Comboni Lay Missionaries

The Ethiopian “Gursha”

Colourful Ethio food

During lunch time, at the clinic where I serve, I (Maggie) eat routinely with four of my coworkers.  They each bring their lunch from home – injera (Ethiopian spongy bread) wrapped around wot (stew) which fits the square little Tupperware perfectly, and even stays in the shape of a square when dumped out.  Surprising to me, instead of each eating their own lunch from home, they grab one dinner size plate and in sequence dump their cubes of injera/wot on top of each other forming the “Leaning Tower of Wot”. Then they eat collectively, sampling and sharing everything.  It is a letting go of what is theirs, and a welcoming in of friendship and fellowship.

In Ethiopia, food is always shared, and typically eaten like this from one large platter without the use of cutlery.  Even strangers will be invited with a simple “Enebela!” (let’s eat!).  To me it is fun and new and means simple clean-up and virtually no dishes but to Ethiopians the tradition is much more deeply rooted, and follows their saying: “those who eat from the same plate will not betray each other.”

During lunch hour I am typically the recipient of the gursha. The “gursha” is a traditional custom that Mark and I initially found quite peculiar.  En route to Ethiopia we read about it in a culture book, and were curious yet nervous about the moment when we would experience our first gursha and how we would respond.  Gursha is when another person who is dining with you, unrolls a strip of injera, wraps it around a tasty bit of wot and then feeds you directly by hand.  It is the final breakdown of the notion of personal space! The trick is to take it without letting your mouth come into contact with the person’s fingers and without letting the food fall. One gursha is considered unlucky so it always repeats.  I think Mark and I each received our first gursha from our homestay sisters.  Since then I have been a regular gursha receiver and while it is still slightly peculiar I quite enjoy it.  I haven’t yet mastered the fine art of wrapping and dipping my injera properly to soak up the spicy wot so when my work colleagues feed me a bite of wot which they have personally selected it is much more delicious that what I have been feeding to myself!  Some days I receive so many gurshas that I don’t even need to eat on my own.  Not only is it tasty but it is also a sign of acceptance, like a hug between friends.  It’s a simple way to say I appreciate you.

A friend once said: “If you bring me to an Ethiopian meal, you are friend enough that I will gladly feed to you my first mouthful of food. If I am lucky you will feed to me your last — and if I am not, I have still profited the messy wonder of an Ethiopian meal.”

 

– Mark & Maggie Banga

Comboni Lay Missionaries serving in Awassa, Ethiopia

Masterpieces

This is an arIMG_0411ticle about my art class, though not exactly.  This is the story about friends we have met here in Awassa, a truly special husband and wife team, Argow andRachel, and through them, the wonderful kids we have met with whom I have the joy of doing art projects once per week.   The couple is an Ethiopian/American duo who met in Hungary at a bible college and felt God calling them to settle in Ethiopia as missionaries.  Argow is from Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples Regional State (SNNPRS), the most ethnically diverse area of Ethiopia with 35 different tribes. The capital of SNNPRS is Awassa, the town where we live.  After learning about some negative customs of one tribe, the Hamar, in the far south west of the region, he felt called to get involved.  The Hamar people have many superstitions and because their survival day to day is difficult, anything they think will negatively impact the people as a whole cannot be tolerated.  For this reason there are several ways a person may become ‘cursed’ and should they become cursed, they are either killed or expelled from the tribe. Unfortunately most often these people are babies and children. The reasons that one could become cursed are many and include: being born out of wedlock, being a twin, having the top teeth come in before the bottom teeth as a baby, not attending one of many rites of passage no matter the reason.   These cultural practices of the Hamar are not openly discussed, even by the government, but some local human rights groups estimate that 20% of their children are killed or abandoned.

Five years ago, Argow learned from his Hamar collaborators that there was a group of nine unmarried woman in a village who were pregnant and because these children would be born out of wedlock, they would have to be killed.  Argow wanted to try to save these babies so he packed his car full of bottles, sleepers, diapers and blankets and made the long 15 hour trek to try to get them out of the village immediately after birth.  When he arrived, all nine babies had been killed – he arrived too late. He returned to Awassa devastated in a silent, empty car.

