Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Season of Mists
Ghinda
------
We travel down to Ghinda the next day. The road is covered in mist for most of the route, and there is the occasional sharp intake of breath as a shave becomes a little too close for comfort on the steep hairpins. But we make it.
Ghinda is clouded over. There is no sun visible but the town and the area around it is incredibly green with new growth. It is an enormous contrast to the dusty, arid land we saw when we stopped here in September.
Ghinda Steve has kindly lent us the keys to his house for a couple of days, so we walk along the main street until we find his compound: a large compound bustling with people, including an Indian family. Some of them call out that Steve is not at home then watch with interest as we produce the key and open the door. We dump our stuff then set off back into the town.
Through the town, back in the direction of Asmara and out again the road passes over a wide rocky river bed, so we decide to follow the river into the hills. Kids call out to us as we make our way along the riverbed and start to climb the lefthand tributary. The going is a little rocky but not too bad. Occasionally a child passes, herding donkeys or goats, and stops to stare at us, curious. Eventually we reach a point where the track becomes very narrow, and looks more difficult to negotiate, so we double back and take the righthand fork instead. Along the way, we spot some huge ants -- the biggest I've yet seen -- marching in a very straight line, five ants wide. I follow them and see that they are climbing up the slope on the left side of the valley and then bunching a little way up. Where they bunch the formation breaks and ants clamber over and under each other, stopping to pass on food or chemical instructions. It is fascinating to watch but more fascinating is the noise. There is a constant hiss, accompanied by a mechanical chatter that seems almost part of the communication process. I don't think it is. I think it is just the sound of many relatively large insect bodies pressing and pushing against one another.
Here too, the track begins to narrow until the only sure way forward seems to be a track cut into the valley side. As we climb, the clouds descend, and we start to feel a couple of drops of rain.
At the top, there is a ridge. From just below, we can see nothing beyond the ridge: the mist has become too thick. It looks like the edge of nowhere. Once we get to the edge of the ridge, the mist has descended so much that we can see no more than about twenty yards. It is an eerie feeling to be standing in the mist-shrouded near-silence, just the occasional echoing call coming from far off shepherds. As we make our way back down it starts to rain properly, and the ground becomes treacherous: we slip and slide around but make it down safely in the end.
We spend our time over the next couple of days walking in the countryside and stopping at cafes for food or drinks. The countryside around Ghinda is incredibly green and lush. The growth is new, so the vibrancy of colour is startling. Birds flit through the trees and their cries echo around the valleys. We see many weaver birds, bright yellow bodies with greenish wings and black faces smudged into red. Their nests hang like wicker baubles from the trees. There are also many bulbuls in their smart monochrome livery top with a rakish crest. Many small canaries flit about the trees outside the cafes, showing off their breasts of blue, red or yellow. Walking by the river, we spot a huge nest in one of the trees. I climb a little way up to investigate, but I can't see or hear any activity. As we walk further down the valley, a pelican swoops over and glides off in the direction of the nest, so I guess that solves the mystery. On another walk along the valley towards Massawa, a mysterious brightly coloured bird flies parallel with us for a while. By it's long tail, split and curling slightly, we reckon that it's a paradise flycatcher. Everywhere we go there is a distant whooping, a bit like a swanee whistle, but we never manage to identify its source.
We also walk up to the old train depot. The track is partially overgrown now, and there are hollow shells of rolling stock scattered about. The buildings are derelict and the place has the sad melancholy of failed aspirations.
There is a restaurant in Ghinda that serves the "best injera in Eritrea". I can endorse that: it's deliciously sweet and firm, and the shiro is a perfect texture and flavour.
On the Monday we head down to Massawa.
Staying at the Dahlak Hotel, opposite the cracked egg of Haile Selassie's palace, we are in relative luxury with an en-suite shower and ceiling fans. The electricity is not perfect, as I discover when I accidentally touch an exposed live wire. Ouch.
