The last week was a bit of a blur.  We taught Monday and Tuesday, Wednesday was Peter’s 21st birthday so we took the day off, went for a morning hike which was awesome and then lounged in the grass outside one of the Orthodox churches playing cards for awhile.  Then back to the seminary for a joint lunch celebration complete with drumming, singing, presents and cake.  Thursday was our last day of teaching, but we didn’t do anything really different.  I reviewed all the vocab I’d done with my group and they did really well and then we played a game, same as normal.  It was weird to think we were almost done; really weird.  Friday Abba Thomas took us to Alitana where a large number of the Abba’s and students are from.  There’s a town called Alitana with a priests’ house and a Sisters’ house but then there’s also a number of nearby villages and schools and parishes which also claim to be within Alitana.  We went to the main town. 

The drive was amazing!  We were out in the country now, it took about an hour and a half.  And it was so green and mountainous and beautiful.  I was jealous of the people who could call this home, who could look out there doors and see what I saw and know it well, as their ancestors had known it and worked on it and fought for it and loved it.  It was a valley full of majesty and history, of beauty and promise; and I loved it.  Abba Thomas pointed out a mountain on top of which was his home and Negasi who had come with us for the ride showed us his house saying “it’s the last one before the mountain there; the last house in Ethiopia.  Everything else is Eritrea.”  That was pretty cool.  He was coming home for the weekend because his sister’s wedding was Saturday.  We dropped him off as close as the road would let us go then waved as we continued on. 

The priest’ house was something else altogether.  Perched on the highest point in the town, constructed of a dark almost slate looking rock in a similar style to a rock wall, no apparent mortar but still very solid looking.  It was really a small compound, a number of different buildings interconnected surrounding a small, breezy courtyard that had a fantastic view of the rest of town.  I love courtyards.  We had a tour before lunch which included their library which was entirely comprised of books which looked at least a hundred years old; I was in heaven with the scent of books –old books even better- all around me.  They had the original printings of the journals written by the first couple of Catholic missionaries to come to the area –and who had actually founded the mission in Alitana- handwritten Bibles I don’t know how many centuries old inscribed on goats’ skin.  Poor countless goats...  and then lunch which comprised the same food as it always seems to and which we were always surprised we never tired of.  Though it didn’t really matter to me because I still wasn’t really eating then, the pills still an ever present reminder and nuisance in my back pocket where I’d put them so I couldn’t forget to take them; sitting on them as I was... 

When we went to the sisters’ house after lunch a crowd of the local kids came running up to us and attached themselves to Peter and Tom, giving Abba Thomas a respectful greeting -and completely and absolutely ignoring me.  I must admit I was hurt.  The boys each had two and one walked in between them perfectly content and seemingly perfectly oblivious to my two perfectly friendly looking and perfectly available hands.  I wonder what was the difference.   The sisters’ were wonderful and we got to meet an Irish volunteer who was there for two months teaching English.  We later met the man who had made the connection and sent him to the sisters on the plane back to Addis –small world.  Back at the seminary we were greeted happily, told we’d been missed and asked if it had rained while we were in Alitana; seriously everyone.  The same three things were asked/ said it made you see just how important rain was to them, and how much this unusually dry summer was worrying people. 

Saturday we spent at the seminary, playing table tennis, reading, talking and annoying Peter as he tried to finish a book by sticking little pieces of grass up his nose and in his ears; and in each others.  Very childish, very fun.  And it wasn’t just me, I didn’t even start it, Hagos did.  Sunday we drove to Axum which was the seat of the ancient Axumite empire, rumoured home of the Biblical Queen of Sheba and one of the supposed resting places of the Ark of the Covenant.  We actually got to see the shrine where it’s rumoured to be.  Only one monk is allowed to enter the shrine and his successor will be chosen by God and shown to him in a dream.  The present monk actually came out while we were there, dressed all in yellow as some of their pilgrims are, he had evidentially been inside for 2 months; we were very lucky we were told.  Not 30ft from where the Ark is supposed to rest, the symbol of the covenant with God; but the glory of God does not dwell in a single place, the Ark at least has taught us that.  Respect but do not revere that which is Earthly.

Along with the Christian treasures, Axum also holds the Axumite obelisks, erected over the burial sites of royalty and nobility.  The largest and most impressive one however suffered from an inadequately sized base and they don’t think it stood for even a day before it came tumbling down breaking into four majestic, tragic pieces.  They have nearly finished re-erecting the obelisk the Italians had taken during their brief control of Ethiopia.  They said it would be finished in two weeks, we’d just missed it.  It started to rain about then so we decided the museum and gift shopping could wait till Monday morning.  We ate at the hotel and I surprised myself by being able to eat, at least a little.  It made me start to think that part of my problem was my mind might be associating the food with being sick and it was my mind that made me feel  nauseous. 

