Note: This is another entry that seems quite contemptous when viewed in retrospect. I only add that it was written with frustration and was isn't indicitive of our experiences in Ethiopia.

You may recall our experiences on the Fart Bus from Kampala to Nairobi. The trip from Addis Abba enters a whole new world of mobile bodily excretions.

More on that after an entertaining incident that occured when we first arrived in Addis. The cab driver looked just like Johnny Cochran. Especially from our vantage point in the back seat, it was quite easy to convince yourself you were being driven through an African city by O.J.'s finest. Johnnie agreed to take us to our hotel for 20 Birr, about $2.50. Then we get into the car and he decides it's $25 Birr. We go to get out and realize there are no door or window handles in the vehicle. No way out.

I got very nervous. I'd heard of this happpening in the great VW taxis of Mexico Coty... on there it's a lot worse than getting charged five Birr extra. You wind up in a dark alley.

But I figured Johnnie wasn't gonna do anything worse than get his 25 Birr. Since our bags were locked in the trunk, I reasoned he'd probably hold them hostage till we gave him the money.

"I would gather and hold hostage the keys and assorted personal effects."
So in Spanish Matt and I devised our plan. Matt would get out and explain to Johnnie that he had agreed to 20 Birr. I'd remain in the car to see if Johnnie refused to open the trunk. If so, I would gather and hold hostage the keys and assorted personal effects around the driver's seat. Then we would conduct an exchange. He releases our bags and gets his stuff back. We get our bags.

I was really looking forward to this. I even worked out how I would say, "You have some things of ours. We have some things of yours." But I never got to say it. The people we arrived with were in another taxi and had agreed to 25 Birr, so we didn't fight.

Grateful Mr. Johnnie Cochran hadn't robbed us in his no-exit taxi, Matt said, "If you arrive alive, you must pay twenty-five."

So about this bus. It's a two-day grueling bus trip from Addis to the town of Lalibela. We'd been dreading it... especially after the aforementioned abject fear Ethiopians have of fresh air.

"Madhouse would seem to imply an enclosed structure."
Our day began around five in the morning when we arrived in the madhouse of the Addis Ababa bus station. "Madhouse" would seem to imply an enclosed structure of some kind, though. No, the main bus depot in this world capital city is more of a "mad-open dirt lot." It's an absolute zoo. Like any complicated undertaking, in Africa every day is like it's being attempted for the very first time. I suppose that's why they have to get started at five in the morning.

People are yelling. Men push around homemade wheelbarrows with two hundred pound bags of rice and home building materials. Bus company employees, due to an inexplicable lack of signage, stand by buses and

A boy in Lalibela carrys wood to cook tonight's dinner.

scream destinations into the surging shoulder-to-shoulder crowd. One guy... I shit you not... was trying to load his eight-foot corner cabinet onto the roof of a bus. All this taking place at five in the morning... in near complete darkness... in an open dirt lot.

"Turns out the conductor was on the wrong bus."
After being told by the conductor we were on the wrong bus... turns out he was on the wrong bus... we finally rolled out of Addis Abba. We passed by a half-completed and now abandoned elevated freeway about the same time I noticed that the bus's door handle had broken off from the door. Rather than taking ten minutes to weld it back on, someone took ten minutes to find some twine and tie it to an adjacent rail so it can be picked up and jammed into the door each time it needs to be opened.

Both the handle and abandoned freeway are examples of a uniquely African way of doing just barely enough to survive the day. The door handle may be tough to use, but it'll get us through one more day. The freeway... hell... those pothole-lined roads on the ground will work just fine. Let's forget the whole thing.

And tonight, the toilet seat in my room sits on the floor behind the toilet. Now don't get me wrong. It's a rare honor to have a toilet seat, attached or otherwise, in the third world... but it's another illustration of the "just enough" mindset. Yes, you must pick up the seat, place it on the toilet and lower yourself carefully on top... but it gets you through the day.

"Contributor number one, of course, was seated right next to me."
With all windows sealed tightly and passengers wrapped in winter coats and wool caps, the temperature inside soared as the sun rose. The bus bounced and shuddered on the crappy pavement winding into the hills. This is when the puking began. Contributor number one, of course, was seated right next to me. He made for a window across the aisle but didn't make it. He'd had the Ethiopian staple food njera for breakfast and now it was under the seat in front of me sliding slowly backward.

Others would follow as the day wore on and my neighbor would offer at least one repeat performance after a lunch of njera. But there would be no opening of windows.

Read the next part carefully. I'm not exaggerating.

"Holdinng their noses against the stench."
In midafternoon, with the sun blazing down and the smell of puke permeating the bus, people sat wrapped in blankets, coats and wool hats, sweating and fanning themselves furiously against the heat and holdinng their noses against the stench. But every time the shimmying of the bus would shake a window ajar, a flood of gasps would ensure it was quicklyl snapped shut.