We spend the first day at Gurgussum beach, where we stayed for our first weekend in Eritrea, all those months ago. The air and sea are cool so we don't stay in for very long. To warm up after swimming, we play frisbee with a pair of young Eritrean girls. They are perhaps about 9 or 10 anbd smile the whole time we're playing. One of them is very bright and soon learns to throw the frisbee fairly well. She even picks up on my game of bluff and is pretty deft at looking one way while she throws in another direction. The other one -- who might be a bit younger -- finds it more difficult to grasp, and the frisbee more difficult to let go. When the games ends, bot little girls come up to me and Jo and very politely shake our hands. Sweet.
Delicious Yemeni-style fish at the Selam in town for dinner, accompanied by a few VSOs we came across in the afternoon. The fish is baked in a tandoori-like oven then seasoned with a dry coating of mild pepper. We mop it up with chapatis as we huddle under the awning in a attempt to escape the pouring rain. A large group of large, noisy Italians is huddling close by, shouting requests for beer at one of their party. When the rain finally eases off, we splash over to a bar for a few beers of our own.
Next day we head off to Green Island, Jo, Senafe Jo, Nicola, Angela and me. It's a fifteen minute boat trip from the hotel, a short swim away from Massawa main island. It's not especially green -- although admittedly much of it is covered in low, scrubby vegetation -- nor is it much of an island, being just a few hundred metres across and about 20 wide. It's nice to have a beach almost to ourselves however, and it feels like a bit of an adventure. Senafe Jo and I decide to go snorkelling. After wading out a long, long way, the coral starts and we get a good look at quite a variety of small fish. I spot many different angel fish and wrasse, Jo spots a green turtle. The water is so couyant that at one point I forget that I'm not SCUBA diving and dive under for a closer look. A lungfull of salt water reminds me that I'm snorkelling.
Back at the shore, Jo has come across a small dead hammerhead shark. It's lying on its back in the shallows with a wide downturned mouth and hollow eyes. It's tail is missing and so are its dorsal fins. Its shape, expression, and white belly make it look like a cartoon ghost. When I find Jo, however, she has passed the shark and is gazing into the water. She saw a large shadow move across the water but got to the edge too late to identify it. Perhaps it was another ghost.
Helen's Concert
---------------
Back in Asmara on the Saturday, we head down towards Bahti Meskerem for a delicious lunch at a Lebanese restaurant. Then we get ready for the evening and Helen's concert.
Helen VSO has organised a concert to raise funds for a project she is initiating. In the summer, a troupe of travelling actors will tour much of the country in horse-drawn caravans. Their purpose will be to teach and promote discussion on the issues around female genital mutilation (FGM). The concert is free and Helen has publicised it around the Asmara ex-pat and business community, but she is nervous that no-one will turn up. No need to worry: it's a packed house. There are even a few stragglers standing around the sides.
The Cinema Asmara, venue for the concert, is actually a theatre. It is very grand, if a little shabby. Stalls and an upper circle settle beneath a fresco of neatly-painted peacocks who gaze down from the ceiling in perfect perspective.
Many VSOs are there to help out and provide moral support. The latter is not needed at all: the concert is fantastic. The National Union of Eritrean Youth and Students (NUEYS) puts on a stunning display of acrobatics; tumbling about each other, stacking chairs and tables to the ceiling and balancing on top, even using one of the girls as a human skipping rope! Helen performs a few songs, one of them a duet with an Eritrean opera singer. There's a display of salsa dancing by a bunch of Cuban doctors, and music from NUEYS. They all get together to sing 'Lean on Me' as a finale.
A bigger success than anyone could have hoped.
Female Genital Mutilation (FGM)
-------------------------------
FGM consists of full or partial removal of, or damage to, female genitalia. It is usually performed on girls before puberty (between the ages of four and twelve). FGM is a widespread practice in Eritrea (one estimate suggests that 94.5% of the female population has undergone mutilation), as well as other countries in Africa. It often leads to disease, psychological distress or sexual dysfunction, and there is a high mortality rate during the operation or during childbirth many years later.
