Thank you for your balanced contribution. I suspect the Africans/ Ethiopians won't miss you either.

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Brighty's website: TheBrightStuffDotCom

CURRENT RR WITH REGULAR UPDATES: The Wife Takes on Chlamydia: A South American Retrospective

Some deep and meaningful input from our friend from Texas. Excellent progress indeed because it would appear that word of the existence of a wider world has reached his little corner of our planet.

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...on the road to nowhere...

Biking roads by bikers for bikers www.bestbikingroads.com

Some of my friends just did a grand tour of Africa in three 4x4 , and they said that the -only- country they had a problem was in Ethiopia. They were surrounded in small villages and the situation went out of control, so they had to basically flee before property was lost and/or someone hurt.
I think perhaps an educational campaign may be a good idea? By the government, for the people. Ethiopia has a large potential for tourism.
There may also be recommendations for travellers behaviour on order.
That is something we could and should discuss here (to some extent we are).
I don't think pebbles in the pocket is the answer.

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So I guess that party won't be returning to Africa in a hurry.

AK47's next ?
Grenades instead of stones, , , , , ,

It wont be long before the whole of Africa is like this.


vette

Oh it already is, mate. Here's the wife dealing with some grenade chuckers in Namibia. God, it was hell. Still, she got to be a pretty good shot with the Glock in the end....

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Well, I am afraid it has been many a peasant's pastime for a long time... I rode my bicycle from Eritrea all the way down to Kenya back in 1995, the country had only been open for independant tourism for 2 years and there were very few travellers back then, but rock throwing and cursing ( F... you ! ) were already a huge problem. And I was slow, not protected by tainted windshields and windows, smiling and interacting as much as I could with the locals... I met quite a few fellow cyclists who gave up, flew or bussed their way out of the country.

Well actually they are going back all the time, as they know it and they love it.

But their next trip is to Caucasus - Pakistan - India....I am sure they will find rock throwers there, too.

In your country, I faced a shotgun last trip. In Conroe, TX.
And years ago I was very nearly shot by a large posse near Rochester, MN. Case of mistaken identity.
Conclusions? Nah.

So....

Is it the bikers or the land rovers who are getting attacked here ???

I was there over a month and never had a single rock thrown at me..... On a bike !!!

I did hear of the 4X4's getting a little flak though.

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Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

Having driven through Ethiopia recently I have a few thoughts. The slow down thing may have been true in the past, but we certainly didn't see it. For one, the roads weren't good enough (I wasn't willing to destroy my vehicle) to go very fast one...plus all the people, livestock, etc. milling about. Secondly, I didn't WANT to go fast. THe country is gorgeous and I didn't go to Africa to drive through as quickly as possible.

What we noticed about the rock throwing was that it was only around Gondar. Down south near Awassa...in the east near Harar, we just didn't experience it at all.

My personal opinion is that these kids KNOW that it is bad. No adults or teenagers threw stones, it was kids about 10 years old or so. They would wave as you approached, you'd wave back but once you'd pass they'd quickly pick up a rock and run into the road and throw it and then if you slowed or stopped they'd run away. From that I gather it is not a "you should slow down, thus I am justified in throwing a rock." It is clear that this is a fun game and they understand the damage and that it is not a good thing to do.

We had the rear window of one of our cars destroyed by a thrown rock and the kid ran off down a hill. I reversed quickly, gave chase, and threw a rock at the child as he climed and embankment on the other side of a stream. THe rock hit him and he fell into said stream getting covered in mud before running away.

In the midst of all of this, he had abonded the goats that he was tending and soon a couple of adults came. One spoke very broken English and was extremely saddened by what had happened and expressed disgust towards the now abscent child. Looking at the goats, they seemed to know exactly which kid it was that did this and expressed that they would tell the parent of the embarassment that this child had brought.

Now, whether or not that happened, I have no idea. It was clear though that the behavior is not tolerated or seen as appropriate and the reactions across the board from the misses and the hits our cars received seem to back this up.

THe truth of the matter is that the perception of tourists/travelers/foreigners that is fostered among these folks all comes from what they are told and what they experience. I am always keen to meet and talk and show people that 99% of us aren't super rich elitests that view Ethiopia as the armpit of the world. I chose to go there because I wanted to see it. Hell, we raised money for several charities there and raised enough to build a school at an orphanage.

I don't expect that I changed the world or anything, but I do hope that the child will give a second thought before hurling another rock at a vehicle.

In regards to bikers, I sort of feel that a cyclist or motorcyclist is seen as more human as there is no "protective shell" around them. It is easier to throw a rock at an object than at a person. A car is much more de-humanizing than a motorcycle and because in my personal opinion, these kids KNOW that it is wrong, they aren't going to be as blatant about it when they would have to physically throw a rock at a person.

Just my thoughts on the matter.

Advice though, just be mindful. Be friendly to folks, and watch your mirrors as you go through town.

Sidenote : We also came across a fake roadblock manned by 4 kids (one without pants) and they tried to demand a toll. Of course we blew through their rope across the road with a couple of sticks beneath it....but still. The day before we came across a fake checkpoint manned by 7 men (3 with guns) that jammed sticks in our wheels and tried to rob us. I guess if these are the folks doing the parenting, the rock throwing doesn't seem as bad.

