Ethiopia Recap Part Deux!

well, the travel log reviews for Ethiopia Recap were such a hit, that i'm doing what any good studio head would do...make a sequel! hence, Ethiopia Recap Part Deux! more pics and more adventure stories. so let's get to it...(again, pics in random order. shot on my iphone4.)

 friendly country girl.

a view of Mariam KorKor from Gheralta rock. we climbed it the next day. i was nervous i wouldn't make it.

cool country kid. no pretense. no game boy. no playstation. curious and content. i'm just saying.

another school CW is involved in. we played volleyball and frisbee with volleyballs and frisbees we brought. fun chaos.

three amigos. (and team member shak in the shades.)

the water walk. at least they are carrying clean water from a well nearby.

the girls carry the 44 pound jerry cans. and start at super young age. back problems gone wild.

 clean water from the handpump can fill the jerry can in 3-5 minutes.

a good day is filling your jerry cans with clean water and letting your camel do the work carrying it home.

hand filling jerry cans with dirty water can take 10-20 minutes per can. and then the long walk home. twice a day.

 some of our UN-esque convoy land cruisers. we had 6. and the drivers ride each other's tails, like in Syriana. dust galore.

 the faces. always told a such story.

 here was a village waiting for water. shot at sunset.

 taxi fleet in northern territory.

view of mariam korkor from gheralta lodge at sunset.

the beast awaits. 10,000 feet at the top. wasn't sure i was going to make it. very thin air.

 the hike had a pre-hike to get to the trail.

 one of the steeper pitches.

 the chief priest of the church at the top.

 outside the church carved into the rock.

 temple of doom feel inside. cool air. towering columns.

 massive pillars and etchings. awestruck.

 built in 400AD, the birth of christianity. it felt so old and very cool. very contemplative. we spent 20 minutes in silence.

the indomitable scott harrison, the head of charity water. our fearless leader with ray-bans, scarf, and panache.

 the view down from 9800 feet. the summit was still above.

 more cliff etchings. cleopatra style.

 real skulls and bones. kept waiting for indiana jones to pop up. the old priests die here.

 the view from inside the second smaller church around the corner on a narrow ledge.

 the second church entrance, very small and tight to enter.

 another view. straight drop down over the ledge. i had an impulse to dive off. didn't have my flight suit. i backed off.

 the etchings on the ceiling of the second church. truly historic looking and feeling.

 the priest gave blessings. he never leaves the mountaintop.

 could be an old pic from a grand canyon vacation. this was on the summit. in tigray.

on the way down we went as long as we could without touching the walls or the ground with our hands. it's a guy thing.

 here's a hand dug well. with dynamite they go down 60 feet and strike clean water. the deep boreholes go 300 feet down. CW has helped 2 million people get clean water in 5 years... NOT 200 million as erroneously reported earlier by this reporter. you should check out CW's site...
http://www.charitywater.org/

 here was my bathroom the last nite of the trip at the castle hotel back in mekele. it looks like a jail cell out of Midnight Express, but aside from the stained tile, no shower curtain, and dodgy dingy floor...there were no bugs and it had hot water. ahhh. all i needed. after 10 days on the road, i was used to things working or not working. sometimes no hot water, sometimes no water at all, so having a shower with both was a luxury.

 ethiopian air out of Addis Ababa. an empty 767. had a row to myself.

 the sheraton addis. felt and like orlando. surreal.

the sheraton addis is $450 a nite, but the new york team only spent the day in transit here. the spa was $16. a nice way to spend the day. here was where i met the mysterious salim amin. a great guy, a doco filmmaker type. we hit it off. had dinner at Stockholm that night, a hot spot in addis ababa.

overall

the trip to ethiopia was a great indoctrination to my new life in africa. it toughened me up. a cultural crash course in all things NOT L.A.. africa is old and wild and emerging into the 21st century. things work and sometimes they don't. you gotta roll with it. you get what you get and you don't get upset. it's easy to get frustrated, but it won't get you anywhere. you have to chill and accept it. like last night i spent 3 hours on this blog at the java house, but the server went down and the whole entry was lost. you gotta roll with it.

