Hibiscus Tree With Flowers

Hibiscus Tree With Flowers

[Photo By: KPA]

The "Girum Shai" brand also sells hibiscus teabags. It  is not my favorite "flavor" but it has an interesting citrusy taste.

Here is my design version of the hibiscus flower.

Hibiscus

Design By: KPA

Summer Pink Begonia in Mississauga

Pink Begonia

[Photo By: KPA]

It is now mid-summer in Canada, and even in the summer heat, we have a display of flowers.

Here are potted begonia, about which I blogged here, which fare well in the heat, and give us their beautiful colors to contemplate.

These pink and white flowers give a slightly tropical feel to the heat-waved Mississauga.

This tiny parkette is right across from the Civic Centre (Celebration Square), and far enough to be a quiet and peaceful respite. The concrete slabs were designed to be "benches," and I often sit beneath one of the birch trees, which are in their full-leaved summer regalia, which provide a gentle flow of a summer's breeze. [More at the link above.] 

In contrast, it is mid-"winter" - kiremt - here in Addis, and the rains and roaring thunder give us another side of nature.

The rains are much needed here, and they go on through August, until the September Spring - Tseday - when the whole country is covered in the beautiful yellow flowers. The clever Amhara also use that flower, and that month, as the New Year, celebrated by all Ethiopians. More then!

Real Progress

Real Progress

[Photo By: KPA]

Contrary to popular intellectual belief, building is good. 

It gives jobs.

It adds room for people to live, to perform commerce, to attend schooling, to save, and much more.

The running opinion is that it adds congestion. But ordinary people are not so stupid, and they eventually weigh the balance, and demand their construction barons toe some line - if anything by NOT buying.

And Ethiopians are not so stupid. Most people live with their families. The women I talk to (preparing for my Kidist Foods Expanded Project) talk about adjusting their homes to fit their families, which includes several generations. 

Why not build, and thus why not buy? And why not rent, even? People need homes!

This construction I photographed (ab0ve) from my apartment across the street started about six months ago, when I moved into my building. The noise was difficult, often starting as early as 6:30am.

But, I am lucky. I always get up pre-dawn, and finish my most thought-consuming tasks in early dawn. That way, I make no judgment errors in my decisions. And I haven't.

It is interesting, and fun, to watch. And somehow, the laborers avoid the torrential rains, and do just enough (I presume) for the day, to keep on track. Sometimes, they break out into chant.

They are, as far as I can gather, Oromo men, day laborers.

The building next to it, which is a part residential, part commercial building, lights up in the evening with diffuse yellow light (each bulb placed by a window) giving the area a beautiful glow, which is progressively dimmed through the night.

Now, most of the exterior is done, and today I saw the workmen (laborers) bringing in window panes.

I asked, a couple of days ago: "How Long!!!"

The foreman laughed, and said, probably by Inqutatash, the Ethiopian New Year, in September.

Then, I will have been here, in Addis Ababa, a year!

Emperor Haile Selassie's Legacy - Hilton Addis' 50th Anniversary

Lion of Judah sculpture in the Hilton 

Hotel grounds, Addis Ababa

[Photo By: KPA]

And the pool, with a cross design, in 1969

[Image Source]

Hilton Addis opened in 1969 under Emperor Haile Selassie after Hilton Worldwide signed a 50-year contract with the Ethiopian government. [Source Wikipedia]

Hilton's Inauguration 

November 1969

With Emperor Haile Selassie

[Image Source]

Banner with inauguration photo

Hilton Entranceway

[Photo By: KPA

July 2023]

Hilton commemorated its 50-year anniversary in 2020 (a year later - 1969-2019).

Hilton's 50th, celebrated on January 16, 2020

[Image Source]

My understanding is that the Hotel's contract continues under the same Hilton Worldwide.

Here is one especially delicious dish: a mesir soup (lentil soup) with the berbere - the complex chili power that is part of Ethiopia's dishes. It is served in the Gazebo Restaurant, by the pool.

[Photo By: KPA]

Gazebo By the Pool

[Photo By: KPA]

Green Leaf Ethiopia

[Photo By: KPA]

Green Leaf Ethiopia, a landscaping group (both for outdoor and indoor plants) has this beautiful logo, along with a thoughtful message.

