On the first of March 1896, a historical battle took place in the North of Ethiopia, a locality known as Aduwa.
The battle pitted against one another the then kingdom of Italy; a late comer to the scramble for Africa, eager to make a name for itself in what was the game of the day, and the Ethiopian Empire, the oldest African Christian state entity and the seat of a dynasty that claimed descent from the love child of Solomon of Israel and Makeda, Queen of Sheba.
Picture this for a moment; in the last un-colonized African chunk of land, in an empire famed for its gold, silver and history, a barren flat land surrounded by jagged hills. Advancing in the valley , 18,000 Italians, arrogant and drunk on the belief that Africa is a place destined to be subjugated, seeing Ethiopia the missing piece to join the concert of colonizing, civilizing nations.
On the hills, an 80,000 strong force of Abyssinians, battalions commandeered by Emperor Menelik, Empress Taytu and the best commanders the nobility had to offer, fighting for their freedom, their survival and the continuity of life as they knew it. Although the Italians had the technological advantage, a combination of sketchy military intelligence, poor leadership and gross inequality between the forces sizes (the Ethiopians outnumbered the Italians 7 to one) led to a defeat so shameful, so scalding, forty years later, Musollini still tried to avenge it, a defeat that shaped the lens through which Ethiopia would be viewed by the rest of the world from that day on.
On the hills, an 80,000 strong force of Abyssinians, battalions commandeered by Emperor Menelik, Empress Taytu and the best commanders the nobility had to offer, fighting for their freedom, their survival and the continuity of life as they knew it. Although the Italians had the technological advantage, a combination of sketchy military intelligence, poor leadership and gross inequality between the forces sizes (the Ethiopians outnumbered the Italians 7 to one) led to a defeat so shameful, so scalding, forty years later, Musollini still tried to avenge it, a defeat that shaped the lens through which Ethiopia would be viewed by the rest of the world from that day on.
Ethiopia became a Reality. To Europe, Ethiopia became unattainable, mysterious, fierce and free, a respected, recognised entity, an empire of Africans in Africa, a place where a stand had been made against European colonisation. To Africa it became a shinning beacon, a reminder of what we had been at some point and what we must strive to become.
Ethiopia became a brand name for virginal, fierce, beautiful, HUMAN Africa, a special place.
Growing up, I built an image of Ethiopia in my mind, a collage obtained from three special places: a calendar, a conversation with my Dad and the lasting impressions three of my uncles and my brother have left on me.
When I was about eight years old, my mother, a travel agent then, brought home an Ethiopian Airlines calendar. Watercolour prints of scenes from rural Ethiopia picturing the inevitable goat-herder standing on one leg, the diaphanous veiled doe eyed Russian icon-like beauties of women, the aloof chiselled staggeringly handsome faces of their men, medieval Gondar, the architectural feat of Lalibella and the Gellada baboons, part-baboon, part-dogs-part-lion from the red Simien Mountains. I remember taking the calendar down and trying to reproduce these images of intense, impeccable beauty, I remember, as a boy, literally being transported into another world. I can remember, then, that I promised myself that I would visit Ethiopia "Quand je serais grand"-When I grow up.
At about the same time, “We are the world” was becoming the anthem it is today. The opening lines and the chorus are probably the first English words that I ever attempted to string together and understand. When I asked my father what “We are the world-Nous sommes le monde” meant (a very confusing literal translation), he patiently told me about the song’s meaning and purpose, about the Ethiopian famine and about solidarity as a responsibility, a debt of the haves towards the have-nots.
Famine-“Amapfa” in Kirundi, my mother tongue, can be translated loosely and litteraly as “the bringer of death”, and for people of my father’s generation it still represents a reality they faced as children when a bad-crop year, cattle disease, the colonial taxes or instability lead to shortages acute enough to see some days go past without food. “La disette”- lean times, a spectre he had known, still feared in a way so strong that it drove him every morning to work harder to build a world of plenty for us, his family. Dad's way of describing ugliness was " Asa n'urwamaze inka- The face of the cattle plague", so ingrained was the memory of hideous hunger and its effects in his psyche and the collective consciousness of his generation.
I understood Ethiopia that day, through my father’s almost contagious disgust and horror of famine, as a place of tragedy so intense the world had to mobilise to attempt and stop it. To stop that horrible thing that robs your body and your mind of all abilities, the slow death, hunger. I think I felt, empathised, for the tragedy of Ethiopia a long time before I had similar feelings for my own country.
A third strong influence of my mental construct of Ethiopia came from close in the family. Three of my uncles are Rastafarians and I suspect my brother to be a closet Rastafarian. I love them, I adore them, I worship their socks. My uncles G(who sports knee length dreadlocks), M and B, are respectively a writer, a journalist and a human rights activist/ political analyst. They are men of immense presence and calm, lean, noble who speak with kind, serious voices that can hardly be told apart on the phone. They have stratospheric IQs and matching inquisitiveness and openness to the world and knowledge. They also have a great reverence for the frail little man who once was the Emperor of Ethiopia.
My brother, the consummate Bohemian bourgeois is an aficionado of all things Reggae and Roots, the Rasta philosophy, the respect for life and the idealistic nature of Rastafarianism. They together represent an Africa I have come to love; educated, conscious of its roles and responsibilities, full of ideals and action. And they have a role model, one of many, one they recognise to have been full of flaws, but full of grace too. One whose idea of Africa was an orderly, united, powerful and respected continent. The Emperor Ras Tafari Makonnen Haile Selassie the 1st.
My brother, the consummate Bohemian bourgeois is an aficionado of all things Reggae and Roots, the Rasta philosophy, the respect for life and the idealistic nature of Rastafarianism. They together represent an Africa I have come to love; educated, conscious of its roles and responsibilities, full of ideals and action. And they have a role model, one of many, one they recognise to have been full of flaws, but full of grace too. One whose idea of Africa was an orderly, united, powerful and respected continent. The Emperor Ras Tafari Makonnen Haile Selassie the 1st.
Their reverence rubbed onto me, an irrational respect and adulation for the last of the great kings.
These were the thoughts coursing through my mind as the Emirates flight made its final descent on Bole, Addis Ababba’s international airport over a patchwork of different hues of green, dark brown and hay, a land with every inch tilled and prepared. And right infront and below me lay a great city with a towering dark block of mountains at one end of it, Addis Ababba, the New Flower....(to be continued.)
