Fasika (as I saw it :-))

I wrote the following e-mail to a dear friend from Finland [who was more interested in history, and the weather, than I ever would] on February 26, 2004. It could use a good deal of editing and might sound disrespectful to some [the sister may have always seen things her own way but wasn’t always as, shall we say, “politically correct” as she tries to be nowadays?! “Politically correct”! Now that is some concept the Democratic world is shoving down the Ethiopian throat]. But I thought I might as well post it as not many articles seem to exist on the internet regarding Ethiopian holidays [except for few impersonal descriptions by tour operators, travel agents and people who live by the camera] and, ofcouse, because there is no better way to say “Melkam YeTinsae Beal” to my home-sick Ethiopian friends!

“Fasika” (“Festivity”) or “YeTinsae Beal” (Commemoration of The Resurrection), i.e. “Easter” is a very colorful and fascinating holiday in Ethiopia! Most of my relatives are either Protestant Christians or slack Orthodox Christians so I can’t tell you much about the … historical background. However, even the strictest ‘pente’ [as Protestant Christians are called here] can’t resist getting up at 3:00 a.m. in the morning to partake of the ‘doro wot’ [chicken stew, both spicy and delicious] that Ethiopian women cook for holidays after the almost 2 month’s lent. According to the Orthodox Church calendar, the lent has set in about 2 weeks ago. I believe the western [catholic?] church has got a one-month similar lent too. Why the Ethiopian one got extended by 15 more days is because of the extra time, referred to as ‘yengus tsom’ [fasting of the kings], when the Ethiopian people are said to have prayed that God return Ethiopia to Ethiopians and that their king {who was on exile somewhere in England for the whole period} return home, at the time of the 5 years Italian occupation. A tribute to a prayer-answered, so to say.

It might interest you to know that what is referred to as ‘tsom’ [fasting/lent] in the Ethiopian Orthodox Christian context is eating every type of food except that which is a diary or meat product, Fish excluded, within either Wednesday or Friday or for the whole season of ‘lent’, also referred to as ‘Abiy tsom” or ‘yefasika tsom’. Ethiopians believe eating dairy product and meat would encourage the ‘flesh’ to indulge in sinful thoughts but vegetable food stuff like peas, beans, and the like doesn’t. This, ofcourse, doesn’t include those Ethiopians who are either Muslim or Protestant. They fast off food and water for whatever limit of time they want and eat what their heart desires when done. Which the Orthodox Christians do not consider a real ‘tsom’. [Fancy that! :-)]

So… after the 45 day’s ‘tsom’, and on the day when Christ was supposed to have been crucified [always on Friday, April 9 this year] most Orthodox Christians [including those who do not attend church regularly] would dress in neat white robes (what we call a ‘netela’) which is supposed to be an attire that angels wear, and go to the church close to them, without food. They worship, by kneeling down at the place of their choice within the ‘sacred’ grounds of the church {usually at a place of shade as the sun is severe}, crossing themselves all the while. And getting up and doing it all over again until they are worn out and unable to raise themselves. At which interval they’d take some breath and rest, listening to the word of God being preached, some spiritual songs by the priests and deacons, confessing their sins and thinking spiritual thoughts. This goes on from 10:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m, straight!

At exactly 3:00 p.m., the priests [who have thus far taken refugee within the walls of the church] would come out with a leaf that’s supposed to represent, i imagine, the ones the whole town of Jerusalem took to greet Jesus with on His arrival there, in their hands and dipping the leaf in a “tsebel” {holy water} ask those struggling to get near them (and be as out of ear shot of those around as possible) what sort of sin they committed within the last year. Upon learning which, they order them to ‘mesged’ [worship] between 40-120 times [according to the severity of the “sin”] and give them absolution by sprinkling some of the “holy water” from the leaf on their face!

Whatever dude!

There are so many things you don’t say out-loud because you love, fear and/or respect those listening weyim out of common decency! You don’t tell your mother, for example, how her attitude towards women & marriage reminds you of a ‘bAriya fengaay” sometimes. You don’t tell your boss his/her jokes are never funny. And you don’t say “these fucking [fill the name of your respective “bisot qesQash” group here] are making you tired already” infront of members of the race or religion group that caused the weary feelings (if you prefer to live in peace with your neighbors, that is). But I really wished I could say something [nasty] against the Muslim fundamentalists in Somalia earlier when I read, on a friend’s facebook profile, the following article: Clerics Killed in Somali Mosque.

