Link dump

In response to several request (3 or 4 at least!), I’m going to be throwing some new content up onto this blog.

Given the gap since I last wrote, I think what makes the most sense here is a series of “content dumps.” So below are interesting pieces or links from the past few months on a few different themes.

Stay tuned as well for my “photo dump” and “thought dump.”

In the “readable” category:

• On aid: The Gates Foundation annual letter on busting aid myths and Jeff Sachs on The Case for Aid
• On (conditionally not inherently) ineffective aid: The Boring Development Manifesto and Development Bloat
• On planning: The Gulf Between Planning and Reality  and Traffic Forecast Follies and Ricardo Hausman on the Atlas of Economic Complexity
• On the next big thing: The benefits of direct cash transfers vs. Why cash transfers are not the next big thing
• On trends in agriculture: The “Boring Development” Blog on hybrid maize as a prototypical example of “boring” (and highly impactful) development; The New Yorker on the Climate Corp bringing “big data” to American agriculture; The Guardian on Tef’s rise as a fashionable grain and the difficulties Ethiopia may see in attempting to profit                                                                                         

In local news:

•  “The Reporter” on current trends and worries observed within the government: military terminology in governance, “Too many reform initiatives, too little change”, “Quietly slipping export.” Plus Ethiopian film wins award at Sundance.
• “Addis Fortune” also has this interesting, if vague, piece critiquing the government for not better modernizing agricultural commodity markets. And Fortune’s “gossip” column on debates over aid to Ethiopia in the US Congress

Interesting, academic, and not necessarily worth reading:

• The mechanisms of persistent implementation failure on why it’s not appropriate to expect developing countries to become perfect implementers overnight
• A theory of good intentions as a behavioral exploration of why donors (individual, but also implicitly institutional) might not concentrate on the projects that would actually be most beneficial
• Development, Structure, and Transformation: Some Evidence of Comparative Economic Growth with its implication that Ethiopia’s lack of a port may be a historical and permanent setback
• A talk on Ethiopia as success story for pursuing a strategy of broad-based rural development (rather than a focus on urbanization)
• The International Food Policy Research Institute on Agricultural Commercialization, Rural Transformation and Poverty Reduction: What have We Learned about How to Achieve This. Apparently what’s needed is “state-led programs and investments to support smallholder productivity growth” and “state-led creation of an enabling environment to encourage private investment” across the agricultural value chain.

Flashy TED talks:

• Melinda Gates on “What non-profits can learn from Coca-Cola”
• The founder of Acumen Fund on ideas and businesses that make a difference

Nepal, contd.

I'm taking a brief break from my normal non-posting activity to pass along a description from Zev and Eliza of the second half of our Nepal trip (in which I get to be their engagement photographer!)

How I spent my vacation

So the last six weeks have been relatively eventful I guess. Among the things to catch you up on (my great mass of loyal readers you) are:

·         My weekend in Delhi -- a pleasant garden city, decades ahead and with a pulsing underground scene (all of this in comparison to Addis).

o   I relived Delhi memories including:

o   Indulging in my favorite regional Indian foods – particularly Goan and Bengali

o   Remembering the convenience of 1) metro travel and 2) autorickshaws

o   Re-noticing the amazing orderliness of the official quarter of central Delhi – block by orderly block of (decently) well-kept bungalows and impressive gardens

o   Observing (and taking advantage of) the remarkable degree to which the high-end lifestyle continues to develop in Delhi: new international brands for the country (Starbucks, Louis Philippe), a hip dj party in the middle of a rundown neighborhood—where women are afraid to be seen outside in their (moderate) club garb, a country house pool party where twenty-somethings are waited on by old servants bearing kebabs

o   Appreciating the kindness of Sonum as my guide for the weekend

·         Two weeks of trekking, hanging out, and eating well in Nepal, for which I can rely on the descriptive powers of my companions Zev and Eliza:

o   Kathmandu

o   (Further posts to come)

·         (A little less than) twenty-four hours in Dubai, an interesting setting in its own right, as well as a strange in-transit counterpoint between Kathmandu and Addis.