After this experience Argow felt even more deeply moved to work with the Hamar people, and therefore he and Rachel founded an orphanage, Ebenezer Grace Children’s Home (EG), 4 years ago. They now have 36 children from newborn to age 12.  The children come from all parts of SNNPRS, not only from Hamar, but they feel a particular call to help these little ones.  Half of the kids in my art class are Hamar children, cursed for one of those reasons I listed above.  Some of the children were ‘rescued’ prior to their murder by the intervention of some sympathetic Hamar who disagree with the traditions.  Some of their parents tried to hide their cursed child to save and keep them, but eventually the only way to save them was to have them moved to EG.  Over these past four years, Argow and Rachel have been trying to build good relationships with the Hamar tribe leaders. In a bold move several months ago, they took a group of 6 beautiful “cursed” children back to their villages to visit with their families and the community. They thought to stay only for a short visit but several of the parents begged them to stay for days.  Maybe these types of encounters will help engage the process for the Hamar to confront their traditions and gradually in time to change them.

Ebenezer Grace Children

The other children in my class have arrived at EG due to a variety of circumstances that lead to children being orphaned: parents dying of HIV/AIDS, a widowed mother too poor to raise them, abandoned at birth, and health conditions that make life in the rural countryside difficult.  One of my students has a heart condition and is nearly blind.  For another there is no information on her scattered past – she was found last year wandering the streets alone of a nearby town, her clothes and hair infested with lice. When asked her story, there was no response – she is both deaf and mute. They guessed her to be about 12 years of age.  She was given a name, a date of birth, new clothes and hopefully now a brighter future. These are my students, each one with their own story, each one special and wonderful.

Fast forward to today and each child is flourishing despite the limitations of institutional care. They have found love and friendship with their “siblings” at Ebenezer Grace and the staff who care for them.  Argow and Rachel consider them all to be part of their family (they have 5 biological children of their own) and are very devoted to caring for them and providing them with every opportunity they can.  I have observed that the line between Argow and Rachel’s own children and their EG children is somehow blurred, in a beautiful way.  Argow and Rachel are making the longterm commitment to raise the children until adulthood, a commitment one can only make with deep faith in God’s fidelity and providence.  The children are being raised to know Jesus and to know God’s love for them and for every person.  It is the hope that some of the Hamar children one day will return as adult Christians to serve their own people, being themselves living examples of the dignity of each human life.

EG Art ClassThe first time I met Argow, he asked me “what can you do with these kids?” and the next Tuesday I was teaching art. They all attend school, even a school for the hearing impaired. They play sports, help with the younger children, braid each other’s hair, have birthday parties and just goof around.  They have their own interests and gifts and are growing into fine young people.  To my delight they all like art. I have an enthusiastic group of 12 (8 girls and 4 boys), all age 5 to 12.  When you start with eager children, yellow construction paper, a dab of glue, a button, a piece of felt, a splash of bright paint, and a few sparkles ….voila you get a masterpiece!

As I look upon my students when they are quietly doing their work, I am grateful that their lives were saved.  These kids are as unique as the materials we use to create our masterpieces.  Each one is a masterpiece of God’s creation.

http://www.ebenezergrace.org/

Contrasts

Since I came to Ethiopia still surprises me how full of contrasts is this place … In the past few days I had two such experiences about it. On Sunday, I was invited by my friend to the graduation of kinder garden of her son. They make a great party and it looks almost like a graduation of the university! The kids presenting what they had learned (mostly in English – whether it be a song, or counting, or alphabet …), then dressed in special clothes, received a certificate of completion of kindergarten. Overall for me it was so funny, especially seeing how seriously people treat it 😉

And yesterday evening I went with the Salesians for the night outing. These are meetings on the street with the boys living there and thinking about going to join the project and try to change their lives, go back to their family, to school, to the society. In Addis Abeba there is enormous number of children living on the street, every day they are encountered at every step. But this meeting in the evening, when the streets were far more empty than usual, with children (some of them even 7-8 years old!), The majority of which was carrying and inhaling glue (because it allows them not feel hunger, cold, pain, etc.), it was incredibly striking. While having before my eyes image of their peers who two days ago graduated kindergarten, who are studying, who have family, who have a house…

Magda Plekan

My name is “She Rained Down”

Ethiopian Children

Names have a unique significance and richness in Ethiopia and the naming of a child may come about in a few different ways.  The country’s ancient Christian roots reveal themselves to this day in the naming of many new babies.  As among other Christians throughout the world, it would be common to name a child after a person in the bible, one of the apostles or a saint. For example, common names here are Hanna,Solomon, Isaac and Yohannes (John).