Don’t get me wrong, now! I have always viewed the war in Somalia as another “tiQur netib” on our history (“torinet” and “sibseba” seems to be the only thing we are good at doing nowadays, none of which have proved much help in moving our “kedihnet yetelaqeqech ager yememesret” guzo an inch). And, if it was in my powers, I’d have had it over before it even started!!

I feel sorry for the people of Somalia, for ‘the grass between two elephants’ treatment they are getting from their neighbors. And I’m sorry their problem, whose end is still difficult to foresee even after 17 years, seems to “metreff” to others. But I can understand why our government needed to get its hand dirty over there. It would not only benefit politically & ofcourse economically from the West, always the West (which it needs more desperately than anything after HR2003), but also help it to punch a hated enemy (the leader of a small country on the horn of Africa who has a striking resemblance, have you noticed?, to Sadam Hussien, Gadaffi & even Joe Stalin) on the nose. Not fair! Monstrously wrong! But understandable.

So whenever I hear claims of Ethiopia invading Somalia, I simply give it the deaf ear. Not only because I am well aware these accusations aren’t made to get a rise out of me but also because I recognize it as only natural to want to blame someone you can’t lay your hands on rather than those you can do something about in times of despondency. [My dad asks God what he did to offend Him whenever my hell-raiser brother comes home drunk and starts verbally abusing every living thing within a mile]. That would give sufficient answer, I believe, to any wonderings any one of us might have as to why if these people aren’t happy with their government and the way it operates (or atleast the neighbors it asks for assistance from), they won’t take it with “it” directly instead of keep blaming all their problems on us! Not that we’ve managed to voice our own “teQawmos” on things we aren’t happy with our government doing, even with a country that has not been torn apart by a war that has been going on for the last 17 years anyway. So I forgive and try to forget.

I can even go as far as forgiving and try-to-forgetting the Ethiopians who are making the same accusations [not from any sense of “teQorqwarinet” to the people of Somalia but to serve their own little insignificant ends] against the Ethiopian government from the States and Europe! After all, as my college classmate used to say, what do you expect from a one dollar dish?!

“Yifelegal”

MOST WANTED

UNLAWFUL FLIGHT TO AVOID PROSECUTION – CAUSING CHAIN REACTIONS, ROBBING OF GOOD NAME

SEIFU FANTAHUN

[NO PHOTO AVAILABLE]

Aliases: Seifish, Sefish

DESCRIPTION OF KNOWN FACTS

Hair: None (bald)
Eyes: Brown
Complexion: Light brown
Weight: 170 to 200 pounds
Sex: Male
Build: Medium
Race: Black
Occupation: Entertainer
Nationality: Ethiopian

Remarks: Seifu Fantahun speaks fluent Amharic. He is believed to be a friendly individual and can be charming.

CAUTION

SEIFU FANTAHUN IS WANTED IN ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA, FOR CAUSING A CHAIN-REACTION TO A SERIOUS OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS HAPPENING LATELY TO A MAJOR ETHIOPIAN CELEBRITY, ONE TEDDYAFRO, AFTER WHOSE ARREST HE IS BELIEVED TO HAVE SKIPPED THE COUNTRY ALLTOGETHER.

CONSIDERED UNARMED AND HARMLESS.

IF YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION CONCERNING THIS PERSON, PLEASE CONTACT THIS GIRL WHO LIVES SOMEWHERE BETWEEN ‘SARIS’ AND ‘MESHWALEKIA’; GOES TO SCHOOL AT ONE OF THE B-COLLEGES AROUND STADIUM AND LOOKS LIKE EVERY OTHER ETHIOPIAN FEMALE HER AGE, EXCEPT FOR HER CONSUMING DESIRE TO PUT AN END TO THE SAID [WANTED] INDIVIDUAL’S LIFE.

REWARD: Nada.