What the hell kind of behavior is this for a civilization that was having coffee parties and doing math while Europeans were running around in rags like cavemen?

But after ten hours of stealthily cracking our window, wee arrived in Dessie. It's an overnight stop on the way to Lalibela, home to some amazing rock-hewn churches. We should be there tomorrow afternoon... after another ride just like today's.

Editor's Note: Due to poor website planning on my part we jump ahead two days to Lalibela.

A priest displays one of his books in Lalibela.

Lalibela, Ethiopia knows when the world’s going to end. The exact date of Armageddon is said to be inscribed on a pillar in one of the city’s amazing rock-hewn churches. The only problem is that it’s kept carefully wrapped in cloths… removed only by a guy wearing a blindfold. And the priests are a little worried about an American TV crew that showed up a few years ago with an infra-red camera. But even if the date of the world’s demise is kept under wraps, Lalibela still has some stunning attractions.

The day-long bus ride was excruciating but little different from the previous day and thus needing no further description. Although upon our arrival, as the bus roof was unloaded, I saw something that topped the guy in Addis Ababa traveling with a corner cabinet. Before our backpacks could be removed from the roof, first came down what looked to be about a fifty pound barbell… the weights on either end of the four foot metal pipe made of concrete blocks.

"The fresh water tap was just downhill from the toilet."
We booked in at what passes for a “guesthouse” in Lalibela. At about two dollars each for two single rooms it was one of our cheaper accommodations of the trip… and was what Lonely Planet likes to call

St George's Cathedral.

"very basic." All the rooms were around an enclosed dirt dirt lot with various farm animals running around. The bare concrete floor had been swept, but it and the walls could have dearly used a good scrub. The "windows" were holes in the wall closed by wood plank doors. The "toilet" was equivalent to what’s called a "privy" in North American hiking situations. I was a little concerned that the fresh water tap was just downhill from the toilet.

But about those churches. I don’t remember the whole historical background, but there was an Ethiopian king who ordered these things built hundreds of years ago. Whenever or whyever they came to be, they’re amazing. The town is littered with these houses of worship of varying sizes, but all carved into a single mammoth rock. They look so much like regular buildings that you have to remind yourself that they weren’t pieced together, but sculpted right out of the ground. The insides have hallways, rooms and even sculptures carved into the walls… sculptures within sculptures. There are also fleas in the plush carpets. Matt discovered this after they’d made the leap from his socks to his sleeping bag.

"They look like construction sites."
Sadly, the churches are leaking. Years of rain and weather have worn down the roofs and are now threatening the structures themselves.

One of the many carved statues within the carved churches.

A few years ago UNESCO came up with a few million to erect some ugly but temporary scaffolding-supported roofs to protect the churches. This was just until the Ethiopian government could come up with a more suitable solution. Right. Of course, in true African fashion, the scaffolding still surrounds the churches years later. They look like construction sites. But at least they’re protected, I suppose.

Fortunately the most striking of all the churches has held up better than the rest and doesn’t yet need a roof. St. George’s cathedral is carved in the shape of a cross, and straight down into solid rock… creating a two-storey cross in an equally deep pit. You’ll need to see the photo for this. It’s tough to explain. Even the roof is intricately carved. As we entered the tight courtyard surround the base of the church at the bottom of the pit, our guide pointed to an alcove carved into the wall opposite the front door of the church. I jumped as I saw bones and a human skull staring back as me. The legend goes that a group of monks had made a grueling, exhausting journey to see St. George’s church and died the moment they laid eyes on their destination. After the two-day bus journey, I knew how they felt.

"I’m not sure if Ed McMahan arrives at their door."
A brief diversion now to what’s called the "Diversity Visa Lottery." If you don’t know what this is, it’s because you live in a rich country. Starting in Addis Ababa I kept seeing sings at internet cafés that said "DV 2005." I though it was some new kind of DVD or something. Every year the United States hands out either 25 or 50,000 (I forget) permanent resident visas to people from countries that don’t have a lot of immigration to the US. No marrying an American. No sponsorship. You just apply online (thus the signs at internet cafes) and prove that you either have a high school education or work experience. Then the INS draws names and hands out visas to a few thousand aspiring American residents. I’m not sure if Ed McMahan arrives at their door with the papers.

It was very interesting to see not just young people, but rich-looking middle aged businessmen filling out the forms. Talking to people about it, I got the impression that most people who are chosen end up not going either because they don’t have the means to travel to the US in the first place, or because the idea of living in America is much easier to entertain than actually doing it. Imagine an online lottery for a seat on the first manned mission to Mars. I think that’s what it probably feels like to most applicants.

On to Bahir Dar, another two-day bus journey. But this one shouldn’t be so bad. The only reason it’s two days is that you have to change buses and there’s only one bus a day from the transfer town.