and wine isn’t too bad either.
Abandoned horses
I have pretty much become a vegetarian. When you see the meat hanging in the shops, just out in the air with no refrigeration or sanitation, it is really hard to think about eating it. I see goat herders corralling goats for slaughter and I saw a group of pigs today rooting through the trash when I was out on my run. I think one of the things I am having the most difficulty with is the way animals are treated. When a farm animal has served its usefulness, they are abandoned on a street to starve. I have watched these horses that were left on a street just obediently stay there day after day and get skinnier each day. I know that one day, I will go by and one will be laying there dead. The worst part is that there are hundreds of abandoned animals such as that. I have seen them kill a rat at the produce stand where I was shopping and that same day, we walked by a dead human body on the side of the road. Ethiopia is 173rd out of 187 countries on the Human Development Index. There are lots of challenges here.
Dawit’s way of looking at life and his understanding of Ethiopian culture is helping me adjust. He reminds me a lot of Matt. Dawit is the chemistry and biology teacher and we work on lesson plans together. He was born in Ethiopia, then migrated to Ghana before being educated in the states but has now come back to Ethiopia to work. School starts next week. Dawit gave me the best compliment I have received in Ethiopia. When I offered him a rain jacket to wear, he told me I was very open with sharing my resources. I told him that it was just “stuff” and wasn’t important and that he was welcome to use anything of mine he needed. He told me I had an “African soul”. I thought that was pretty cool and I am getting a pulse on what that really means to be able to write a blog post about it someday.
I typed this out on my computer in my apartment so that I could go to the internet café and post it because our internet line was cut in one of the construction projects and the government hasn’t fixed it yet (it has been several weeks). Of course, I had to wait for the deluge of rain to stop before making the dash down the road. They keep telling me that the rainy season will end in 3 weeks… I don’t believe them.
Cheers to everyone and know that I am well. Following are my apartment pictures.
Apartment from outside. I live in a unit on the bottom floor
The next 50 years…
Song for the day: Tom Petty’s “Learning to Fly”
I’m learning to fly, but I ain’t got wings. Coming down, is the hardest thing.
I’m learning to fly, around the clouds. But what goes up, must come down.
I never said I was doing this right, I just said I was doing it. Yesterday, I needed a reality check. Thanks Carl, Panos and Dawit for helping me have a shift in perspective.
Sometimes, I need a good swift kick in the pants to wake me up. I have spent a week in the doom and gloom of the “woe is me” phenomena. What if I made a mistake in coming here? What if the situation doesn’t change, how am I going to do my job? What if…what if…what if… Carl, thank you for giving me the first perspective shift with that one sentence: I am here now, so instead of complaining, what can I do to change the problems? Yes, I know that I can’t change everything and I need to stop letting that be a limiting factor. The question I need to ask myself is what CAN I do instead of dwelling on what I believe can’t happen. Believing in what can’t happen is the limiting thought we all have at times, and it is the thing we need to fight more than any other human behavior.
It was once believed it was impossible for a human being to break the 4 minute mile in running, until one man did it. Within a year after the first man did it, over a hundred others had done it also. As human beings, we are only limited by what we believe is impossible. I have to believe that all things are possible.
The second perspective shift I had was when someone else told me that I “am part of the 50 year plan”. I need to stop thinking that I am going to save the world tomorrow. I am one piece of a puzzle that fits together, hopefully effecting change in the next 50 years. It is a process and I am just one cog in the process. My business is STEM education. The practical applications of STEM disciplines (engineering, applied math, technology, etc) are a major key to improving the quality of human life in basic services such as clean water, sanitation, energy, shelter, infrastructure, food production and communications. I believe that we have a collective responsibility to improve the lives of people around the world in respect to these basic services and key to that provision is educating a generation of students capable of providing solutions in their own countries. That is how I can effect change. Now I just need to do that without whining.
Interesting thing about the 50 year plan: I will turn 50 years old in a couple of weeks. So I will never see the 50 year plan come to fruition, I just have to believe that actions I take will actually make a difference. In 50 more years, my two beautiful granddaughters will be my age. What kind of world will they get to live in? And how can my actions today make it better for them when they are 50?
