Nearly Native

Dear Friends and Family,

I think I'm finally acclimated to Addis. Generally speaking, I know where I am going and how long it will take to get there. Sometimes I even know how much it ought to cost... A taxi driver tried to snooker me the other day, and I gave him the old "2-whole-burr-are-you-kidding-me?" look. He hung his head sheepishly, and I claimed a moral victory for myself.

I spend a lot of time on wiyatts, which are pretty much like taxis that take you where they want to go. I was riding in one the other day and the driver pulled over and got out to talk to a friend on the sidewalk. So that's the mentality. Wiyatts look like volkswagen vans and they are usually packed full of people, who will often strike up a conversation if they know English. A couple of university students showed me their report cards the other day, and I managed to look impressed, without having a clue what I was looking at.

Perhaps the most obvious sign that I am adjusting is that I've adopted the Ethiopian mentality to cars in general— pedestrians own the rode, while cars are simply nuisances. I'm doing at least two or three miles on foot a day now, and I'll walk into several lanes of oncoming traffic without hesitation. I mean, all those rich diplomat Land Cruisers  can go around me, right? I used to be pretty paranoid even on sidewalks, but you'll never get anywhere in Addis if you're afraid to wander nonchalantly in front of irritated cars.
 
So I'm starting to feel at home. I'n fact, a couple of the waitresses at my cafe of choice seem to think I'm a white habesha, a local. I just smile and nod when they chatter on in Amharic, and throw in a knowing look now and then. They love it. My laptop causes quite a stir too. Not because they've never seen one, but because, culturally speaking, meals are for eating and socializing, not working. The old-timers reserve a special frown for western ferenji's and their devious ways.

Our ministry is going well, and the whole team stays quite busy. Actually, today is our last day of class at Evangelical Theological College, and the students have come a long way in the last month. Learning to preach well is not easy, especially since we have condensed material from two whole courses at Dallas Seminary into a single five-week class here. Second-language issues further compound the difficulty for students, though most speak decent English, since they are in their third year of a bachelor-level program.

You might be wondering what I've been doing with myself... My homiletics (preaching) class was in the evenings, so I spent my days preparing for Sunday (sermon, dramas and classes), grading papers, and meeting with my students. I most enjoyed the latter, and students seem deeply appreciative of face-to-face interaction, both for the educational help and the friendship.

For my part, I have come to realize that a large part of effective ministry is simply hanging out with people. In Ethiopia, relationships are more important than business, and people view a weak or insincere greeting as a serious faux paux (French for "party foul"). I've also seen that a smile is pretty much universal— you just can't go wrong socially with a smile.

One of the guys from my Sunday Class offered me his sister's hand in marriage the other day. I'm pretty sure he was serious too. I mean, what do you say to that? I went with: "I'm sure she's very nice but..." Several of the elders in the church have told me it's time for me to find a wife too, which led me to suspect that my mother somehow called ahead.

I nearly bought a ticket to western Ethiopia the other day, after someone invited me to teach at a refugee camp for Sudanese folks. Since our class ends tonight, and I don't return home until August 1, I thought I might go for it. It didn't work out though. Maybe next time. I've also shelved a plan to take a bus to Kenya— didn't really want to spend 5 days cooped up in a smoky bus to get to Nairobi, only to have to return in a couple of days.

So all that to say, I'm not sure what the next couple of weeks will hold. I'd like to see more of Africa, whether that means Ethiopia or elsewhere. The famous Lalibela stone churches are three days north by bus. The buildings are centuries-old monuments of Ethiopian Orthodoxy, which is a pretty strange phenomenon, if I do say so myself. You see, Christianity and Ethiopian culture have been intertwined for centuries. Almost back to when the church began. In fact, Ethiopians see themselves as descendants of the biblical King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, who supposedly returned to Africa bearing the King's child. So in many ways, the connection goes back long before Christ. (Whether this is true or not, their perception of reality here is the important thing.) For this reason, the Ethiopian people see themselves as the people of God, indistinct from Israel. They view themselves as a chosen people, perhaps THE Chosen People. Probably most do not consciously think this— rather it is built into their worldview.

So it's all pretty fascinating. Some intriguing discussion continues to take place as to whether Evangelical Christians ought promote conversion from Ethiopian Orthodoxy or reform within it. I tend toward the former, but it is a pretty complex issue.

Home in three weeks! I'll be sad to go, but ready. And I'm confident that several of my new friendships will survive time and distance.

I thank God for the opportunity. And I thank you all for your part in it.

Joel

---

Use video conversation to talk face-to-face with Windows Live Messenger. Get started.