Injery Christmas

Our second attempt at catching the early morning bus north was more successful and after 18 hours, 1 bus, 2 overpacked minibuses and 1 flat tire we reached Lalibela just before midnight. Lalibela or Roha as it was originally called was founded in the 12th century by King Lalibela, as too many of his pilgrims were being killed whilst trying to reach Jerusalem he decided to make an own Holy-land within his country’s limits. In 23 years he somehow managed to carve 11 churches out of the rockface, but while the monuments of for example Petra are carved into the mountain most of the churches in Lalibela are freestanding having been completely cut loose from the surrounding stone. Today Lalibela is home to 15,000 people but during Ethiopian Christmas, which by chance happened to occur during our stay, hundreds of thousands of pilgrims flock to the holy sight. We made the same rookie mistake that Joseph and Mary once made not having reservations for Christmas and there was no room in any of the inns, but as fortune would have it our brother T.I. is from the village and he arranged for us to stay in his family’s house. So for the next four nights we made a room in a two-story mudhut our home and were spoiled rotten by our temporary mother who filled us with injera, coffee and tella (a homemade beer-like drink which tasted all right even if you had to siv it through your teet to catch all the twigs and residue.) When our faces weren’t being stuffed we spent our days with our brother’s brothers which technically should be our brothers… exploring the mystical rock-hewn churches, hiking in the high mountains and I managed to be crowned table-tennis king of the village. On Christmas Day we went to the market and bought a new goat, I then went for a walk and came home to a sumptuous stew, the goat must have escaped though because I never saw him again. The night was topped off with the yearly spectacular tradition of a 16 hour (and I though Donald Duck in Sweden or The Queen’s speech in England were long) live show outside one of the churches where our brother sat from the break of dawn holding the best seats in the house. The spectacle was unlike anything I’d ever seen, with drumming and dancing priests performing before me as I sat crowded on narrow wall in a snakepit of white-draped pilgrims. The show itself could have been about 15 hours shorter but the experience as a whole was entertaining to say the least. After Christmas we said farewell to our generous family who asked for nothing in return for their hospitality, and took a two day trip further north pit-stopping in Mekele before finally getting to Aksum.