I get so irritated with myself for not being able to stop playing the tape in my head. Here is how my tape goes: “I miss my grandchildren and I miss enjoying firsthand what wonderful parents my son and daughter-in-law are. I miss my beautiful effervescent daughter and all she adds to my daily life. I miss my amazing friends and the strength they give me every day to do the things I do. I miss my bike. I miss the freedom and independence of having a car to go wherever and whenever I want to. I miss being able to hang out on the internet all hours of the day”. Okay…there is my pity party… now … get over it Robin. Shut the tape off. The third perspective shift I am going to give myself right now. Here it goes: I have had the most amazing life anyone could ask for. I have been able to travel to every inhabited continent on the planet. I have had an incredible career that has allowed me to make a difference in so many peoples’ lives. I have the two most remarkable children on the planet and they are both now in relationships with loving partners who are as wonderful as they are. On top of all that, I am blessed with these two intelligent, loving, beautiful grandchildren that astonish me every time I am around them. I have a loving family and supportive friends. So WHAT TO HELL AM I COMPLAINING ABOUT???? I need to do the job I came here to do and know that all those things will be there when I get back.
When I focus on the negative aspects of life and my situation, I am a pretty miserable person. When I take the time to notice and give thanks for the positive things in life, I am a happy person. So today I have a choice: miserable or happy, what is it going to be?
Today, my goal is to take pictures of the beauty I see around me. There are a lot of things that are horrific, but there even more things that are beautiful. Today is a day to focus on the beauty of Addis Ababa. No complaining. One day at a time. Breathe, be aware, smile, and own it. 50 more years…
The practical side:
Practically speaking, I would say our greatest need is for a generator so that we could have consistent power. Second most important is means of communication, both snail-mail and internet. I am going to research the cost of a post-office box for the school and I am trying to find out how to get satellite internet. I see satellite dishes everywhere and there has to be a reason for that. But of course satellite dishes require power so we are back to our greatest need of a generator.
The Well of Strength
I have to admit I am struggling, more than I could have ever thought possible. We haven’t had power in 24 hours and I was sick for about 8 of those hours, I slept for over 12 of the rest. We haven’t had internet all week. I am so used to being connected to my family, it just feels like a huge loss not to have them there every day even just virtually.
Physical strength requires exercise. When we exercise, it can hurt or be difficult but it is what will make our muscles strong. I believe emotional strength and resilience is similar. It doesn’t get stronger when everything is perfect all the time. Emotional strength is gained through struggle. Somewhere, down deep inside myself, is a well of strength that I have cultivated over the last years that I need to draw on. When I was going through my divorce, that was my mantra: The pain I go through today will become the well of strength I will draw on tomorrow. I need to reach inside myself and draw on that well right now. I am made of sterner stuff than I am demonstrating.
I don’t remember ever crying as much as I have in the past week. I will not just turn tail and run away because things are a little challenging. I have to give it enough time. Usually, when I write this blog, I find the act of typing out whatever I am whining about helps me turn things around so that I can see the good side of the situation. I need that ability right now. June seems so far away.
So, what am I whining about? Lack of power, lack of internet connection, the inability to communicate, and just the enormity of being in this strange place where hyenas howl at night, roads are rivers of mud, and I have no sense of connection to anyone here. I am trying to build relationships at the same time as juggling the strangeness of the land and the environment. I just have to figure it out and get in a routine and it will be better. Having regular times for internet usage, routines for going to the store, etc all will help normalize things. Right now it is almost overwhelming with all the differences. Not almost, it IS overwhelming.
I wish I had a bike. Riding my bike would give me a way to find my center.
A Sense of Community
There can be no vulnerability without risk; there can be no community without vulnerability; there can be no peace, and ultimately no life, without community. ~ M. Scott Peck
Village house
Ethiopia is not what I expected. The truth is, I am not sure that anyone could ever imagine what it is like until you experience it with your own senses. The sounds, the smells, the absolute essence of stepping back in time to the birthplace of humanity, none of that can be understood until you experience it. It is truly an amazing place.
The street near my school
Ethiopia is a contrasts in opposites. New, modern houses are built next to shanties. Horses, donkeys, goats, etc share the road with cars. Farmers growing teff to make injera and using wooden plows next to a modern university of stone and glass. Barefoot beggars share the street with men in Armani suits. People precariously cross the highway, dodging between buses, taxis and livestock. Beautiful new buildings are constructed with scaffolding made from eucalyptus branches. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to any of it. Some would call it chaos. I call it humanity.
Church on the hill
The sights, sounds, smells, and tastes of Ethiopia are like seeing, hearing, smelling, and tasting time itself. It is the oldest culture in the world. Time is started at daylight, when the sun comes up, so dawn is 1 o’clock…a new day. Every morning at dawn, the monks from a nearby church greet the day with chanting and drums. I lay in bed and listen to the sounds as well as the oxen lowing in a nearby field. The smells of sewage are offset by the smell of freshly cut grass. The sour taste of injera, spicy wot, and the most amazing coffee I have ever had in my life make all my taste buds come alive.