In the morning we ate, then headed back to the area where the obelisks –and we discovered- the museum was.  It was an interesting museum, a very interesting museum.    Not so much for the displays, which were sparce and not too impressive, except for the largest piece of obsidian I’ve ever laid eyes on.  It was about as big as a basketball.  No, the interesting part of this museum was how everything had been put together.  It wasn’t quite fully built or organised yet.  Half the cases didn’t have glass on them and those that did all had the keys in the locks.  The pottery and other displays were nestled in cardboard boxes and other various containers –Peter found a Philadelphia cream cheese dish- and there was a rather large hole in the floor of one room where they believe there might be a tomb under the foundations and just thought they’d check before fully opening the museum.  It was very fun.  They also had a very well made model of the ruins of an Axumite palace which is buried under the middle of the town; I really liked the design of it.  Most of the palace was a rectangle around a central garden or courtyard but then the dining hall, or royal quarters it was hard to tell, in the centre.  It was really cool and different, especially compared to European palaces and castles. 

After the museum we did a little bit of shopping, feeling like real tourists for once, and then piled into the car for the long drive back.  The roads are pretty good for the most part but, they have a subtle and constant bumping which hurts after three and a half hours.  Everyone was really happy to see us again and we’d missed them.  But we could tell it was coming to an end, even in the conversation topics the three of us found ourselves discussing, things like tv shows and European friends started coming up more and more often, it made me sad.  Monday passed uneventfully and then it was Tuesday.  We were going to leave Tuesday after lunch and drive to Mekele to spend the night to make sure we made it to the airport on time in the morning.  We all packed for a little while in the morning, but then found it too depressing so left it till after lunch and went back downstairs to enjoy what time we had left.  We played table tennis and talked and laughed.  And then it was lunch.  We all ate together again in the seminarians’ dining room and the Bishop came as well.  We ate the same things we’d had for the past month and still hadn’t tired of them, then the drum came in and everyone sang for us, a song about having the prosperity and longevity of the longest lived people in the Bible and one about how they hoped we would be well and come back soon.  I was really fighting tears by this point, but managed to hold them off.  Then came the gifts, they’d already given us so much and yet there was more; never have I met a more generous people. 

They had gotten each of us a set of their formal feast attire, all white and beautiful.  A dress for me with the most incredible embroidery all down the front and a shawl they call a ‘netela’.   Peter and Tom’s feast clothes are white, a tunic reaching to their knees and white trousers.  Very stylish.  We decided to wear them on the plane ride home, it seemed appropriate that since we’d come to Ethiopia looking like westerners, we might as well go back to the west looking like Ethiopians –or as much so as we could. 

Leaving was hard, very hard.  Everyone was outside, we took pictures, we hugged, we smiled and promised we’d come back.  Negasi climbed into the front seat having made up an excuse of having to see a doctor to come with us to Mekele.  Abba Thomas sat in the middle with Tom and I on either side.  Everyone waving, we drove away. 

I slept most of the ride, and missed a camel caravan they said we passed along the way.  I was mad; I’d fallen in love with them in Axum.  We wandered around Mekele before dinner, walked up the hill to the memorial of the Tigrinia Liberation Front who were the main rebel force that ousted the Communist Party, thought they were also one of the smallest rebel groups, having started with ten men and five guns.  We spent the night in the hotel, Negasi stayed in Tom’s room.  In the morning we all got dressed and wandered down to the lobby quietly, all dressed in our new Ethiopian clothes.  From the moment I left my room everyone I passed stared or did a double take to take in my outfit.  At the airport they didn’t seem to trust our bags –or their scanners- and had us put our stuff through twice and then went through it by hand as well.  We checked in when they finished and tried to eat but the three of us couldn’t really do it. 

We were met in Addis by Hagos’ uncle who is the head of customs.  The family ties in Ethiopia are so amazing and in my opinion should be spread through the world again, especially in Europe and the States.  It creates such a connection and deep feeling of community when you are that close to so many of your relatives.  He bought us all a drink and wouldn’t hear of it when Tom tried to pay.  Then he took us to the front of the check-in line and walked us to the customs line.  He was wonderful.  Our plane from Addis to London was tiny, but it was one of the smoothest flights I’ve ever been on.  We had a lazy decent over London which I always love being able to watch.  And then a massive customs line, a long wait for our bags and finally we walked out to the pickup area.