Greetings from Ethiopia!

Well, we made it! The airport in Mumbai was interesting, but the flights weren't bad, so we arrived without too much trouble a few days ago. Will and I have recovered nicely from Kinabalu, although the elevation here is still rather high, and are adjusting without too much trouble to Ethiopian food and lifestyle. We spent a day in Addis, touring the university, which used to be the palace of his Emperor Haile Selassie, the "lion of Judah" (a humble man) and hanging out with Kristen's friend Mami. The next day we flew to Lalibela, where 800 or so years ago king Lalibela decided to carve churches out of rocks, very impressive. the first church we saw there was a free standing structure carved from basalt, not an easy thing to do! So we spent a few days there, then a day in Gondar, where they have a medieval type castle built during Ethiopia's feudal period, and now we are in Bahir Dar, a much nicer city by a very pretty lake.

Ethiopia is a very interesting place. It is definitely a "developing country"; they only turn the power on every other day here, and we thought we were going to die several times on the bus ride here because of the cows, sheep, goats, donkeys, rocks, and people that were on the highway. most of the people outside of the cities act as though nothing has changed in the last 500 years, which is really cool to see, but that makes it interesting when they get their hands on modern equipment, like cars, rickshaws, and high powered weapons.

Now we're in Bahir Dar staying with one of Kristen's PC friends Anna. This is a rocking city bigger than the other two we've seen, and we're enjoying the luxuries (read: internet, french toast, and the bajaj!). We'll be here for two more days to see the source of the blue nile, hang out with kristen's friends, and meet some hippos (not that her friends are hippos). Then we'll head to Finote Selam where Kristen calls 'home' to meet her neighbors and friends there and see what she's been up to for the last year or so. The Finote is famous for monkeys, sugar cane, waterfalls, and the white girl. I guess we'll draw some more of the Ethio papparazzi while we're there.

Bye for now, thanks for stopping by!

Will and John