Eucalyptus scaffolding
Having always traveled as a tourist, I am realizing that visiting in a foreign country is very different from living in one. It is strange and foreign land after spending my life in the sterile environment of the U.S., a place where everything seems so orderly by comparison. In the US, I turn on a faucet and have clean drinking water. I flick a switch and have dependable electricity. I pay a bill and have reliable internet access. I want groceries and supplies for my home, I can get it all at one store. Life is easy in the U.S.
Shanties
In Ethiopia, life is harder. The internet hasn’t worked in 3 weeks at my school (I came to am American hotel and had to pay $15 for a day of wifi), the power goes out on a daily basis, shopping requires several stops to different stores and paying the ferengi [foreigner] price, and then there are the daily difficulties of acquiring clean water. For me it is difficult but still easier than it is for most Ethiopians, because I have money and resources. For the average Ethiopian, it is much harder. To offset the hardships, people here depend on each other.
Modern housing
There is a sense of community, history, and belonging that I rarely see in the U.S. where we don’t need each other for basic survival. But in our isolation from each other, Americans also lose a sense of emotional connection that many (including myself) continually search for. Connection and community are two things go hand in hand. But to be connected, we have to be vulnerable to people. We have to open up and show others what we need and we have to meet those needs in other people in our community. For many of us, this kind of vulnerability is hard.
Brooklyn
Charlotte
So I begin this year of renewal and transformation. I am not convinced yet that I can do it, either the job I am being asked to do or just staying so long outside the U.S. I am already missing my family terribly. Spending the last week with Charlotte and Brooklyn has made me long for more time with them. I long for a sense of community of my own.
NOTE: I had a lot of trouble with pictures today. I forgot the cord to the camera that I had the majority of my photo on back at my apartment. So here is link to the ones I already uploaded to my drive. I will try to put the rest up later when I get back to an internet connection. http://sdrv.ms/1dxhsFh
Next stop…Africa
I was out running errands on Monday, planning on spending my last evening with my wonderful family, when I decided to check my flight times for the next day and lo and behold…I had the wrong day. Fortunately, I didn’t miss my flight but it sure got my adrenaline pumping to be leaving in 3 hours when I thought I still had 27 hours. Unfortunately, it made my goodbyes to my family much shorter. But maybe that was for the best. I tend to let things drag on otherwise.
I have no great words of wisdom this morning. Today is the day. When I wake up tomorrow morning, I will be in Africa. Although I am scared, my fear doesn’t own me. I know that anything that I have forgotten can be taken care of once I get there. I don’t know what to expect, I am probably the most unprepared traveler on the planet. For someone who has always been a planner, that should be freaking me out. But for whatever reason, it isn’t.
I will have some pictures of my new home on my next post. I am not sure when that will be, but I promise it will have pictures. Let the journey begin…
A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find that after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us. ~John Steinbeck
The Journey of 1000 miles…
Sometimes, I think life tests us. Every time I have had some kind of insecurity about this decision, life will throw some kind of obstacle in my way which I have been interpreting as “see you can’t do it”, but I think the question life is trying to get me to ask is “how important is it to you?”.
I leave tomorrow for Washington DC. Then fly out Wednesday morning for Africa. My big worry was my obscene amount of baggage and how I will negotiate it all around the Addis Ababa airport. I have 3 checked bags and a small carry on and backpack. I think I need to cut one bag out. That means either leave some of the clothes or some of the school supplies I wanted to bring.
That was my big worry, until the fire ants struck. Mean little beasties, fire ants are. For those who don’t know me, I am deathly allergic to fire ants. I was coming home from the store yesterday, in a hurry and not looking where I was going and stepped in a mound of fire ants. Fortunately, thanks to reacting quickly, I am fine except for a painful foot. It was an inconvenience but one that had me saying “you can’t even watch what you are doing in your own country, how are you going to go to another country, negotiate baggage, find your way around, figure out how to teach a class that doesn’t speak your language…etc etc”. The litany of “I can’ts” began.
So today, I have to purchase the last of my supplies. Spray my mosquito net with Permethrin, have lunch with a friend, repack and try to get rid of a suitcase full of clothes. Sometime in there, spend my last day with my son, daughter-in-law, and grandbabies. I really should have finished the packing thing earlier. There just hasn’t been time to get my stuff done and visit with everyone also.
