Day 3 - Addis Ababa to Debre Behran

I had a hard time falling asleep last night - and it wasn't because of the sound of hyenas howling outside in the compound. It was because images of things I had seen kept creeping back into my mind and I was overwhelmed with despair for these people. I cried myself to sleep wondering how God can bear watching over scenes like this everyday and how frustrated He must be with those of us who live such selfish and self-centered lives. One day here has changed my perspective forever. Whenever I'm tempted to complain, I hope He'll remind me that I have absolutely nothing to complain about.

We were up early to prepare for our overnight visit to Debre Behran, a rural area up in the mountains about 120 km Northeast of Addis. Nearly 70,000 people live in the area. We were told that the trip would take @ 2 1/2 hours, but it seemed much longer than that - probably due to the condition of the roads. They make some of our potholed & 'washboard' roads look like superhighways! Not once in Ethiopia did I see any traffic signals or speed limit signs. Until recently there hasn't been any construction or improvements made to the infrastructure. Now however, the Chinese are here building roads and towns in exchange for the natural resource rights of the country. Scary! Since this is a major route to Somalia, we needed a special permit to travel on this road and we were stopped at several checkpoints by heavily armed soldiers. We shared the road with cars, taxies, buses, large trucks, horse drawn carts, herds of brahma cows, donkeys and of course GOATS! I have never seen so many goats in my entire life.

As we traveled along , the ever-present 'tin towns' gave way to mud and/or dung houses with thatched roofs. We passed by many Maasi compounds which were easily identified by how the houses were situated in a circle. The Maasi are considered to be the predominant tribe in this region of Africa. This area is mainly farmland, but due to the drought conditions (and the fact that it is winter in this part of the world), most of the fields were nothing more than brown stubble covered by a layer of red dust. I noticed that in some of the 'villages' there was a house that had poles with flags sticking out of the roof and was told that indicated the home of the local 'witch doctor'.