In Praise of Women

This week was all about “Fathers’ Day.” The media, the web, everybody’s talking about the day; how fathers are important in the lives of their children, the good deeds fathers do, …  All these are great, giving credit for the man of the house.

But today, all these have changed dramatically. And it was all because of 18 women, collectively named “Lucy.” The Ethiopian National Women Football Team beat its Tanzanian counterpart 3-1 on aggregate to qualify for the 8^th African Women Cup of Nations to be held in Equatorial Guinea in November. Everyone here is happy about it. Their victory has, once again, brought joy to the football fans who are still looking for such success in the men’s department for the last 30+ years. These women have proved to the nation that they can put a smile on everybody’s face, among other things.

I have come to know a lot of women who stood against the odds to succeed in life, and bring change to others. My mother and my sister are, for once, among those who faced a lot of challenges, and became outstanding leaders at home and/or at the workplace. Other women that I know from different walks of life have managed to overcome norms of the society and contributed a lot to their localities, and to the world.

In Ethiopia, views towards women are mostly discouraging. Our proverbs, sayings, and beliefs all have been degrading women for a long time. But now, things are changing. A number of women have reached to levels that were once considered the “Man’s sole territory.” It’s a fact that is hard to swallow for a number of men; some even claim the women got these chances thanks to their “womanhood.”

As a man, I can understand the men’s frustration. That’s how we are raised to think. Add sexist ego to it, and the mix is quite bitter. But we must admit; this wasn’t always the case. Some women may use their charm to achieve their goals, but I can say, with full confidence, most of the successful women have worked hard to make their dreams a reality. And for that, we must give respect for our women. Besides, women are humans too. Also, as Shaina Twain puts it, they are “not just a pretty face.”

I never wished to be a woman, and never will (no offense, ladies). But I wish I had a fraction of the self-confidence, determination, and compassion these successful women have exhibited in their journeys to success in mine. That’s what we all need to have in our hearts, if we truly want to be “perfect” in what we do in our lives. What our female footballers have given the Ethiopian people today and the years before is far greater than the game. They have achieved all this without adequate assistance from the concerned parties. They proved to us one outstanding fact. Women can change the world. Women are mothers, care-givers, hard workers, lovers, wives, and many more. They can create something out of nothing. So let’s praise them, give them their proper places in the society.

Whom are We Treasuring?

The year was 2003. A young sculptor came up with an idea of placing a statute for Emperor Theodros II, Ethiopia’s leader from 1855 to 1868, at a square named after him in the country’s capital, Addis Ababa. His proposal was accompanied by a full-scale design of the statute and the envisioned look of the square after completion. Mega Creative Arts Center, a company once involved in the production and presentation of art works, which used to own the nation’s first cinema around that square, supported the idea and began coordinating efforts to raise fund for the project.

The project got momentum after the city administration granted permission for the launch of the project. With preparations almost completed and the project was about to be commenced, though, an organization established to retrieve stolen treasures from Maqduella, the place where Theodros committed suicide after the British forces overpowered the Ethiopian troops, intervened, claiming it was the right authority to undertake the project. With this claim (and, maybe, with invisible, powerful hands on the background), the organization has managed to persuade the new provisional city government to suspend the previous permit and got a new one for itself. The organizers told the media that they would float an international tender for the design and erection of the statute. Until then, they erected the replica of the artillery named Sebastopol, which was locally built by Europeans held prisoner by the king at Gafat, a place sought to become an industrial center.

Fast forward to 2012. Sebastopol is still there. No statute for the emperor yet. Even the organization became defunct a while back.  Why? Nobody knows.

This poses a number of questions: Whom are we treasuring, the creation or the creator?  Was it this much difficult to erect a statute in Ethiopia where we have a load of artistic talents? Are we truly celebrating history? …

A visit to Central London, where the statue of General Robert Napier, dubbed “Lord of Maqduella” by his people makes one wonder, as Daniel Kibret puts it , “Who’s the real Lord of Maqduella?” The British   hailed him as one of their all-time greats, and we the Ethiopians, don’t even bother to put a symbol for our own in the nation’s capital. What a joke!!

Every time I pass around Theodros Square, and look at Sebastopol, I get this feeling that we are becoming ignorant about fact and history. Putting a statute for an arsenal which was shot only once and dismantled afterwards, over that of its mastermind, who was a true visionary,  is [for the lack of a better word] an insult of all insults.

I don’t think the problem is financial or technical. It’s just lack of good will. The people in charge of such works are either ignorant or unqualified to do their job. Historians don’t seem to bother about it. The media prefers to back down on the matter.

I am not going to prescribe a solution here, since the solution is right on the table. But I want to say this: Please let’s respect out history, let’s practice to honor our greats. Let’s not put the creation ahead of the creator.