So I am stressing and when I get anxious and start to panic, I start focusing on all that I can’t do rather than on what I can. Right now, it is full-blown panic time, so the “I can’ts” have possession of my otherwise positive attitude. I have to remember that it is one step at a time. I need to start with the first item on my list and go until I have finished the list. One step at a time. The journey of a 1000 miles begins with a single step. I just need to begin. I can figure the rest out as I go.
Deep breath Robin. Remember to breathe, stay present, and be aware. You can totally do this. I wish Matt was here.
A Birth, A Death, and a Wedding
Yesterday was a day of a lot of shifting emotions, not for me, but for my son. One of his best friends became a new father, another best friend died unexpectedly, and his wife’s best friend got married…all of which happened in the same day. I have empathy for him and my daughter-in-law. They are dealing with the up and down emotions of balancing two joyous events with a tragic one and trying to be happy for their friends while mourning the death of the other. Life doesn’t happen when it is convenient. Yesterday for my son, daughter-in-law and all their friends, life was divided by zero.
I sit here and listen to my son and his wife process their grief by telling stories of their friend and sharing pictures with their social group. I am reminded that our lives consist of our stories. They don’t consist of how much money we have, what things we own, or even what our jobs are. Our lives are about our experiences. At the end, the people who we have touched will tell our stories and share our photos. It is our legacy and reminds me to always treat people well. Life is about caring about other human beings. The most important gift we can give another person is the gift of our time.
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” ~Maya Angelou
“To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and to endure the betrayal of false friends. To appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know that even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
Sometimes, it is the right question at just the right time…
I have 5 more days in the US, 4 here in North Carolina with my son and his family and then 1 day in Washington DC before leaving for my new home in Africa. As a person who has always considered herself a homebody, this is stretching me a lot. I read an article this morning about the state of the telecom industry and the unreliability of wifi and I am worrying about how to stay connected with my family and friends who are such a great source of support for me. I guess I will have to figure it out.
My son asked me a great question the other night that really made me think. He asked me what I was most looking forward to. I gave him a quick answer but then I really started thinking about the question more in depth. I think the thing that I am most looking forward to is a whole year of teaching math at the high school level.
For the record, I loved teaching high school math. I love that level of mathematics and I enjoy seeing students get excited about a subject that is difficult and frustrating while also necessary and essential for 21st century life. High school math is the gatekeeper to higher education so the ability to teach students and watch them reach their potential so they have the opportunity to go to college is a huge source of satisfaction for me. I have missed it the last 12 years of my life while I have been in higher education. I am looking forward to seeing my students in Ethiopia reach that potential. I am even looking forward to the challenges of having to negotiate two languages and limited resources.
I have also missed that age group of students. They are just on the cusp of becoming adults. They have so much potential and aren’t yet jaded with ideas of what they “can’t” do. At that age, they believe they can change the world. At 49, I am still one of those people that never lost that belief that I can change the world and being around their energy always just fills up my spirit.
I left teaching in 2001 to go back and get a PhD because I didn’t feel like I knew everything I needed to be able to reach all my students. I always intended to go back the classroom. Teaching in higher education was never a goal for me. I left a very collaborative high school teaching situation and went to grad school and was captivated by research. I think my love of research had more to do with interacting with a group of intelligent grad students and professors who were having great conversations and working together to find solutions for the problems in education. Being an isolated faculty member in higher education isn’t like it was in grad school. Research loses its luster when it is done in isolation.
The other issue I have in higher education is the content I am currently teaching. I am a great math teacher. I am great at facilitating professional development for teachers who like me, just want to know more about how to teach their students better. I suck at teaching math education to people who have never taught before and who have no idea what teaching is really going to be like. I find I have little tolerance for rigid ideas of what classrooms are “supposed” to be like. I think classrooms are as individual as the teachers and students who fill them and what works for one teacher and group of students isn’t necessarily going to work for another. So when I teach math education, I have tried to teach aspiring teachers to find their own way. The college students I teach perceive that I am not actually “teaching” them anything. The problem is that I can’t teach them what they want to know and I don’t have the patience and tolerance for consistently trying to break through their ingrained beliefs of what education is “supposed” to be like that my colleagues seem to be able to do.
Between the frustrations of research and teaching, I have not been very successful in my current position so I am most looking forward to the chance to get back to my roots. I am looking forward to teaching high school math again. I hope it will help me make some decisions about my future.