seeing the villagers and staying in remote hotels and driving everyday from breakfast to sunset, you see the people and country and get a feel for their incredible past. most of the villagers have probably never ridden in a car. our world as foreign to them as theirs was to us. we take so much for granted in the states. cars, food, clothing, housing, clean hot water all day everyday. the trip got us all out of our comfort zone. and into a new reality. nairobi is a commercial city, but there are still old school issues. my power went out the other day for 4 hours. and has gone out every day. but the upside is i get power most of the time. you appreciate things more here. little things. it's a process, but i feel i'm acclimating easier after the ethiopia reality check.

safety

the kenyan invasion into somalia triggered some grenade attacks in nairobi. that's settled down for now. the security is still high at the malls and hotels and some buildings, but i live in a remote area called Hardy past the karen blixen museum. not a high target zone.

the cottage

the one bedroom cottage sublet is working out great. small, cozy, like a weekend getaway shack. finding space for all my stuff is a challenge, but it'll all work out. my expectations are in check. i'm in a good place. and i'm glad to be here. it sure beats lying on my couch watching TV! no TV needed here. i came here for a new life and to find adventure, and in less than a month it has certainly surpassed all my expectations. i'll be busy cutting the charity:water footage for the next two weeks. then may off to sudan and darfur with Voice of the Martyrs to scout the people and places up there for a video for VOM and maybe find a way to get some clean water wells up there to serve the 100,000 refugees. another amazing trip potentially in the works.

well, all for now. it's bedtime, sunday nite. a long week ahead. but the adventure continues. it's been pretty hectic and fast paced right out of the gate for this life change. i can't expect it to last...or can i???

cheers. ddm

ETHIOPIA RECAP

wow

sitting back in civilization in the nairobi java house in the Galleria on langata road. trying to blog about the last 10 days is a daunting task. suffice it to say i am a changed person. in short, i was hired by charity:water to shoot footage of two teams visiting from NYC to the northern territory of ethiopia to visit villages with clean water wells and villages without clean water...waiting for a clean water well. i'll let the photos do the talking with some captions. hopefully they are more nat'l geo channel than home movie feeling. many to post...they are in random order. (pics on this blog site are somewhat hard to manage. anyway...enjoy)

livestock everywhere all the time. felt like old testament times. and lots of flocks on the highway. dodging goats and donkeys and LARGE cattle and oxen! crazy driving conditions. fun for a city kid to see so much livestock.

 another village welcoming our team. so many people getting clean water now.

tribal council of sorts. i really learned to dig all the old gray bearded guys. such lines in their faces. so much character.

typical old school hut and mound of hay. lots of these primitive shacks in the northern Tigray region.

 nothing reminds you you're having an exotic adventure like a random camel caravan rolling through. it's how they roll. i love camels.

 the horns on these beasts were enormous!

 "relentless beauty" was how one team member described the country.

 driving all day til sunset.

 we 4-wheeled a lot to get the forgotten people who had no clean water. the roads at times were beyond dubious at best.

 another shack. they love a view.

 another primitive village.

 in town. baby donkey. you have to share the road.

 more village people.

 cute kid.

 looks like a serene stream but this placid water source is polluted by livestock feces and microbes and leaches and and and.

 the kid holding the megaphone speaker beamed with pride.

 monument valley? the 10 sisters? this rock formation was so high!

 me and the gray beards. this stop was only old guys, waiting for their clean water hand pump to be finished.

 kiwi singer/songwriter brooke fraser and CW founder scott harrison.

 i thought he was offering papaya juice or maybe guava. turned out it was happy hour....he offered me a beer.

 slow your roll. cows win.

 these critters will randomly run across the street. always exciting sharing the 405 with a petting zoo.