o   My excellent layover adventure included:

o   A morning swim in a four star hotel

o   A trip up the world’s tallest building where sand clouds obscure the horizon

o   Stocking up on much-needed electronics as well as delicate Parisian fare at perhaps fanciest mall I’ve ever been in

o   Zipping on the metro back up to the “old town”—mainly from the 1950’s, the museum in the restored fort touting modern Dubai’s ties to nomadic desert culture and values

o   A public boat taxi across the creek for a few dirhams

o   Strolling through the charmless “gold souk” in which an absurd flow of precious metals pass through rows of modern shops that each individually could be at home in a strip mall

o   A trip back to the airport with a Pakastani cab driver who thought my travel beard and American-ness meant I’d been in Afghanistan

o   My delight at finding bourbon in Dubai duty free

o   Enjoying a last meal in Dubai of a Big Mac extra value meal in the departure area

o   Getting a glimpse at global labor flows on my discount flight back to Addis, which was 95% women (Ethiopian domestic servants returning home) as compared to my flight in which was 90% male Nepalis heading to become construction workers

·         Another trip out of country (to be fair, I did work for a week in between :-)), this time for a long weekend in the Seychelles:

This one was less eventful per se, except to say that I enjoyed being in a beach paradise so perfect that Bacardi has used a Seychellois beach in its ads as an on-screen stand-in for the stereotypical pristine Caribbean paradise of sand and sun. (Also very good creole food – particularly the octopus curry)

·         The news of first the Westgate Mall attack in Nairobi and later an explosion in Addis in which two Somalis in a neighborhood near my own seem to have accidentally blown themselves up while constructing a bomb.

o   A few thoughts:

o   Most public safety news that I hear in Addis comes primarily through rumors – particularly as I can’t follow the real (i.e. Amharic) local news sources – but the accidental bomb blast notice came from the US Embassy as well

o   This follows on the heals on a report a couple months ago where a Sudanese news source claimed bombs had been disarmed in the Addis airport, as well as talk of crackdowns by public safety forces on the occasion of Eid-al-Fitr around the same time (Google it)

o   Meanwhile in DC though a crazy man was shooting up a naval complex and a crazy woman was running down police officers in her car -- to some degree these are risks that we run to live anywhere

So that’s been the last six weeks, more or less. Same old same old I guess.

For Nepal photos, Zev and Eliza should be able to provide. For the wonders of Dubai and the Seychelles, stay tuned and I’ll try to throw something your way.

Max

Quick Update (On the Lack of Updates)

Hi all,

I have been delinquent about posting new material in past weeks: I've settled into Addis so that I don't have too much new to say about it, and I also haven't gotten out of Addis in the past month. I was hoping to make it out this weekend--to Mekele, a regional capital in the northern desert highlands--but my reason to fly in for work on Friday got cancelled.

Updates for the coming month will continue to be infrequent, but for different reasons: I'll be leaving this Thursday night for a quick weekend in Delhi followed by two weeks in Nepal. The crew from http://zevandeliza.com/ (for APT people that would be Zev and Eliza) and I will be celebrating Indra Jatra in Kathmandu and trekking the Langtang Valley. I have not extensively prepared for this, so I really hope my 3 months living at 7,000 feet will have prepared me well.

(Sidenote: I'm really hoping to get myself jogging again before I leave here, so that I can come back to the US with a little bit of altitude-driven endurance. But to that I have to get over my mild distaste for being an object of amusement of locals when I'm jogging in the park near my house. You'd think in a country with a substantial running tradition, it wouldn't be that surprising to see someone out running, even a ferengi).

So check back in October -- hopefully I'll have some tranquil Himalayan photos to post if nothing else. And before I sign off for now, here's another update on work my team at the ATA has been doing. (The weird formatting in that link is not my fault).

Peace,
Max

Hard to Find

One fact of life in the upper income bracket of a poor country—for an expat or a local—is that you’ll likely have domestic help, and that it will be provided by a person of a much lower socioeconomic status.