Without even knowing it, you've described one of the main reasons why travelling on a bike is better than a four wheeled shell...

__________________
Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.

Oh, I was well aware of what I was saying. That is the good and bad with riding...you are more exposed. Many times that works against you...and many times that works for you.

I'm an avid 2-wheeler, but have never done it in a multi-country roadtrip.

To me though, that is a big part of the "rock-throwing" equation.

Yikes, so pray tell, how did you get out of that one?

Well, we had discussed what we we do in that situation in a general sense multiple times over the past year or so. We figured it would be in Libya, Uganda, Burundi, Kenya, et. where we would run into those issues. We didn't expect it to be Ethiopia.

We were two vehicles at that point and I was driving the 2nd vehicle...we had radios but it all happened too fast to stop and chat a bit about what was going on.

We were driving and came across sticks and brambles in the roadway along with some rocks and then a rope across the road anchored by some sticks on either side. There were 2-3 men standing near the rope and 3-4 well off the side of the road, maybe 20-25 feet or so. As we approached, I saw it and realized it was NOT a legitimate checkpoint...as all of the men had scarves covering their faces with the exception of theire eyes. I was hoping that driver of the first car wouldn't think that this was legit. He slowed down a bit, but then gunned it and smashed through their rope and sticks. The men closer to the car tried to jam sticks in the wheels, but they just broke the sticks. The other guys that had been further off of the road were now on the road and pulled out AK-47s and started to point them at our car, which was moving at about 25 mph towards them. I told my gf in the passenger seat to duck, I also ducked down low and then gunned it, hit a couple of the guys in the road with the car...bumped over a few things (not sure as to what, as my head was down) and kept driving.

I have no idea if I hurt the guys or anything. They never fired their weapons (not sure if they even had bullets) although they did throw some things at the car as we passed.

ONce through we radioed back and forth about the ordeal and stopped about 5 miles down the road as the first car thought something was broken...turned out it was just some of the broked sticks wedged in between the wheels and the brakes.

We all assume they were just bandits trying to get some money/goods/etc...and perhaps weren't really ready to kill or use excessive force. However, we weren't going to find out and didn't want to have to take chances as to whether or not we could talk our way out of it.

We are lucky it ended the way that it did and even more lucky that in our entire trip THAT was the worst experience that we had.

It doesn't deter me from going to northern Ethiopia again, but will definitely be vigilant and try to travel in groups through that area.

One nice thing about Ethiopia is that the police leave you alone on the roads, as soon as they see you are foreign they wave you through.

Ethiopia is a very complex country for people - 80+ tribes in a country. Addis is quite a nice city by African standards and has a great collection of food compared to the rest of the country. If you spend much time there you start to realise that a lot of people there are refugees from the countryside - they had to run for their lives away from troubles and tensions.

I had a long chat with an Ethiopian in London the other day. I calmly told him my thoughts on the country and on the negative things he completely agreed and said he has to put up with this as well, its not just tourists. NGO workers I meet there carry thousands in cash under their seat in case they hit somebody, else they said they would be killed.

I meet a young couple who ran over somebodies foot and they were very lucky to only be a few km's from a police station who was quickly surrounded by a hundred or so people throwing stones. They had to pay $3,000 to get out of their alive.

I also meet a lot of nice people in Ethiopia - rasta guy who wanted to give me a huge brick of hash as a welcome present, guides in campsites who brought me lamb stew as I was alone, friendly people on the street and so on.....

The Afar people by contrast were extremely hostile and unfriendly, though across the border in Djibouti much less so...?

People are complex ;-)

Not much chance of anything happening from the government side of things, they are as corrupt as any other and cause many of the problems and tensions between people. There is a huge land grab going on all across Africa with politicians signing away land that displaces people and of course projects such as damming the Omo river:

Indian investors are forcing Ethiopians off their land | Global development | guardian.co.uk

http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-dev...es?INTCMP=SRCH

Ethiopia dam project is devastating the lives of remote indigenous groups | Global development | guardian.co.uk

Ethiopia overall was an interesting place for us. At least here in the US, everyone thinks of the distended bellies, drought, etc. when Ethiopia is brought up. While it is certainly not a rich nation, that is a totally outdated image.

In talking with folks we got a sense that while hardline, many people like that the government has made strides in sanitation, healthcare, infrastucture, education, etc. However, it actually has made it more difficult for foreign aid to come in. As we drove through the country we would see so many failed NGO projects...and old signs for projects.

Many of the reactions from locals to us were that we were white, so we must me extremely rich and must be NGO workers. This is also outdated and when talking to some locals in Addis they explained that the adults taught the children that, because that is what a white person was in Ehtiopia in the 1980s.

I was shocked how divided the country was on religious lines though. I really hadn't been aware that there was such a massive Muslim population and how segregated the Christian and Muslims were outside of the large cities. We noticed these pockets of diverse culture as we crossed the nation and headed into Somaliland.

Of all the places I have been, I feel Ethiopia was the one where my preconceived notions were the most off-base.

I'm interested to see how things change in the next 10-20 years.