 gheralta lodge. a slice of heaven.

 my room at gheralta. rustic charm.

 overview of gheralta.

 we climbed this mountain. amazing.

 gheralta lounge.

 lounge view.

 felt like santa fe meets taos.

 hand dug well. waiting to discharge some dynamite.

 cactus w/out pricks.

 paddle cactus with pricks.

 our castle hotel in mekele.

 everyone was usually awkward around a camera. and rarely smiled. pictuers/portraits were serious business.

 scott shooting shak with a reservior CW had made to supply a large part of the valley below.

 a camel carrying water sure beats a 10 year girl slinging 44 pounds of water on their back.

 i always was sneaking the ECU when possible. juggling my canon 5D and my iphone. all these pics were from my iphone.

 women with jerry cans queing up for contaminated water. which takes 10 minutes to scoop into the can. then an hour walk home.

 a village waiting for clean water.

 the faces were amazing.

 the farming was asiatic, planting high up the hills.

 neil hutchinson and scott harrison, riding on top of the land cruiser convoy.

 more gheralta.

 on our way to mariam korkor

looks high. 10,000 feet on the top.

 always greeted with signage.

 the fellaz.

 cover shot.

 the ethiopian look.

 some shepherds.

 striking young girl.

 think i like this one better.

 leaving addis airport on our turbo prop.

 vik harrison and grebe.

 scott boards.

 addis domestic terminal.

 freeze frame.

 the trike taxis reminded me of the tuk-tuks in bangkok.

 more grateful peeps for clean water.

 they were as curious of us as we were about them.

 joel huston got some gifts from the village. the hillsong worship leader donated his birthday and raised enough for several wells. cool guy.

 road side stop for some machiatas!!!!!!

 breakfast at the castle in early light.

 horse cart

 donkeys gone wild.

 the mountains were endless. classic oxen. his horns almost touched.

vik puts on the sunscreen. much needed.

recap

overall, a very enlightening trip to the country and the water situation. we met one woman, she had 5 kids, and had to walk 2 1/2 hours each way to a dirty water source twice a day. that's 10 hours a day folks for sickly water. luckily, a clean water well was being built 10 minutes away. talk about a life change. "water changes everything" is CW's motto. and it's so true. lives are transformed in every way. health, hygiene, prosperity, schooling, family time, and and and.

check out
http://www.charitywater.org/
and see what they are up to. scott has done incredible things in 5 years. he's goal is reach 1 billion people who don't have clean water. he's impacted 200 million in 5 years. be a part! donate a birthday!

today

today i am in my sublet. my one bedroom guest house. very suitable. unpacking, grocery shopping, getting sorted. but the next phase is starting. leaving chris & lindy's B&B to my own digs. in Hardy very close to karen blixen's original home in out of africa. kinda surreal.

my next two weeks will be consumed cutting the footage from my trip. one of the highlights was meeting the mysterious Salim Amin in addis ababa. at the sheraton hotel lobby. cool doco filmmaker guy. we will be friends. he lives in nairobi. he has a script he wants me to read based on his father mohamed amin who was the photo-journalist who broke the story of the ethiopian famine in 1984 that led to live aid.

gotta jump for now. promise to blog when i can. will be buried for a while and i have a new wifi situation that is limited.

overall, ethiopia is an amazing place. the people have no edge. no tension. no rivalry. no angst. it was a peaceful and serene place. and as usual, the beauty of rural africa trumps urban africa. the people were so lovely and the country to the north is breathtaking. like bryce canyon. times 100. i have more pics to share. next time. i'm having a blast. and it sure beats my couch back in my loft. i guess i'm having the life i was searching for. adventure! and thanks to CW, meaning as well. flying back into NBO this time from addis, kenya really felt like home. and i confess, i felt a twitch of homesickness when the last NYC team flew back to the states, but this is my life now. it is here. in africa. and i approve of this message! sawa sawa (it's all good!)

all for now. cheers!

ddmafrica