When I joined my shared apartment we had a maid coming one and a half days a week to sweep, scrub, and do laundry by hand. She spoke and wrote serviceable English, and for the most part she reliably delivered a quality service. For this we paid her a total of just under $75 a month, split across the four of us in the apartment.

Periodically, debates appear on Addis’s online expat forums of what the “right amount” is to pay your maid. Typical viewpoints from each side:

• How would you like to be paid only (small amount) per month?
• (Same small amount) is already more than a policeman makes here

Overall, the expats I know all pay their maids well over the going rate among locals (which could be as low as $30/month for the same services described above or more). And it’s relatively uncontroversial that maids who speak good English, can cook foreign dishes, are good with children, etc. can expect to be paid more.

Ultimately, what I’m building up to here is that our maid asked for a substantial raise, and rather than discuss or negotiate with her, our consensus as flatmates was to sack her and find a new maid.

We paid the requisite severance—custom apparently is to prorate this based on how many months the maid has worked for you—and the new maid we took on was out of work after being much beloved by colleagues who had moved on from their old house to places with already established maid situations.

The former maid gave us the impression that her ask for more money originated in part because she had more lucrative clients on other days of the week, such that it was no longer worth it for her to clean our house at the previous rate. The new maid on the other hand was happy to work three days a week at the rate we’d previously been paying for two days.

This rate, by the way, adds up to less in a month than I was paying individually in DC for one morning of cleaning, and that’s even before I split the rate across the four of us. (Not that the US doesn’t have its own economic inequality issues).

I rarely ever saw the old maid, or see the new maid, because each usually arrives after I’ve left for the office. From my limited encounters, both are fairly young traditionally Ethiopian women, expressing themselves quietly and wearing white shawls.

One more story: I recently heard of an expat in Addis who, upon leaving the country, was forced to let go her maid of two years. This woman also had “guards” at her house (basically someone who sits in a shed and guards the compound gate) who she liked well enough to leave some electronics for as well as arrange new jobs. The maid got no such deal—just a customary severance payment and a letter of reference. On the woman’s second to last day in the country, the maid helped herself to several hundred dollars worth of electronics and clothes on her way out.

All of which is to say, the benefit of cheap domestic labor can certainly be great, but it puts one in situations calling for complex economic and moral decision-making. And—at least for someone like myself who likes to hold life to as little complexity as possible—this makes it a double-edged sword.

Favorite Addis Restaurants

Not unlike yuppie culture elsewhere, the question of where to eat ends up being a central preoccupation of ferengi life in Addis. I figured listing some of my favorite spots so far can provide some color on my life here—for better or worse—while minimizing any need to get serious. I’m not calling these the “best restaurants in Addis,” they’re just those which I’ve been to and to which I’m most likely to want to go back.

(By the way, I am a fan of eating Ethiopian fairly regularly—I’d say half my lunches and a smaller proportion of my dinners—but the list below is mostly the non-Ethiopian places, which tend to be more distinguishable.)

·         Sangam Restaurant – This Indian place about a five minute walk from my house seems like it must be tied in some way to the nearby presence of the Indian ambassador’s residence. It offers pretty good tandoori chicken, saag paneer, and chana masala; as well as the naans, chai tea, and dingy white tablecloth ambience of a classic outside-India Indian place. The clientele is a mix of NRI’s, white ferengis, and locals – including at one point a delegation from one of the Ethiopian regional states we saw dining here.

·         Bunni Restaurant – A small, leisurely brunch place, Bunni sits in a sixth-floor spot near the Greek Embassy that offers excellent views of the city below and the hills in the distance. The décor (dark wood floors, comfy armchairs, glossy magazines) and the menu (fresh juices, pressed sandwiches, pancakes and omelets) both speak to a relaxed international style less widespread here than it might be within a more developed expat scene. A good place to work away a weekend day.

·         Da Ting Restaurant – The most “authentically Chinese” place my little group has found so far in Addis, this place has it down to the chintzy imitation-temple façade, the clouded fish tank of seafood offerings, the China Central Television programming of costume epics, and the private room of intoxicated (Chinese) businessmen. Excellent offerings of spicy Sichuan soup, among other dishes.