------
We travel down to Ghinda the next day. The road is covered in mist for most of the route, and there is the occasional sharp intake of breath as a shave becomes a little too close for comfort on the steep hairpins. But we make it.
Ghinda is clouded over. There is no sun visible but the town and the area around it is incredibly green with new growth. It is an enormous contrast to the dusty, arid land we saw when we stopped here in September.
Ghinda Steve has kindly lent us the keys to his house for a couple of days, so we walk along the main street until we find his compound: a large compound bustling with people, including an Indian family. Some of them call out that Steve is not at home then watch with interest as we produce the key and open the door. We dump our stuff then set off back into the town.
Through the town, back in the direction of Asmara and out again the road passes over a wide rocky river bed, so we decide to follow the river into the hills. Kids call out to us as we make our way along the riverbed and start to climb the lefthand tributary. The going is a little rocky but not too bad. Occasionally a child passes, herding donkeys or goats, and stops to stare at us, curious. Eventually we reach a point where the track becomes very narrow, and looks more difficult to negotiate, so we double back and take the righthand fork instead. Along the way, we spot some huge ants -- the biggest I've yet seen -- marching in a very straight line, five ants wide. I follow them and see that they are climbing up the slope on the left side of the valley and then bunching a little way up. Where they bunch the formation breaks and ants clamber over and under each other, stopping to pass on food or chemical instructions. It is fascinating to watch but more fascinating is the noise. There is a constant hiss, accompanied by a mechanical chatter that seems almost part of the communication process. I don't think it is. I think it is just the sound of many relatively large insect bodies pressing and pushing against one another.
Here too, the track begins to narrow until the only sure way forward seems to be a track cut into the valley side. As we climb, the clouds descend, and we start to feel a couple of drops of rain.
At the top, there is a ridge. From just below, we can see nothing beyond the ridge: the mist has become too thick. It looks like the edge of nowhere. Once we get to the edge of the ridge, the mist has descended so much that we can see no more than about twenty yards. It is an eerie feeling to be standing in the mist-shrouded near-silence, just the occasional echoing call coming from far off shepherds. As we make our way back down it starts to rain properly, and the ground becomes treacherous: we slip and slide around but make it down safely in the end.
We spend our time over the next couple of days walking in the countryside and stopping at cafes for food or drinks. The countryside around Ghinda is incredibly green and lush. The growth is new, so the vibrancy of colour is startling. Birds flit through the trees and their cries echo around the valleys. We see many weaver birds, bright yellow bodies with greenish wings and black faces smudged into red. Their nests hang like wicker baubles from the trees. There are also many bulbuls in their smart monochrome livery top with a rakish crest. Many small canaries flit about the trees outside the cafes, showing off their breasts of blue, red or yellow. Walking by the river, we spot a huge nest in one of the trees. I climb a little way up to investigate, but I can't see or hear any activity. As we walk further down the valley, a pelican swoops over and glides off in the direction of the nest, so I guess that solves the mystery. On another walk along the valley towards Massawa, a mysterious brightly coloured bird flies parallel with us for a while. By it's long tail, split and curling slightly, we reckon that it's a paradise flycatcher. Everywhere we go there is a distant whooping, a bit like a swanee whistle, but we never manage to identify its source.
We also walk up to the old train depot. The track is partially overgrown now, and there are hollow shells of rolling stock scattered about. The buildings are derelict and the place has the sad melancholy of failed aspirations.
There is a restaurant in Ghinda that serves the "best injera in Eritrea". I can endorse that: it's deliciously sweet and firm, and the shiro is a perfect texture and flavour.
On the Monday we head down to Massawa.
Staying at the Dahlak Hotel, opposite the cracked egg of Haile Selassie's palace, we are in relative luxury with an en-suite shower and ceiling fans. The electricity is not perfect, as I discover when I accidentally touch an exposed live wire. Ouch.
