On leaving Lalibela

Viv’s thoughts

Leaving the hillside town of Lalibela, and dropping down to the airport 25K away, I was suddenly struck by the starkness of the landscape.  Mountains upon mountains, lined up against the horizon, everything brown or dusty.  Misty or dusty: not sure which.  The small fields have been harvested and some stand bare of any vegetation, some with short stalks of maize or wheat, but mostly grazed short, by the multi coloured, skinny goats, brown fat-tailed sheep, horned cattle and Zebu. Some thistle and sparse bushes line the edges of the fields, and some stumpy trees still standing, with small dust covered leaves.  There are a few really big trees – sycamore or fig – and the black and white boubou birds take advantage of the shade and perches they offer.  A dribble of water can be seen in the otherwise dry river bed and either side of the water are beautiful irrigated and green fields.

Up in the plane you can make out the round compounds each with their straw-roofed tukul and their stick surrounds to hold the animals in the evenings.  On the extensive plateaux there are rectangular fields right to the edge and then terraces down the sides of the mountains.  During the fight of the TPLF against the DERG one of the sayings was ‘Guns against the DERG, stones against soil erosion’.  That stone terracing is still doing its job really well.

Gareth in Lalibela

It must be nearly nine months since we had confirmation of our placement in Ethiopia. At that time I knew very little about the country that was to be home for the next two years. Up until then, Ethiopia had been synonymous with famine, athletes and Emperor Haile Selassie; I now have a very different view of a country that continues to reveal so much of its rich cultural heritage.

The latest part of my education took place in Lalibela where we spent a wonderful three-day break. Set in the mountains of Lasta, Lalibela is one of Ethiopia’s premier tourist destinations and is part of the northern Christian Heritage trail that also takes in centres such as Axum, Gonder and the monasteries of Tigray. It is a small, isolated town that attracts visitors to 11 astounding rock-hewn churches. As with so much Ethiopian history, legend and fact are sometimes very difficult to disentangle and the history of the Lalibela churches are no different.

There appears to be consensus that the churches and the many interconnecting tunnels, chapels and crypts were constructed in the 12^th and 13^th  centuries during the reign of King Lalibela. However, how they were built is altogether more contentious. I prefer to accept that they were yet another product of highly skilled Ethiopian masons and labourers rather than the celestial intervention of angels during the hours of darkness. One only has to look at the Stelae at Aksum and the ruins at Yeha to appreciate that an astonishing history in construction stretches back thousands of years. 

Writers far more adept at expressing themselves than I have struggled to comprehend the immensity of what confronts the visitor to Lalibela so I’ll settle for a rather lazy conclusion that it has to ‘be seen to be believed’. A distinctive feature of some of the churches is not that they have been hewn from the rock but are, in fact free standing; the most spectacular and recognisable of which is Bet Giyorgis. The Lonely Planet Guide describes Bet Giyorgis as the ‘most mesmerising object in all of Ethiopia’, a claim that is very difficult to dispute even amongst so many astonishing buildings. Incredibly, it is also the only church that, as yet, hasn’t been protected by one of UNESCO’s unsympathetic protective ‘umbrellas’. When asked, our guide replied the locals were ambivalent, at best, about the protective roofing and that it seemed to cause more consternation for the visiting tourists. I suppose it’s the feeling that somehow we have been cheated and are not seeing the churches as they have stood for so many hundreds of years before the conservationists intervened. That aside, Lalibela is a must for any itinerary. At least that will allow you to reach your own conclusions about the place and free me from searching for the words that will really do the experience justice. 