Deadly Voyages

On my last piece, I promised my next post would be entertaining. Unfortunately, this will not be the case today. A burning issue is on the plate. So I chose to say a few words on that.
Yesterday, I heard this disturbing news of a terrible road accident in the late Tuesday afternoon near Gelan town in East Shoa zone. A minibus and a bus collided head-on at a narrow road. Eighteen people were killed,of which the entire passengers in the minibus. A friend of mine, who was at the scene, told me that three members of a family, one of which is the driver of the minibus, were among the dead.
Road accidents are no special cases in Ethiopia nowadays. What's new is their magnitude; the number of deaths, the various forms of injuries, and the bizarre debris of vehicles involved. The reoprts that are heard on the media every morning are disturbing. The multifaceted damages caused by these accidents are getting bigger and uglier by the day.
Last month and the first week of June were, according to my observation, the deadliest times of road accidents. Just three weeks ago, another horrendous accident at Meri, an area around my neighborhood, happened. An automobile was crushed by a truck after the two collided at a crossing where one side was fenced for the construction of a light train line. The passengers at the Toyota hatch-back; a mother, her baby, and the maid, all killed in the accident.
We can go on and list the number of this tragic accidents all day long. But the big issue is , What are we going to do about it?
What is happening to us? Is human life worth nothing? When will all end?... 
The questions are endless. Whatever the answers may be, they must come quick.
It's so disheartening to learn that Ethiopia ranks first in the world in the level of traffic accidents. This accidents are often accompanied by accelerated death rates. A study released in 2008 shows that more than 300 people die each year of car accidents  shockingly, in Addis Ababa alone. The number of deaths is in thousands annually. It's better to leave the amount of damages in property. Ironically, all these are happening in a country whose total population of vehicles doesn't even reach the one million mark.
Looking at the nature and causes of these accidents, around 81% are caused by negligence by the motorists, 9% by pedestrians, 5% by technical failures, 4% by the nature of our roads, and the remaining 1% is attributed to other factors. This tells us that we all have a stake in what's happening.
If this is the case, then we have to act soon, like now. One of the messages that I heard recently read marking the Road Safety Week says "How Many Accidents are Needed To Make You Understand The Tragedy?!" Yes? How many more? As my friend puts it, even HIV/AIDS didn't kill as much people as the roads did. Shouldn't this be a lesson to stop this madness at once?
There were a lot of things that I wanted to say over the matter, but I fell short of words to share my feelings right now. I'm upset, confused, and emotional about this issue. The only thing I can say now is: May God Protect Us All from this tragedy! I don't want the foreigners to scare of this blessed land over its  road fatalities. The ugly image imposed by our drought-stricken days is more than enough.

The Start

Here I am, expanding my network into the social media once more. Started out by creating my first e-mail account a decade ago, adding another two soon after, joined Facebook and Twitter last year, I have now added blogger.com to the list. Have you ever imagined all of these means of communication would become a reality ,say, 20 years ago? I know I haven't.

It's really amazing how fast things have changed in our world. I frequently pass through the main post office in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia. Whenever I see the logo of the national postal service, an envelope between a pair of sticks (the method used in the early days to deliver written messages), I always wonder of what Emperor Menilik II, whom I highly admire for his landmark efforts and remarkable successes in modernizing Ethiopia, would say, if he somehow manages to trick death and comes back to life, to see us sending and receiving mails right on the palms of our hands.I picture him holding his mouth in his left palm, and say "ወይ ግሩም !!" ('Wey Grum'), loosely meaning "Incredible!" in Amharic. Even ourselves are saying 'Wey Grum' right now, looking at the changes we are witnessing at the moment.

I believe that we don't have much problem these days expressing ourselves in anyway we can and like, if we discover and rediscover ourselves and our surroundings constantly. Whether in writing, painting, speaking, dancing, ..., there is a way for each and everyone of us to make ourselves heard. With our efforts to make ourselves heard, we develop our skills of communication with others. And there is a lot of fun doing that.

Why this blog?

To be honest, I didn't see myself as a blogger (not even a writer) for a long time. I know I have a fair skill of using the languages I speak for everyday communication and work, but not in a way that could reach others in a different way. 

Then comes the era of social networks. I see the impacts FB, Twitter, Linkedin, socialcam, etc, have created in worldwide interconnectivity. This transition has helped me to think "outside the box." I realized that the usual "hi's" and "hey's" that we exchange with the ones around us do not help us much in the real world to grow and become fruitful. So I jumped into the pool of big-time information sharing waters.

Adding to this, when I started studying computer science three years ago, I saw the numerous grapes of the IT garden that we somehow missed or bypassed for God knows why, I started to think, "Hey, there's something that I can further my networks in this, plus the other benefits." I'm not saying this is easy, especially for someone like me, who comes from a totally different discipline; but for those with the 'will and balls', there is always something to explore.

Back to the social networks; when I get more and more connected, I found out that I can say more that I have already said, explore more than what I have explored, and get myself to places that I have never set foot before. Comments from friends (on and off the web) have encouraged me to "scan my system" once again to find out more about what I can do in life. Being a Computer Science student, I glued myself onto the computer almost all the time; working on programs and applications, researching, or simply surfing the net. Despite the pressure on the eyes and the brain, man, what you can find in this business is enormous!

That's when I came across the terms "blog" and "blogger." At first, I thought a blog is only for those who can afford it; but then, I discovered, that everybody can have it, if there is "the will and the ball." As I discover deep, I learned that some people, whom I know and appreciate, have their own blogs, and use them to deliver powerful messages. So a question popped in my head, "If it's as simple as this, why can't I do it?" The answer, "No reason."

There you have it, now I created my own blog. It even doesn't take as long time as I have taken to talk ti through! Writing this piece, I thought "Wheew...! That wasn't so hard." And the best lesson that I have gained today, "There is nothing that one can't do, if hearts and minds are put to it."

I hope I haven't bored you with my first post. Remember, this is a beginner talking. I don't know when my next post comes, but when it does, I assure you that it will be more entertaining. Besides, I have said it earlier: "There is a lot of fun in doing that."