Travel to an African country that borders Sudan, Somalia, Kenya and
Eritrea can be dangerous to your health in more ways than one. But, if
you’re a skydiving, snowboarding, tomb raiding Indiana Jones kind ‘a
trekker, you might find Ethiopia just your cup of strong coffee.

Since the murder in 1975 of the emperor, strangled in the
basement of his palace, Ethiopia has seesawed from absolute rule by a
God-King, to Marxist/Military totalitarianism to the present Federal
Democratic Republic of Ethiopia with a Constitution. Though tribal blood
feuds do exist in parts of the country, the U.S. has an embassy in Addis
Ababa, and you can check the State Department’s travel alerts.

The Last Emperor

Now that you’ve packed and done your homework, you’re ready to go.
You’ve read that Ethiopia’s history goes back to the dawn of man.
Archaeologists have unearthed human remains that carbon-date 3.2
million years ago. I worked in the capital, Addis Ababa during the reign
of Ethiopia’s last emperor. A tiny man with a title larger than himself,
“Emperor Haile Selassi I, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, Elect of
God, King of Kings of Ethiopia” proclaimed himself the direct
descendant of Menilek I, son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba.

Each Christmas Day, the emperor opened his palace to foreign
embassy bigwigs for tea and sweets while his pet lions strolled around
the gardens. I got to go only because I was taking photos for an official
brochure. Can you imagine tea with Haile Selassi? I lived near the
palace and went to bed each night to the screech of peacocks and the
roar of those noisy cats.

To experience the geological diversity of the land you only have to fly
into the 8,000-foot high capital. The mountains and plateaus seem to
rise up to meet you. Eucalyptus forests, high canyons, steep gorges,
scrub desert and ice-cold lakes are secret untamed places for hikers,
climbers and happy campers. You’ll find yourself eating Injera and Wat
with your fingers. Injera is baked from a sourdough batter and placed on
your tabletop like a gigantic pancake. Wat is the stew that’s served in the
middle of the Injera. You tear off a piece of Injera and use it to scoop up
the fiery stew (chicken, meat or vegetables). You don’t want to find
yourself on the other end of a meal. At the Sudanese border, the Baro
River teems with crocodiles. Sadly, I lost a friend there. See http://
www.peacecorpswriters.org/pages/2001/0101/101cllook.html

Hyena Man

Addis is home to Ethiopian Orthodox Churches, U.N. Economic
Commission For Africa, museums and some modern hotels that did not
exist when I rubbed elbows with the little king! Back then there were no
streetlamps. After dark, hyenas skulked into the city scavenging for
anything they could get their jaws around, garbage or human. There
was a man, a prowler of shadows himself, who had a way with the nasty
predators. Wandering the back alleys, he mysteriously lured the beasts
to him and then out of town, kind of like a Pied Piper. We called him “the
hyena man,” and that is all we knew about him. Present day
“entrepreneurs” have made the former event into a thriving business
performed for tourists.

The Blue Nile Falls

We took off in a single engine Cessna T-210 from the ancient capital of
Gondar heading for Bahir Dar and Lake Tana, source of the Blue Nile. In
Ethiopia, everything was ancient, including the Cessna. A former
Korean War Ace, Walt had been spraying malaria-infected areas for
years. The Blue Nile, as opposed to the brownish White Nile in Egypt,
gets its name from the waters of Lake Tana, the largest lake in Ethiopia,
from whence the river flows to Khartoum and on into Egypt. Walt didn’t
fly over the falls; he practically flew into them. Swooping low on the first
run, I nearly lost my breakfast, but I asked him to do it again for a closer
shot. Staring up at me through the tree branches of the surrounding
rainforest was the white-fringed face of a silky black and white long-
tailed monkey. Hunted to near extinction for its beautiful coat, the
Colobus Monkey, the only kind of its species without a thumb, is an
endangered acrobatic marvel of grace and elegance.

Mist from the thundering waters creates a rainbow bridge to the sun. I
was snapping photos when bullets tore through the fuselage,
zapping Walt in his bottom. We couldn’t see the shooters but we knew
they wanted the Cessna. Despite terrible pain, the seasoned pilot wasn’t
going to let them have it. Shouting obscenities over my prayers, he
managed to hold on to the faltering plane while the floorboards
soaked up his blood. We arrived in Bahir Dar with Walt’s pride as
wounded as his anatomy. After medical attention and a few belts of Jack
Daniels, the bush pilot was on cloud nine.

Rock Churches of Lalibela

Ethiopian Airways’ hotshot pilots take off and land on postage stamp
plateaus. A short flight from Addis is the tiny town of Lalibela whose
airport terminal, in my time, was a tin roofed hut. Never mind. Hidden
under ground are eleven monolithic churches carved from rock. Built in
the thirteenth century, the churches are holy places of Ethiopian
Christian pilgrimage. I had to crawl down into the subterranean spaces
on my hands and knees. Once inside, I was in the Middle Ages. A priest
with a torch stood in the darkness guarding an altar and religious wall
paintings. He looked like he’d been standing there for 500 years! Monks
tell you the Ark of the Covenant is similarly hidden in a monastery in the
ancient city of Axum, where Queen Sheba stayed in the 10th century
B.C. Someone should tell Steven Spielberg.

“Simplicity-Courage-Humor-Soul”®

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