Ben Abeba Restaurant

It could be argued that Lalibela represents the pinnacle of Ethiopia’s architectural tradition with the newly built Ben Abeba restaurant’s ‘space age’ design adding a distinctive contemporary dimension to the architectural landscape. Situated on the outskirts of the town, Ben Abeba is owned by a Scot named Susan and her Ethiopian business partner and attended by a project to train young Ethiopian men and women the skills of cooking and restaurant management. It is an ambitious project that is reflected in the post-modern design of the restaurant but there is every indication that it will be a success. The food is good, the ambience welcoming and the relationship between the management and staff is evidently one of mutual respect. Following the meal, we enjoyed a lively evening listening and dancing to traditional Ethiopian music with a few renditions of the ‘Gay Gordons’ thrown in for good measure; the Scottish influence coming to fore as the evening progressed. However, as memorable as our evening at Ben Abeba may have been, it was the churches that will live long in the memory. That’s not to say we won’t be recommending Ben Abeba as an excellent venue for food, entertainment and spectacular views.

The trip to the Danakil - January 2012 - Viv Nutt

Extraordinary scenery; heat in the 40s; no breeze until the evening; miles and miles of salt; miles and miles of sand; damp sand; dunes with scrub bushes; pebbles reaching into the horizon;  looks just like you are at the seaside but the tide never comes in.  This landscape was created by the red sea seeping into the depression and then the water evaporating many times; the salt is quite a big industry and it has spawned the most revolting and unsanitary of villages, where the military, local workers and phosphate companies are serviced by bars and prostitutes.  Unsanitary?  There is not one toilet here, and no attempt at organising any.  No pits, no long drops, no attempt to harvest the human waste.  You just go for a little walk on the vast flat lands, and find a flat pebble to cover up your poo.  You hope someone else hasn’t found that same pebble first.

The salt is removed from its layer of sand; cut into blocks and loaded onto the camels and donkeys that wait patiently.  At this point each salt block is sold for 10Birr; the Afar sell it cheap because they know that they can make a profit in other ways from the traders.  By the time the camel trains have carried the salt blocks (20 to a camel; trains of about 20 camels, each with their camel master; groups of 4 or 5 trains) up the mountains to the market in Mekele, each salt block sells for 50Birr.

We visited the volcano of Irte’ale(613m); it is one of the only permanent lava lakes on the planet.  Because of the heat the trek is done at night and on an evening with a full moon rising behind the summit, we started the 3 hour trek at 6pm. It was so worthwhile to be able to see the moving lava, hear that force of nature, experience the bubbling as a burst of molten rock is forced up into a splash and a burst against the sides of the crater, feel the heat, not only from the moving red lava but also from the very rock that we were standing on. This was a ‘wow’ moment; you couldn’t help but be over-awed by the sight.  I shall never forget it.  We camped that night on the crater’s edge and after a short sleep we trekked back down the volcano so that we were at base camp just as the sun was hitting our backs, but before the heat of the day. A lovely breakfast of pasta soup awaited us cooked by the 2 women that we had bought with us.  Thank goodness that we had 4x4s to take us the 6hour drive across sands and pebbles and rocks, back to Hamd’ula and our main camp.

Our other visit was towards the North to see the sulphur pools and oily lakes of Dallol; Here again you really experience the heat of the area; it’s unrelenting and at -116m is the lowest inhabited place on earth.  The colours of the sulphur lakes are best seen, so I’ll try and upload some pictures. Beautiful shapes and pools are produced and gasses can be seen escaping from the earth.  The chemical is harvested from time to time and there is an old Italian settlement on a nearby ridge, now only used by temporary workers.  The other lake bubbles incessantly too and here the hot spring brings with it underground oils.  Birds and insects are attracted to this lovely blue lake in the midst of the desert, but the polluted waters spell death, and there are several bodies lying around.  The Afar collect this oily water as a skin preparation.

This was an amazing adventure, and one that I am so glad I had the opportunity to make.  I don’t think that there will be any trips to the Danakil for a while, as seven days after we were there, five tourists were killed and four others taken hostage just in the camp at the base of the volcano.  I count myself lucky to have been there and lucky to have got out, and incredibly sorry for those people who didn’t make it back home.