Wide awake in the land where coffee was born
Ethiopia opened my eyes to see others as different from my own — not better than the Philippines, not worse than the Philippines. Just different
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Ethiopia opened my eyes to see others as different from my own — not better than the Philippines, not worse than the Philippines. Just different
We plow the fields and scatter the good seed in the land.
Traditional attire.
An Ethiopian coffee ceremony.
Typical dress of one of the ethnic groups.
Jebana — a traditional Ethiopian coffee pot.
Injera, native Ethiopian bread made from teff grains.
Kitfo or raw beef, minced and served with spice sauce and yogurt.
Spicy hot mitmita, an Ethiopian spice mix.
Sun drying berbere for three days.
The Medhanialem Church — the largest Orthodox church.
I don’t know what got into me that I volunteered for the La Salle Mission to Ethiopia.
Call it faith or Godly inspiration, the answer came easy when I was asked if I had ever thought of going to Africa: No. But when I was asked if I would go to Africa for the mission, I said yes.
I was going to the capital city, Addis Ababa, to a higher education institute (HEI) that only had about 100 or more students. Ethiopian Catholic University of St. Thomas Aquinas (ECUSTA) is the name of the school I was to work in. It is owned by the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of Ethiopia and managed by the De La Salle Brothers. I was the new Brother to be there.
Since it was during the Covid pandemic, I did not have any orientation on what I was going to do there nor did I get any training on how to adapt to a different culture, people, or language.
My transition to the food of Ethiopia, however, was seamless. Right from my first meal, I ate the injera, a spongy type of fermented crepe that Ethiopians eat as bread. I was told that most foreigners took time to adjust to eating this sour bread. Injera is served with different types of wat, a spicy-hot stew made of chicken, goat, beef, or vegetables.
When Br. Armin Luistro, FSC came to visit, he whispered in my ear, “Hans, medyo matabang (ang pagkain nila).” I pointed out that one had to add the Mitmita spice to the food to add flavor. Mitmita is a blend of 14 or more spices dried in the sun with salt, pepper and chillies. I took a kilo home to the Philippines and it is quickly being eaten by the Filipino Brothers.
It was November 2021 when I first arrived in Addis Ababa. I went from the battle with Covid in the Philippines to a real war raging in Ethiopia. There was an internal conflict between the Tigray region and the national government. Every day we heard of the Tigray forces advancing closer and closer to our location.
The Philippine government issued an order to all Filipinos to leave the country. I chose to stay. If the worst was to happen, we needed to defend the students living in the dorm, many of whom could not go home due to the war. However, come 2022, the military drove back the rebel forces and it has been quiet in that sector ever since.
During this conflict, the United Nations claims that there were a lot of crimes against humanity committed by both parties.
Ethiopia is a nation made up of many ethnic groups with the Oromo ethnic group being the largest and the people of Amhara being the second. The people either speak Amharic and/or Oromo. Even though there is relative peace in Ethiopia, there are still some pockets of conflict of one ethnic group or another against the federal government.
This is the reason I was not able to go to Lalibela, the place where Orthodox Churches are dug from the ground and where the Ark of the Covenant from the bible stories of Moses is kept — so they claim.
In the Ethiopian Museum lies the body of an ancient person whom they call Lucy. Lucy is the very first humanin to have stood on her two hind legs and walked upright. So it is from Ethiopia that all human life arose.
This land of ancient people also lays claim to a great queen who traveled to a far land to listen to a wise king named Solomon. The Queen of Sheba remained with Solomon for many years and eventually returned to Ethiopia with her and Solomon’s son, Menilik. 1. This royal line still exists in Ethiopia.
The largest religion in Ethiopia is the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. This is the oldest Christian church even older than our Roman Catholic Church. If you recall the story of Philip and the Eunuch in the Acts of the Apostles, this baptized eunuch returned to his home in Ethiopia. The Ethiopians accepted this new religion in Jesus Christ way before the other Churches of Christ.
The second largest religion is Islam while the Roman Catholic church is a very small minority of only 0.9 percent of the total population.
Ethiopia follows its own calendar which is similar to the Julian calendar. This Julian calendar seems to be a week or two behind the Gregorian calendar which the Roman Catholics follow. Thus while I was in Ethiopia, I celebrated two Christmases, two Easters and two new years.
Ethiopia also follows its own way of telling time. Ethiopia is near the equator and so the difference in the sunrise is as minimal as it is here in the Philippines. For them, the day is when the sun is up and night is when it is down. Day begins when the sun rises so what we call 6 a.m. for them is 0:00 a.m., 7 a.m. for them is 1 a.m., and so on.
Even though Ethiopia has the largest GDP growth in Africa, this is not yet felt by the people who struggle to make ends meet. I too, as the president of ECUSTA, had to face many trials in trying to make ends meet.
There were many nights when sleep would not come as I sat wondering where I would get the payroll for the school staff. But through these tough times, I learned faith in God for you cannot deepen your total trust in God unless you journey through times when it was all that one can do.
I spent three years in Ethiopia amidst its cultural kaleidoscope first as a simple teacher and then the last two years as ECUSTA’s Brother president. Ethiopia opened my eyes to see others as different from my own — not better than the Philippines, nor worse than the Philippines. Just different.
I thank God for the chance to serve the Catholic Church of Ethiopia and the Institute of the De La Salle Brothers. It has been an honor and a privilege. The journey had its very rough times, but it was never without faith in a God that loves.