·         Juventus Club – A legacy of the colonial past that Addis had only for the briefest of moment, Juventus offers home-cooked Italian within a down-on-its-luck private club setting that seems to automatically equate to charm. There’s still a member’s only room where old Italian men play cards. My first time in the confines, I watched an afternoon soccer match on the grounds between two local sides. My second time I had pretty decent pesto spaghetti.

·         Yeshi Bunna – One outpost of this chain offering Ethiopian basics is near my office and a favorite lunch place for the foreign staff (not so much for locals, as it’s slightly more expensive than the alternatives). Not something that would be recognized as “chain” or “fast” food by those who think we know what those terms mean, it’s packed with knee-level stools, arrayed around tables of traditional wood, has the Ethiopian origin legend of coffee posted on its wall (this involves a shepherd named Kaldi, the hyperactivity of whose sheep lead him to the small, red bean they’ve been eating), and offers a good representation of typical Ethiopian dishes.

·         Bata Cultural Restaurant – Representative of a genre of restaurant in which the array of Ethiopian regional costumes and dances are presented not just for foreign but also local enjoyment, Bata has the advantage of an impressive entrance courtyard that has led some to believe its primary revenue comes from wedding photos. It also has a creepy stuffed lion set in rocky a bar area diorama alongside oversized liquor bottles that it would seem tough not to mention. The range of classic Ethiopian dishes is available, and the performers—a seemingly unsupportable number based on business volume the one time I was there—will pull audience-members in to attempt Ethiopian moves. (The style is heavy on shoulder gyration, and each of the two times of gone to cultural restaurants, one of the more Addis-seasoned ferengis  proved to have a hidden talent for this.)

·         Dodi Restaurant – The second chain on my list, the Dodi I know as a restaurant of pleasant courtyard tables and a spacious, if overly florescent, interior is apparently an outpost of a Sudanese chain with at least five locations in that country and one more in Egypt. The draw of Dodi is good juices (which aren’t actually hard to come by here), reliable Middle Eastern offerings like falafel and hummus, and delicious fried chicken that should single-handedly be enough to promote the need for more widespread poultry production in the country. Sits across from the office of the EU.

·         Rainbow Korean Restaurant – This place, too, offers excellent spicy soup, along with delicious meat (e.g. pan-fried pork belly), and the free pickled appetizers common to all worthwhile Korean spots. It has a pleasant courtyard interior ringed by three small indoor and outdoor dining areas, with large windows and white tablecloths. It also has, as became apparent on our last visit, a karaoke machine available free of charge.

Honorable Mention:

·         Sichu Burger – Run as a social enterprise, and set in large and fashionably appointed warehouse near the animal market, this place has what many call the best burger in Addis.

·         Mexican Family Restaurant – This outpost of Americanized Mexican food, undoubtedly set up by return diaspora, is a good place for the occasional lunch meeting. Sitting just outside the compound of the World Food Program, I think it has become their de facto dining option of choice.

·         Café Parisienne – I prefer this local chain to the more well-known Starbucks clone, Kaldi’s Coffee. Parisienne has red awnings, clean interiors, and a little more of a grand promenade café feel.

Not yet tried:

·         Kitfo houses – I have yet to go for this Ethiopian traditional dish of seasoned raw (or half or fully cooked) meat.

·         European fine dining – At least a few places, particularly Le Mandoline and Le Grande Reve, apparently represent pretty decent takes on standard European fare at quite-high-for-Addis prices. (Mandoline apparently is French enough to follow the closed-for-August tradition, which here happens to also correspond to the rainy season).

·         International hotels – The Hilton, Radission, and Sheraton offer international meals at international prices. The latter two, at least, come well-recommended.

Six weird things I saw this week in Addis

I figured people might enjoy this. The list is not meant to be exhaustive, nor is it meant to belittle the city or its residents (there were plenty of weird things to be seen in DC as well).