We spend the first day at Gurgussum beach, where we stayed for our first weekend in Eritrea, all those months ago. The air and sea are cool so we don't stay in for very long. To warm up after swimming, we play frisbee with a pair of young Eritrean girls. They are perhaps about 9 or 10 anbd smile the whole time we're playing. One of them is very bright and soon learns to throw the frisbee fairly well. She even picks up on my game of bluff and is pretty deft at looking one way while she throws in another direction. The other one -- who might be a bit younger -- finds it more difficult to grasp, and the frisbee more difficult to let go. When the games ends, bot little girls come up to me and Jo and very politely shake our hands. Sweet.
Delicious Yemeni-style fish at the Selam in town for dinner, accompanied by a few VSOs we came across in the afternoon. The fish is baked in a tandoori-like oven then seasoned with a dry coating of mild pepper. We mop it up with chapatis as we huddle under the awning in a attempt to escape the pouring rain. A large group of large, noisy Italians is huddling close by, shouting requests for beer at one of their party. When the rain finally eases off, we splash over to a bar for a few beers of our own.
Next day we head off to Green Island, Jo, Senafe Jo, Nicola, Angela and me. It's a fifteen minute boat trip from the hotel, a short swim away from Massawa main island. It's not especially green -- although admittedly much of it is covered in low, scrubby vegetation -- nor is it much of an island, being just a few hundred metres across and about 20 wide. It's nice to have a beach almost to ourselves however, and it feels like a bit of an adventure. Senafe Jo and I decide to go snorkelling. After wading out a long, long way, the coral starts and we get a good look at quite a variety of small fish. I spot many different angel fish and wrasse, Jo spots a green turtle. The water is so couyant that at one point I forget that I'm not SCUBA diving and dive under for a closer look. A lungfull of salt water reminds me that I'm snorkelling.
Back at the shore, Jo has come across a small dead hammerhead shark. It's lying on its back in the shallows with a wide downturned mouth and hollow eyes. It's tail is missing and so are its dorsal fins. Its shape, expression, and white belly make it look like a cartoon ghost. When I find Jo, however, she has passed the shark and is gazing into the water. She saw a large shadow move across the water but got to the edge too late to identify it. Perhaps it was another ghost.
Helen's Concert
---------------
Back in Asmara on the Saturday, we head down towards Bahti Meskerem for a delicious lunch at a Lebanese restaurant. Then we get ready for the evening and Helen's concert.
Helen VSO has organised a concert to raise funds for a project she is initiating. In the summer, a troupe of travelling actors will tour much of the country in horse-drawn caravans. Their purpose will be to teach and promote discussion on the issues around female genital mutilation (FGM). The concert is free and Helen has publicised it around the Asmara ex-pat and business community, but she is nervous that no-one will turn up. No need to worry: it's a packed house. There are even a few stragglers standing around the sides.
The Cinema Asmara, venue for the concert, is actually a theatre. It is very grand, if a little shabby. Stalls and an upper circle settle beneath a fresco of neatly-painted peacocks who gaze down from the ceiling in perfect perspective.
Many VSOs are there to help out and provide moral support. The latter is not needed at all: the concert is fantastic. The National Union of Eritrean Youth and Students (NUEYS) puts on a stunning display of acrobatics; tumbling about each other, stacking chairs and tables to the ceiling and balancing on top, even using one of the girls as a human skipping rope! Helen performs a few songs, one of them a duet with an Eritrean opera singer. There's a display of salsa dancing by a bunch of Cuban doctors, and music from NUEYS. They all get together to sing 'Lean on Me' as a finale.
A bigger success than anyone could have hoped.
Female Genital Mutilation (FGM)
-------------------------------
FGM consists of full or partial removal of, or damage to, female genitalia. It is usually performed on girls before puberty (between the ages of four and twelve). FGM is a widespread practice in Eritrea (one estimate suggests that 94.5% of the female population has undergone mutilation), as well as other countries in Africa. It often leads to disease, psychological distress or sexual dysfunction, and there is a high mortality rate during the operation or during childbirth many years later.
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