It is all about perspective…
One morning when I was newly single and still very emotionally fragile, I was walking in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood in search of breakfast early on a sunny Sunday morning. It was one of those rare mornings after a bad breakup that I was optimistic about being able to move on and carve a new life out for myself. A smile on my face, feeling confident, healthy and beautiful, curly red hair all askew, strolling down the street and all of a sudden, a man gave me the best spontaneous complement I have ever had. He said “top of the morning to you. Wow, the redder the hair, the hotter the woman.” It was unfortunate that he happened to be jumping out of a dumpster at the time and wearing a woman’s skirt and a pair of black pantyhose with a run in them, but hey, at that point in my life I was going to be thankful for a complement wherever I could get it. It is really just a matter of perspective.
I was reminded again this week that all my “realities” of life are a matter of perspective. The lens I am looking through, colored by my experiences, beliefs and emotion, distorts reality as I see it. Every single human being on the planet has a distorted view of their reality. It is only through communication that we can understand how others are seeing the same situation and realize the fallacies in our own perception of events. That is why communication is imperative in misunderstandings. If we refuse to communicate, we can never understand any but our own distorted reality of things.
Pure joy
My reality was distorted enough that I was having a pity party earlier this week. I am staying with my son and his wife, enjoying their company and the pure joy that radiates from my two beautiful granddaughters. Given that scenario, the true reality is, there is absolutely no reason I should have been feeling sorry for myself, but I was. My reality was colored by the fact that my son lives in my former home and every time I visit it brings back memories of my marriage. Added to the emotion of that was an unexpected visit from my ex, who is happily ensconced in a new relationship and I was just flooded with the “all that could have been, all that isn’t now” perspective instead of seeing the reality that is before me. After a virtual slap from my friend Jonathan, I decided enough was enough of that. I needed a big perspective shift to remind myself that my life is my own. I am not in competition with my ex. I am happy that he is doing well. That was the end of that whole line of thought. That was perspective shift #1.
My reality has also been distorted by not having a place to call my own or any personal space. It makes me cranky. Although I am an extroverted person, I need time to myself to recharge. This summer, even though I have had great friends to rely on that have taken me into their homes, having no space that is my own has played havoc with my whole emotional system. By emotional system, I am referring to more than just feelings. I am speaking of the hard-wired physiological, psychological and social mechanisms that human beings have evolved as a matter of survival within a family unit. Our emotional system includes the internal and external interactions and reactions associated with our basic human needs for food, water, sleep, shelter, territory, protection from harm, mating, and nurturing of young.
Living on the road and off the charity of others after a lifetime of having a home of my own, when I was always the person who others turned to for help, has definitely been a challenge for me. There have been many times that I didn’t think I was going to make it, that I was ready to go back to Seattle and start looking for an apartment. But with each challenge I have faced and overcome, I have grown emotionally stronger. I am learning to rely on people and to listen to my body’s needs and to convey those needs to others.
One of the hardest things I have ever done is to tell my children that I was going to get a hotel room this week. It has nothing to do with them and certainly nothing to do with my beautiful granddaughters. I would spend every possible minute with them. But I have realized that I have to take care of myself too or I won’t be any good to anyone. What I need right now, on this last week before I head to Africa, is some time to myself where I can go through my things once again and do a last packing. I need to have a place to spread out all my stuff and pack up the few things that I have with me that are staying in the States while organizing and purchasing enough supplies for my classroom and my personal life (shampoo, mosquito net, etc) that will last me until I get back to the States during the holidays. Unfortunately, I can’t do that with my beautiful children and grandchildren around because I love them so much I just want to focus on them when I am with them. I need a few days to focus on myself to get all those last minute things done.
So I have been stressing all week until I came clean and admitted to my children what I need. As I would expect from them, they are wonderful and they understand. Why did I ever think they wouldn’t? I really have the most amazing children ever. Telling them gave me the perspective shift that I don’t always have to fix everything for them, that I can rely on them to help me also. It made me realize that I can tell them about being scared and unsure of myself as I embark on this journey. I can tell them how much I am going to miss them and how worried I am to be leaving them.
The truth is I wonder if I have made the right choice and whether I have what it takes to do the job I am being asked to do. Do I have what it takes to live in a place that is so different from everything I have ever known? Am I a good enough teacher to teach math in a place where many of my students don’t speak English while I speak no Amharic? Will I have the courage to explore this new country I am going to or will I stay in the safety of the school area I will teach in?
My perspective right now is being colored by my fears and insecurities about where my life is heading in the next year. I need my family and friends to help me with that perspective shift, this week more than any other. The closer the time comes for leaving the more excited I get and at the same time, the more insecure I get. I think that is probably a very normal and human reaction. I just have to breathe, stay present, and be aware and remember to keep communicating to keep a good grasp on true reality not just the reality colored by my experiences and emotions. It really is a matter of perspective.
Life Divided by Zero 