1. Ox gallstones for sale -- This was the headline of a poster on the bulletin board inside the entrance of a ferengi supermarket, along ads for imported Landcruisers and the like. The headline was accompanied by a shot of solid earth-brown lumps that I'm going to have to assume were--for lack of a better theory--exactly what they claim to be. I'm guessing the audience was the Chinese population, but its hard to know for sure.
2. Chechnya -- One of the of the neighborhoods of Addis (along Telebole, around Atlas Hotel and, appropriately, the EU compound) apparently gained this nickname when heavy construction in the area brought with it a general lack of safety and security, and when conflict was ratcheting up in the contested Russian region. I think this speaks to the sometimes cosmopolitan nature of Addis. It's an official enough designation to make it onto the pizza boxes of a popular place there.
3. The First Laughter School in Africa -- I have almost no idea what this is, but its advertised by a large billboard along one of the city's main roads, centered on a cheery African man and a middle-aged white woman. (It is a real thing apparently -- if you want to learn more I've done the service of Googling it.)
4. Old Mercedes -- Legitimate luxury cars are a relatively rare site here, and when I do spot them it's often either an official vehicle accompanied by a police escort or as part of a string of fancy cars, draped in wreaths and honking wildly, which are contracted to celebrate a wedding. Occasionally, though, I see a more dated luxury model, and when I do it also prompts me to wonder whether the current owner, or perhaps a previous one, collaborated with the old, pre-1991 regime.
5. Chai Latte at Kaldi's -- Addis has a chain called Kaldi's coffee that is often described as a Starbuck's clone: same green and white color scheme, same font, tries to project a similar ethos. So not long ago I made my first trip to Kaldi's and wondered what I'd get if I ordered my typical Starbucks non-coffee drinker standby of the chai latte. (I held off on asking for soy milk, although that's apparently widely available here due to the frequenet fasting days when Ethiopians refrain from meat and dairy). What I got -- while a useful learning -- is not something I'd order again: a cup of frothed milk, and a tea bag.
6. Cast-off American t-shirts -- I recall an interesting piece I once read or watched (I haven't tried to source it for this) that tracked clothes from America's donation bins to Africa's markets. Walking down the street here, it's not uncommon to see clothing clearly in its second or third life, and every so often a fragment of American culture on one of these pieces will stand out as particularly humorous, apropos, or personally significant to me (if not necessarily to the wearer). A disproportionate number of them are sports related--perhaps these have a shorter American half-life. Some of the--often well-worn--shirts I've seen include a commemoration of the 1997 Cleveland Indians' American League pennant, a shirt for members of the Washington Huskies women's basketball supporters, and shirts for a Boston College-sponsored kids sports team and a little league pitching camp in Kuwait. My favorite so far, though, is one I saw yesterday. As we drove toward the Eastern outskirts in search of a delicious and deliciously-non-assimilated Chinese restaurant, I saw a man in a worn orange shirt with "Pump This" as the motto on the back. As improbable as it still seemed to me, when we passed on by I could see that below that slogan it really was a shirt from the Village Pump in Kelleys Island, Ohio. Brandy Alexanders all around!

A Top 10

Today marks the end of my tenth week in Addis, which also makes it a little over three months since leaving my previous job. On this non-momentous occasion I started thinking about what have been the highlights of my time here so far, and have put together a brief, more-or-less chronological list.

Few of these are life-changing milestones (and some I've written about before) but I think they capture the texture of my time here:

Introducing myself in Amharic:
My first trip to the field (meeting union managers in Hawassa) had me sitting in day-long meeting entirely in Amharic. Learning two sentences the night before, so that I could at least introduce myself and where I was employed, made me feel just a slight bit less out of place.

Seeing the emperor's rooms:
One of my first weekends in Addis -- back when I still had the appropriate combination of ambition and the hesitancy toward decoding the public transport situation -- an hour long uphill walk eventually landed me at Addis Ababa University. The Ethnographic museum of different cultures within Ethiopia (itself an interesting experience) sits inside a former imperial palace on the grounds. And inside, the emperor's bedchamber remains more or less undisturbed, with a guard who (I'm told second-hand) served the man itself. It also opens onto his preserved imperial bathroom (which somehow I didn't get a picture of!)

