22 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC TRAVELLER INDIA | JULY 2019
BENEDEK/ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES(CITY),GRANT ROONEY/AGEFOTOSTOCK/DINODIA PHOTO LIBRARY(PEOPLE),SOHADISZNO/ISTOCK EDITORIAL/GETTY IMAGES(MARKET)pungent scent of singed beans.
It’s not just the birthplace of the
bean though, you are also constantly
reminded that this is the birthplace
of humanity itself, the beginning of
everything. The country’s tourism board
brands it as the “Land of Origins.” Lucy,
a 3.2-million-year-old human fossil,
and the nation’s most famous entity,
now rests at the National Museum of
Ethiopia. Lucy, or Dinknesh as she is
known in Amharic, is a small-brained,
bipedal Australopithecus afarensis
specimen discovered in 1974 and has
been crucial to our understanding of
human evolution. There was something
arresting about visiting Lucy and other
Addis Ababa (top) is in the throes of transformation, with construction in full swing in
different parts of the city; Originally said to be the ‘drink of nobility’, tej (top right) is a sweet,
saffron-coloured mead made from water, honey and gesho leaves; The open-air Merkato
market (b ot to m) is a hotspot for chaotic bliss, with busy shoppers making their way through
humans and animals, as music blares around them.
ancient remains even though bones in
a glass case might be underwhelming
for some. In case there was any doubt
that this was the cradle of it all, a large
information board illustrated how “the
world became African.”
But almost everything else here
is new. Emerging from a violent
communist past and civil war, this is a
country, and a city, swirling in the midst
of construction. Skeletal buildings
with scaffolding and Chinese signs
are springing up everywhere. A new
light rail was opened in 2015. A new
address system is being planned. A new,
reformist prime minister is in power.
This was only my second time inAfrica, my first time in sub-Saharan
Africa, so everything crackled with the
frisson of the new: the nameless streets,
the white-clad Ethiopian Christians,
the Chinese-hating locals, the chunky
Amharic script. Even the chaotic
Mercato, said to be Africa’s largest
open-air market,heaved with energy—
donkeys wandered through, music
thumped, people chewed the narcotic
khat leaves and women clutched at
their purses.
But the most novel were the tej bars,
tiny shacks serving the local brew of
honey wine, originally said to be a
drink of the nobility. It took several
minutes to find Topia Tej Bet through
the warren of darkened alleys behind a
luxury hotel, and once my friends and I
reached we were the only group in sight.
Made from water, honey and gesho
leaves (plucked from an African shrub),
the sweet, saffron concoction arrived
in transparent goblets. The tej, also
Ethiopia’s national drink, tasted strange
at first, then grew on me gradually.
Two litres later, at 9.30 p.m. we were
kicked out.
But we were not done yet. Bundling
ourselves into a taxi, we made for
Black Rose Bar, but as with Ethiopian
cab drivers, he was having none of it,
and refused to take directions from
us. “Listen to Abba,” he said, using
the generic honorific for elders, whilst
confidently steering us in the opposite
direction. “What about Google Abba?”
one companion asked. But Abba
simply laughed. My friend promptly
disintegrated into pidgin, the refuge of
the desperate and confused. “But we no
go there,” she beseeched. Abba laughed