But what is also common and beautifully unique here is that many Ethiopian names are compounds or small phrases rather than one word.  Some examples of compound names are:

Ehitnesh – You are a sister
Terunesh – You are wonderful
Serkaddis – Always new
Zenebetch – She rained down
Engedawerq – Golden guest
Yibeltal – He is above
Yemiseratch – She who works
Nega – It became dawn

The meanings sometimes reveal the circumstance of the child’s birth, a personality trait that the parents see in the child or an aspiration of the parents for their child. For example, the name Tesfaye which means “My Hope” is frequently given by a mother who is very poor or single reflecting her hope for her child’s future goodness and success. Or a name like Mitiku meaning “Substitute” would be given to a child after the death of a brother or sister. One of our friends is named Teshale which means “He is feeling better” because he was born sick but pulled through.

Many compound names may also stem from the parents faith and reflect one of God’s characteristics. They are given to give reverence and thanks to God for the gift of the new life into this world, for example:

Meheretu – His Mercy
Gashow – His Shield
Mebratu – His Light
Gebre Mariam – Son of Mary
Habte Mikael – Gift of Micheal (if the parents had prayed to St. Michael the archangel for a baby)

Another unique feature is that there are no surnames. The tradition is that the first name of the child’s father becomes the child’s last name.  Since my fathers name is Alex Banga, had I been born in Ethiopia I would have been named Mark Alex instead of Mark Banga. Also, a woman never takes her husbands name in marriage, instead she keeps her fathers first name.

Because the Amharic names still sound ‘foreign’ to our ears we don’t notice how different the names are.  Meheretu enters our mind as Meheretu and is quickly classified as a foreign word, not decoded into its Amharic meaning.  But if we stop to think about what we are hearing it’s quite peculiar for us.  The compound names shown above do not symbolize the meaning but are in fact the literal words. Just imagine if you overheard this conversation:

“Good morning His Shield
“Hi You are Wonderful, how are you doing? Did you see My Hope last night”
“No, My Hope did not come to the party but He is feeling better was there with his new girlfriend She is sister.”

The names have on one hand been helpful to learn Amharic, because we have not needed to remember a lot of names as new vocabulary. We can translate someone’s name into the literal meaning which both reinforces the Amharic grammar and helps us remember their name. Bonus! But on one hand it has been difficult. Perhaps in reading the little conversation above you were confused? This often happens to us for example when listening to the radio.  We are not always sure if the broadcast is about the government or if the person who is being interviewed is named The Government!  Also several names can be used for both boys and girls. For example, Tesfaye – My hope or Fiqere – My love.

As for our names, although Maggie is a short name and easy to spell in the Amharic alphabet (only 2 characters!) there is no equivalent or similar Amharic word so they struggle a little to remember it.  We have found it funny that if Maggie says her long name with a Spanish twist and calls herself Margarita they have no trouble remembering! But for me, there is no easier name to recognize under the Ethiopian sun than one of the Gospel writers, Markos.

– Mark & Maggie Banga

Comboni Lay Missionaries serving in Awassa, Ethiopia

First months in Ethiopia

Madzia-AdisIn the beginning of January I came to Ethiopia, beginning my mission! I’ll work as a physiotherapist in Bushullo Health Center, near Awassa (in the south part of Ethiopia). Joining there Maggie & Mark with their children!

amaric

But now the first months I’m spending in Addis Abeba (in the community of MCCJ) on the language training – trying to learn Amharic. It is the second-most spoken Semitic language in the world, after Arabic.  The graphs of the Amharic writing system are called fidel. Each character represents a consonant+vowel sequence and there are more than 230 of them! Now it’s such big joy for me to be able to read something (finally!). So wherever I go I try to decipher the texts around me – on the buses, on the buildings… 😉

After school usually I spend some time for voluntary service, using my physiotherapy skills and at the same time improving Amharic through communication with the patients 🙂 . People here are so friendly for me, helping a lot with everything, always smiling and greeting. I really enjoy it! And also they teach me their culture – like for example inviting for coffee ceremonies or for enjera. I also had the possibility to be here for Timkat – one of the biggest feasts of Ethiopian Orthodox Church, which celebrates Epiphany and Baptism of Jesus. For me it’s so interesting to experience the variety of churches here – catholic is only 1%, the biggest is Orthodox church, then protestants and Muslims. But the religion seems to be very important part of live, even in the language all the most common expression include God – like for example the answer for greeting is “I’m fine, thanks be to God”.

peopleSo slowly I’m getting to know this place, these people, this culture, this language. And day by day I’m more and more happy that God sent me here!

Madzia Plekan. CLM in Ethiopia