Watching the Ethiopian soccer team win, and the subsequent celebration:
My second trip out of Addis, in Adama, coincided with Ethiopia's victory over South Africa in World Cup qualifying. Before they learnedthe next day that a disqualification in a prior match meant that this win had not actually sent them forward to the next round, celebratory Ethiopians swarmed the street and danced through and on traffic.

Credit for this photo (taken in Addis) goes to Hayoung

Meeting Haile Gebrselassie:
The two-time Olympic gold medal distance runner came to give a lunch talk at my organization within my first month. He spoke about his potential political ambitions, his burgeoning business empire, and made several witty jokes (at least judging by colleagues responses--that part was in Amharic). The experience of seeing possibly the most famous living person in Ethiopia (whose face appeared on a giant billboard next to our office) within my first month in the country is best summed up by the response of the distance running former coworker I shared the story with -- "Holy Shit!"

Drinking with the analysts:
While I've often lived a much more "ferengi-fied" life in Addis than I'd care to admit (if only because it makes boring stories), one evening a few weeks into the job I ended up drinking after work with a group of local coworkers that gradually shed expats until only I was left. We ended up at a fairly stylish drinking establishment that was all locals, and while nothing particularly noteworthy happened the rest of the night, I at least got to feel I was living this Economist article.

Moving day:
Four or so weeks ago, on a Thursday after work, I finally completed the move from my second temporary place into my long-term home. It carries the nickname "International House, though it's actually an apartment), since it used to include coworkers from four continents. Now it's two Americans, a Canadian, and a Brazilian. But still a pretty nice set up (minus the drying clothes).

Busing across Amhara:
My trip onward from Lalibella -- the most talked up tourist site in the country, and perhaps deserving of its own slot on this list -- was another opportunity to feel I'd gotten at least some minimal depth below the surface of the country. The 5 AM wake-up, two hours standing up bouncing over unpaved roads, hasty transfer in a road junction town, and five more hours passing along hillsides in a minibus with curious university students generated the satisfying sense of other-ness present in travel. (Ultimately, I was traveling to a work destination, and while I could've chosen a more comfortable means, it's fortunate that I didn't come into this thinking that travel would be easier logistically than at my older job).

Taking a boat trip in Bahir Dar:

The destination of my bus journey, Bahir Dar, is a city I wrote about in my last post. I arrived with nearly a full-day to devote to site-seeing -- enough time, as far as I've heard, for just about any individual city in Ethiopia. The city sits on the edge of the sizable Lake Tana, and I spent my free morning on a boat journey to a few of the monasteries that dot that lake's islands. While learning bits and fragments of Ethiopian Christianity, I saw centuries old books, dusty crowns given by long-ago kings, and an incredible depiction of Biblical scenes.

Meeting farmers:
Another experience described in my last post, getting into the field and meeting the farmers of Ethiopia, gets to the root of why I'm here. To be honest, the communication barriers are high (even with translation) and anyway conversations with a few farmers shouldn't replace decisions driven by data, recorded outcomes, and expert sources. But individual farmers in the fields are fundamentally my "clients" in this job, and to have even the most superficial exposure to their day-to-day life and efforts is better than having none at all.

A surprise ending to a hiking trip:
Bringing it back to Addis, I'll tell (mostly for the pictures) a story from this past weekend. A pair of friends and I contracted a taxi one morning to take us to a hiking spot outside Addis, and return by midday. The driver, unfortunately, didn't realize he had no idea where we actually wanted to go until he was well past the turn we would have needed. Instead, whether intentionally or by accident, we ended up at a wildlife refuge with a "no visitors allowed" sign, wondering whether we'd have to just give up and head back for Addis. Instead, one friend's brief chat by phone with the British manager of the preserve led to a personal tour. Just your typical day where you mean to go hiking and end up hanging out up close with leopards, Ethiopian lions (distinguished by their dark manes), and baboons.

In the field

At my old job, we'd use "on the road" to describe being out of the office on a work trip. The phrase was appropriate regardless of actual physical location at the time or means of transport. This occasionally led to phone conversations where a client would interject with concern halfway through my walking them through a powerpoint, "Shouldn't you not be doing this while you're driving?" (Which, of course, I wasn't).

