A Day In the Life of a Farenjua

October 6, 2009

As I am writing you this, my latest blog entry, I am dining on a sandwich of canned “potted meat” that my friend Chris received in a package and was scared of (I have no such qualms about foods with ingredients such as “mechanically separated chicken”), topped with several month-old cheese whiz. I know I have bragged about my cooking prowess but I guess it’s just one of those nights. You order delivery, I have potted meat sandwiches. I am also listening to Christmas music because that makes me happy. If it’s any indication, “All I Want for Christmas Is You” is the most-played song in my iTunes.

Moving along… I am sure that many of you have heard (through Mama Mohan) that I had an unfortunate incident a few weeks ago, when a crazy bum on the street punched me in the chest during the middle of the day completely unprovoked. If you hadn’t, then please be assured that I am fine. But this incident was a breaking point of sorts for me. After months of daily harassment, this incident really upset me and made me realize that I could not keep living like this in my town. This was also just one week after I had some small items (hair conditioner, body wash, and rolls of TP) stolen from my bathroom, which is just outside of my house. So I met with Peace Corps senior staff and we decided to do an intervention of sorts in my town. Two staff came down to Dilla and we had a meeting with the head city administrator, my counterpart from the HIV Office, and the head of the health center. We discussed the problems I have been having in the town and ways that we can address these issues. For the first time, I really felt that I was taking control of the situation and was being heard. The city administrator agreed that there was a serious problem in Dilla and the head officials in the town had been meeting about how to address these issues. In fact, on the day of the punching incident I learned from my co-worker that an HIV-positive commercial sex worker was attacked in the town because of her status. Not a great place.

But even still, I have decided to give Dilla another chance. Additionally, I am moving houses! It became clear after the second theft (you may remember my clothes being stolen off the clothes line when I first got to site), that this is not a safe place for me to be. I also have a very contentious relationship with my landlady, which was exacerbating my feelings of negativity and frustration with the town. So I have found a new house that is right across from the health center and just a two minute walk from my office. The house is beautiful and HUGE, not just compared to the tiny place I am in now. It is a little bit farther from ”downtown” than my current place, but I like to look at it as similar to my choice to live in a spacious studio in the Bronx rather than a closet in Manhattan. The neighborhood is much more residential than my current neighborhood and I think living and working in the same neighborhood will really give me the sense of community that I have been craving but lacking up until now. This week I will be meeting with the kebele (local division of the town) leaders for my new neighborhood, my counterpart and the head of the health center, to organize a kind of community meeting to formerly introduce me to the community and explain why I am here. I feel that if I have at least one place in the town where people know me and understand why I am here, that I can tolerate all the other unpleasant attention. And I will just avoid the crazies as best I can.

So that’s what’s happening with me. Now I just have to find the money to buy all the new furniture I will need for my new mansion that I never had room for here. :) But at least I will have the space to host THANKSGIVING!!! My mama and sister will be here in Ethiopia for the holiday (and mom’s birthday, shhhhh) so I am preparing to have the works. I’m already trying to track down a turkey. I’ve also heard rumors of a pig farm in Dilla where I might be able to get a ham. I myself have not seen a pig since coming to Ethiopia (no one here eats pork) but I think the Catholic Church in town runs it or something…good ol’ Catholics, right Nanny? I’m crossing my fingers.

So anyway, now that I have spent months carping about the harassment I get here, I thought you might enjoy a little taste of what I mean by that. So here, for you all, is “A Day in the Life” of Bonnie Fewel Mohan, Peace Corps Volunteer in the character-building town of Dilla, Ethiopia. For those of you who will not be able to experience the charm of Ethiopia for yourselves (at this point, everyone except my mom and sister), I hope this will give you an idea.

“Greetings” (in relative order of their frequency)
1. The general “you”, which comes in several different forms:
• The steady, high-pitched string of “yous”, most common among young children, and generally delivered uninterrupted until I am out of site.
• The “you” couplet delivered in a kind of coo coo clock rhythm with increasing volume, under the misconception that I simply cannot hear them.
• The single, painfully loud shout of “YOU!”, most common among the adults in town and usually given at distances of less than three feet
• The comparatively delightful Amharic version for women, “anchey” (a has the ‘ah’ sound). For men, it is “anteh”
2. The “foreigner”, specifically “white person” accusation/identification, which also has different varieties: farenji, farenj, farenjua (female), farenjita (the Sidaminya version…that’s the language of Sidama Zone, just above of my zone, Gedeo), and finally farenjitay (Gedinya, the language of Gedeo).
3. “Ky-yo”, meaning “the red one” – I could understand this one if I were sun burned but I rarely am
4. “China” – the only other foreigners that are here for long periods of time are the Chinese guys working on either roads or telecommunications. I think they just think it’s another word for foreigner but I get a kick out of it and sometimes reply with “Bulgaria” or some other random country. They don’t get it.
5. “Sister” – this one I don’t mind
6. “Miss” or “Mrs.”
7. “Ennatay”, which means “my mother” in Amharic. Oddly, this usually comes mostly from beggar women that are my grandmother’s age (or at least look it, they might be 30 years old the way people age here).

Inquiries
1. “Where are you go?” – somehow, everyone in this country thinks this is a normal question to ask someone and the grammatically correct way to do so.
2. “Are you fine?” – to be “fine” is very good here so people will just ask you if you are it, rather than “how are you?”; there is only one real answer: “I am fine”
3. “What is your name?” – they often don’t even know what this means

Rude stuff
1. “Give me money”
2. “Money”
3. “Fuck you”
4. “Sex”





So that pretty much sums up the main things I have yelled at me here. Not to mention all the people that just stop in front of me to stare, follow me, or touch me. Please keep in mind that this begins from the minute I leave my compound until the minute I am inside somewhere where people know me. Take a minute to think about what that would be like, every day of your life. I know it is mostly innocent and comes from a lack of understanding, but it is also extremely exhausting. But, I guess that’s what I signed on for. So I try different tactics for how I respond to the attention to see which are most effective. The jury is still out. One experience that I have a lot, and which my Irish family will appreciate, is Ethiopians’ preoccupation with freckles. They seriously do not understand what they are and I constantly have people rubbing my arms, trying to figure it out. It’s also a difficult concept to explain because they tend to just think they are sun spots or “blemishes”. Being a proud Irish American, I refuse to have my beloved freckles reduced to being called blemishes. So for the kids at least, I just say that they are little spots of habesha, which is the name Ethiopians call themselves. This goes over pretty well and then the kids start pointing to all the different freckles, naming them “habesha” and then to the white areas saying “farenji”. It’s pretty adorable.

One last tidbit that I have to share is my first real “Peace Corps” experience. Get ready, it’s kind of gross. I had a worm lay eggs in my toe! I always wear my chaco sandals around town and have never had a problem until the rainy season came and some worm worked its way in. I guess the way they operate is they dig themselves in, lay a bunch of eggs, and then as time passes they will burst out and infect all the other toes. Fortunately, I caught it before this happened and just had to dig all the eggs out with my tweezers and nail clippers, throw on some Neosporin and call it a day. It looked a lot like puss but when you look at it up close you can see it’s hundreds of tiny little white eggs. Pretty gross, huh?

Ok, that’s all for now. I hope you have a better idea of what my days are like, at least concerning the attention I get. It will be so nice to get back to NY when no one looks twice at you, no matter how hideous, beautiful, or outrageously dressed you are. But in the meantime, I’ll work it :)