A little sampler...

(The taxi stop and juice hut just across the street from the SIM guesthouse)

Blue...the color of every single taxi cab and taxi van in Ethiopia! In 15 days our daily life will consist of wheelin'-n-dealin' with these very taxi drivers just outside the SIM guesthouse where we'll be living! It's quite the event, actually, having experienced it before. Envision this scene with me... I wake up at 5 AM to the calling (over a loud speaker) of the Muslims to prayer, but I go back to sleep of course! I wake up again, several hours later, to start my day. Life in the city is calling my name, so I grab some birr (the Ethiopian dollar) and approach the gate of the SIM compound. The zabunya (guard) opens the gate for me with a huge smile on his face and lets me go like a butterfly out of it's cage! As soon as I place one foot on the sidewalk of the streets of Addis, I immediately am bombarded with greetings, smiles, handshakes, and offers from the dear taxi men just waiting for the next ferenj (foreigner) to come their way! I politely greet them with the little Amharic (Ethiopian language) I know, but walk past the first few men. Curiosity strikes them all and they start to wonder why I would pass them up...some even start to lower their prices as I walk further away from them! I get past some more of them and see a little boy with a rag, some muddy water, and some soap. He doesn't speak English, but it's obvious what he wants...money in exchange for a shoe shine! No matter how many times I explain that you can't shine a pair of flip flops, he still follows me and persists in his salesman tactics! I tell him, "another time," and continue walking. By now, the taxi men are badgering with each other over who's turn it is to take me, all the while, still trying to convince me to ride with them! There's really no point in explaining what I'm doing because they don't usually listen. So, I just keep walking...and smiling...and enter the juice bait (house) where I order a pineapple, mango and papaya mixed fruit juice! Delicious! I finish my drink, pay, and walk back out on the street with the you-know-whos waiting for me...the taxi drivers! And their persistence continues as they escort, or follow, me back across the street! I wave good-bye and thank the zabunya for letting me in the gate!

And so my day has begun...

Waiting anxiously for this day,

Sunshine