At my current job the comparable phrase is "in the field," which is used to describe time out of the office regardless of the distance or nearness one spends to an actual field in that time. (Remember that I work in agriculture, and so time in actual fields is far from out of the question).

Hence my first two trips spent "in the field" were passed at all-day meetings at decent hotels in regional capitals. I recently returned, however, from a six-day trip that--despite four of the nights being spent at a decent hotel in a regional capital--involved spending actual time in actual fields:

In my tradition of attaching personal travel to work travle, my journey actually started with a trip to Lalibela, probably the most touristed place in Ethiopia. Ours was one of two flights in that day:

Lalibela is famous for its rock-hewn churches from as long ago as the 12th century. Rock-hewn basically means that instead of just building a church, they excavated all of the "non-church" from a giant rock. (Blame UNESCO for the ugly metal support):

St. George's church below is the most famous:

Two cramped buses, seven hours, and 350 km later I was in Bahir Dar, the capital of Amhara region and a picturesque city on a large lake:

The work part of the trip started at the Amhara Regional Bureau of Agriculture:

That was followed by a trip to maize fields!

We stopped at several points to talk with farmers. The picture below shows a field where weeding is half-complete. We asked the farmer (not pictured) about the new system being piloted for maize seed distribution:

We visited several primary cooperatives, including the one below. These distribute seed and fertilizer to smallholder farmers, and often purchase their output as well:

We stopped at this Farmer Training Center to meet with the development agents: 

However, the road in and out was nearly impassible:

 Distribution of inputs (DAP fertilizer) at another Primary Cooperative:

Large-scale storage facilities at a Cooperative Union (parent of the primary cooperatives):

Overall, I covered 1,000 kilometers in 7 days. (Note that Google's drive time estimate below is extremely inaccurate under Ethiopian road conditions):

What I'm homesick for / the lure of frictionless consumption

I made a commitment that my next post would include photos. Unfortunately, I'm going to delay that for one more post, hopefully early this coming week, once I have better upload bandwidth (sorry John O'Connor!). In the meantime, here's a post that is less about Ethiopia, and--I guess--more about me.

Caveat, the conclusion of this post may feel a little political:

The other week I had a moment at work where I really and truly wanted nothing more than to be able to step out for a brief moment; grab a quick, easy, custom-made, and familiar sandwich from Mike's Cafe; and make it back within 10 minutes to eat it in the office.

For the most part I've avoided too much homesickness while in Addis. To different degrees this could be attributable to the fact that I'm still in a "honeymoon period" (coming up on the two months mark!), that I was ready to leave DC, that Addis isn't as lacking in familiar comforts as might be expected--if you know where to look, and that my expat colleagues before me have figured out exactly where to look.

Still, I've been putting thought on occasion into what it is I really miss from "home" and why.

1) Summer -- The rainy season in Addis has not hit me as hard emotionally as I was warned it might. Twelve weeks (now half-passed) of a couple hours of rain daily and a little mud to walk through doesn't forebode for me as much as the dark and cold of November entering into a New England winter. And, in terms of weather specifically, I'm willing to take up the bargain that Ethiopia will more than make up for this briefly sub-optimal weather with sun and moderate temperatures the entire rest of the year. (Especially when I know folks in the Northeast US are suffering: even three years in, I was still feeling lucky to take advantage of a mild DC winter that wasn't Boston's or Ohio's).

Still, certain things about summer in the US I unequivocally miss not being able to take in. Mainly these have to do with summer days spent on Kelleys Island, Ohio: views of the lake, placid ferry rides, steak from the barbecue, corn on the cob, outdoor drinking, and the general feeling of languor that accompanies all these summer luxuries. I understand, though, that it's been an unusually hot summer so far in the US--one that makes you want to stay inside, turn up the AC, and interferes with some of these simple pleasures. And even more so with my next desire...