April 2008

On a less playful note:

I was hoping my last post on TeddyAfro would be my last post on TeddyAfro and that we will be able to move on with our lives [and talk about something else .. for a change!] Which is why I refused to comment on his recent arrest, inspite of Yehe’s repeated attempt to make me. But things have proved more serious than they did first. So following is the news on “Addis Fortune” regarding Teddy’s arrest, for which, if convicted, he might get 5-15 years imprisonment. I’m hoping they’d change his “fiird” to money (which I’m sure they’d find him guilty of, whether he did it or not). Not because he is above the law, as everybody seems to think, but because people get away with murder all the time, why not “aynn yaarefebet”  young celeb some consider as the only light at the end of the tunnel?! Now, I am a skeptic! I do not have [as] much faith in mere mortals, laying nothing in store by them. But, inspite of his over-the-top fans, he’s an ok kid! Just in the wrong country, at the wrong time.

Lemanignawim amlak yirdaw!

Fortune Newspaper: Teddy Afro Behind Bars

Dreams and promises

Infront of the Olympia light, stood two girls. Young, pretty, skinny. Waiting for a taxi and… fighting! Not a serious fight. Rather, a playful fight. The kind you fight with your spouse when it suddenly hits you how much you enjoy their company. Or with a female roommate, as Joey and Chandler of F.R.I.E.N.D.S. would have it no other way, in bras and using a pillow.

One had a short and curly hair French-styled perhaps an hour or so ago. The other had a long hair that rose and fall on her shoulder every time she threw a playful punch at her friend’s arm. Which was being fended off by her friend who was laughing as if she was unaware of the world around them. This included a minibus holding yours truly and a handful other travelers; a “Woyala” lighting a cigarette and calling for new comers to join us; a pregnant lady looking bored; a ‘santim azwari’ boy who also sold the Nyala and provided the lighter; a young man using his chest as a shelf for books he also carried in a duffle bag on his back waiting, perhaps, for a bus-home after a long and fruitless day; and two young men who look as if they were on their way to a hot spot somewhere. One wearing a hat that hid half his face and, along with the colorful attire and pointed shoe, completed whatever look he was aiming for (gangsterish? Pimpish?!). The other, clean shaven and neat in an expensive light-colored sweater (the kind of neat and sweater that bespeaks of good-upbringing and well-earning parents) had tiny dreads that lent him that “feminine” look guys with dreads have, making them cute, also waiting for a taxi. They obviously were, what in literature is called, ‘the target audience’ for the pillow-fight-save-for-the-pillow the girls had going on.

Not many of us knew what neither Jemanesh Solomon, nor Alemneh Wasse looked liked when we loved them for years. Yet, that didn’t stop us from considering them as part of our family and, in Jemanesh vs. young men all over Ethiopia of the time case atleast, the ideal person for “..a bed fellow, in marriage pleasures playfellow” (as Shakespeare would say). Which is why, by the way, that other girl who copied her voice on Fana Radio and always reads love stories off disgusting love letters in a sing-along voice got the job to begin with. We did not love them [only] because she made us cry, and he made us laugh. We loved them because they had beautiful voices that made “promises” all on its own. The kind of voice that you’d like to curl in and go to sleep, in his case, and the kind of voice a woman who needs a man to save her in hers. So women loved him, coz they needed a man to make them feel like a woman, and men loved her because she represented the Ethiopian version of a damsel in distress. To men, he sounded like the ‘it’ guy. And to girls she sounded like the “yet to be the ‘it’ girl, the minute her gallant gentleman rescued her”. [The classic!]

So we loved these people. Seeing what we want in them. Or seeing what we want to be seen-as in their voice. Or in it’s promises!. Until such time came for them to come out of their shell — to disappoint us. Fortunately, Alemneh knew what our reaction would be before he came to Alebe’s show. Where he was asked by the tactless and rather slow host, nefsun yimarewna, why he wanted to remain anonymous as long as he did, with an admonishing “ahun ante minih yaastelal?!”. Alemneh’s response: it wasn’t so much about his looks (which, let’s be honest, didn’t show much in the way of improvement even now, after he dumped his pretty wife) but what his voice promised [a promise he and his mediocre look can never hope to live upto].