My first full day off

Today was the quintissential day in Addis, never to be equaled 'cause this was the first. There will be more like it but nothing equal. It started out with a trip on the blue bus from Bole Road to Paul's house. I accosted a blue bus on Bole and they wanted 80 birr to take me to Sarbit. I thought that was ridiculous considering Dr. Paul told me it would be no more than 5! I walked a bit more and approached a bus that was almost full. I said "Mexico", the name of a square where I could get a ride to Sarbit.

A guy in the bus told me when the bus turns to get another one that will take me to Mexico. He was worried I did not have enough small bills, so gave me 10 1-birr notes. I paid the conductor 1 birr and switched as instructed. The next ride cost me 75 cents (yes 3/4 of 1 birr or about 6 cents) and took me to Mexico. The road was very very busy. Everytime we passed a vehicle throwing thick black smoke, the conductor very nicely closed his window. At Mexico I transferred to another bus to get to Sarbit. I was such an idiot; there was a guy outside a vehicle yelling "Srbt Srbt Srbt" whom I did not hear. I asked where I get the bus to Sarbit and was politely directed to the bus beside the guy yelling. Difference 292,013 between Addis Ababa and Ottawa ... if that had happened in Ottawa someone would have very sarcastically, if not rudely, quipped "what are ya, hard of hearing"?

At Sarbit, it looked familiar, its having been the place I grabbed a cab last night. With some assistance, i found the way to walk to Dr. Paul's. We were there about a half hour and the three of us took 2 blue buses to mercado. A woman on the first bus ensured we did not get lost. Mercado ... the epitome of outdoor markets, as expected. Christine's daughter Sophie bought an outfit. I talked the guy down from 5850 birr to 800. The guy told us he would take us to a store where I could look at guitars.

We wandered with him through the rain and ended up at one of his buddy's establishments that had, surprise surprise, just about everything other than guitars. I bought some leather loafers for $22 (or 250 birr) and then we cabbed it back to Dr. Paul's. I stopped at one point to put my umbrella in my backpack and, while distracted, felt a hand go into my left pocket. I pulled it out of my pocket before he could get my passport. Nothing was taken.

I am going to figure out something better for my valuables when in crowded places. When I come back to Ottawa in September, I am going to Greenbank tailor to get some velcro sewn on a pair of jeans and something like some Adidas jogging pants. I will also get some cargo pants with outside snap or velcro closures. Once back at Dr.'s, we ended up going for a nice long walk to pick up some local artifacts which was long but great exercise. I learned the expression "tinnasterling" which means "have a nice day".

We are going out for Chinese tonight (twist my arm). Now that I can use the blue bus, I can get around for less than 5 birr what would cost 80 by cab. To translate that, I now spend 40 cents rather than 7 USD.