2) Outdoor exercise -- Biking up into Rock Creek Park, down across Memorial Bridge to the airport, or even across to downtown or unknown parts of Northeast was a favorite way of mine to kill time in DC while not giving in to complete laziness. This would be a more difficult and (likely) less enjoyable pursuit here for any number of reasons. In particular, I'm thinking lack of quality roads and parks, difficulty getting ahold of the required equipment (bikes aren't a thing here even for urban commuting), conspicuousness of a ferengi engaging in something laborious for personal enjoyment (although, unlike in India, running is a recognized thing here and so this might be less of a hurdle).

While I'm on some level skeptical of a lot of the outlets for enjoyment available to young American urbanites, this was one of the several that I nonetheless got substantial enjoyment out of. And another was...

3) My apartment -- My apartment in DC was pretty damn awesome. Lots of square feet; wood floors; light; views; outdoor space; modern conveniences; proximity to public transport; walkability to--if not actual presence in--legitimately interesting parts of DC (sorry Foggy Bottom); and less than two blocks from all the conveniences of modern yuppy life--Whole Foods & Trader Joe's, CVS, grab-and-go quasi-gourmet burgers, salads, and sandwiches. Which leads to...

4) Friction-less consumption -- This is to some extent a catch-all bucket. At times I can miss many of the things that were easy to get ahold of someplace I've been recently and no longer are: chai tea lattes, respectable sandwiches, and a chattering crowd at a hip coffee shop in DC (Tryst basically); Vietnamese, Japanese ramen, and fresh seafood options; coherent neighborhoods to walk around in--whether in DC, London, or San Francisco--that are held together by the fact that someone else is there to buy the overpriced food, art, or whatever else.

I desire what I don't have--in my prior situation I missed the novelty and immediacy of life in a foreign place, and now I miss the comfort and distance of an American suburb. At a more material level, I miss a world that has become very good at serving up whatever I desire at a particular moment with limited hassle--whether it's combining the elements of a quick meal at the Whole Foods hot food bar, ordering the exact right green tea off of Amazon, or finding an alright movie on Netflix to kill some time.

My experience in Addis tells me that this form of consumption hasn't reached the entire world. Fulfilling a particular consumer desire/demand often takes a lot more input and effort here, for better or for worse. There's no self-checkout, no walking into Target and walking out with prescriptions and trail mix and jeans and furniture, no one-click purchase then putting it out of mind until it shows up two days later.

Transactions involve explicitly formulating your desires, strategizing over how to fulfill them, and--invariably--interacting with actual people at the point of sale. My colleagues know exactly which expat supermarket will sell particular "staples" (for instance Parmesan cheese, disposable cups, frozen chicken breasts). You'll have to bargain for a taxi there and a taxi back. And you'll generally have to stop at smaller individual stands and shops to fill out your basket--bread, fresh produce, etc. coming from their own individual proprietors.

Some of the friction comes from being foreign and not used to it (e.g. it's not as easy to negotiate for taxis), some of it comes from the economy being not used to me and the goods people like me desire (e.g. quick, customized lunch sandwiches in the Mike's cage example above), but some simply comes from being in a less automated and less streamlined economy (see Whole Foods, Amazon, Netflix, Target above). In a way this raises prices for everyone, by adding on a layer of "hassle" in addition to the monetary cost of goods. (Those with servants to do their shopping for them--which was common in India, and seems common here though on a less full-service model--may manage to substitute most of this hassle cost with an additional monetary cost).

It reminds me that many of the accomplishments of the American retail sector over the past 50 to 100 years (really as far back as the Sears catalogue) and the American technology sector over the past 20 have been to remove this sort of "hassle" cost and make the sole cost of a purchase its monetary cost, as in the examples of big box stores, self-checkout, and one-click shopping noted above. This is no doubt efficient in a specific sense, and is positive for someone like me who enjoys consumption and dislikes instrumentalized human interaction as a barrier to it.

Some would say that this removal of "friction" is good for all in the long-term, as it's inherently something without a net benefit. Others might counter that a trend toward not having to formalize, strategize around, and then communicate your desires is dangerous to society in a variety of ways--a push toward thoughtless consumption, as well as social inequity. 

Without coming down one way or the other on that, as a hallmark of the society I'm used to, I miss it.