Green Leaf is also a clever name, referring to the "greening" of Ethiopia, which is now a major country-wide tree-planting project. And Green Leaf can be a decorative term, as well as a way to combat the several months of seasonal dry weather. 

More green=more rain=more green, and why not beautiful as well.

Vive La National French Fry Day!

How did I miss this!

Vive La French Fry Day was on July 13 (just a day short of Quatorze Juillet)!

This according to Time Out New York. And you could have had Free French Fries!

I was having French Fries, but in Addis, on July 13!

At Bete Maed, here in Kazanchis.

And with ketchup, no less (Quelle Horreur!).

[Photo Sources: Bete Maed Google Photos]

The fries also come with a green chili paste (qariya). 

We have been redeemed.

Quatorze Juillet in Addis

Bonne Fete!

Happy Quatroze Juillet, today.

The French are busy celebrating the July Fourteenth holiday with military parades and fireworks.

It was 8:03am in Paris as I just got my cafe, which was 9:03am in Addis. 

The parade is to start at 11:00am Paris time - still too early. But an early start is a good thing!

I chose a simple cafe au lait in the beautiful Chez Jean-Pierre.

There were roses on the table, I'm sure for the occasion, and the usual 1970s/80s French popular music was a little louder than usual. The small cafe was festive!

There is a photograph of the Arc de Triomphe on the wall behind me, which is where an imporant part of the defile, the military parade, will take place.

I gave the wait staff a short French cultural lesson, which they enjoyed.

Bonne Fete, tout-le-monde!

Summer Grass by Lake Ontario

We are in the middle of dramatic, thundrous, rains, here in Addis Ababa, but in Ontario, it is mid-summer, and with a heat wave.

The photo below is what I took two summers ago, in Port Credit, by Lake Ontario.

The grass is Queen Anne's Lace, which became one of my designs at Well-Patterned.

Summer Grass by Lake Ontario

[Photo By: KPA]

Trillium and Queen Anne's Lace

[Design by KPA]

From Well-Patterned

The Rains, The Semien Escarpments, and The Amhara

Clouds Above the Simien Mountains

[Image Source]

There are brief, thunderous, minutes of downpour, true to the "kiremt" season of rains before the harvest season in September.

There is something majestic about these rains, which today occurred in early dawn.

There might be some later in the early afternoon, which didn't occur yesterday. Perhaps the wind blew them to another location.

I was thinking of the Simien - the Northern - Mountains, and how those many centuries ago, the group that would eventually found Ethiopia, and cultivate its civilization, becoming the Amhara group (now synonymous with Ethiopia), fared traversing those mountains during this thunderous rain, as they came looking for the ideal, God-given place to found their territory.

They chose the highlands, to make sure that no enemy would arrive unexpected. Their escarpments gave them a permanent, and natural, look-out.

And they succeeded.

Hydrangea Bush

Hydrangea Bush

[Photo By: KPA]

Hydrangeas bloom throughout the summer in Canada. They have variations of colors, from the lilac to blue, as in the above bush, to white (and very, very pale green, for the less mature ones).

Their bursts of bubbles are everywhere now.

Happy Fourth of July!

The Fourth of July 1916

By: Frederick Childe Hassam (1859–1935)
Painted: 1916
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 36 in. x 26.13 in.

Place of Light

Bete Birhan

House of Light/Place of Light

[Photo By: KPA]

Landscaping in front of a highrise, an onrdinary highrise, which is given this name.

Happy Canada Day!

Happy Canada Day!  (Yesterday, July 1!) - From Addis Ababa.

I had the right idea. 

Here's a repost (June 30) of my Mississauga Summer post.

Mississauga Summer

[Photo By: KPA]

From around June 2023 - last year!

It is mid-summer in Canada now, and in Mississauga (Ontario), it is Lake Season. Sailers and spectators (and all those in between) relish in these few, short beautiful months of sun.

Here is one photo I took of a sailboat, and its navigator, on Lake Ontario, near Port Credit, Ontario, a short half hour from the City of Mississauga.

Calla Lily

Calla Lily

Zantedeschia aethiopica

[Photo By KPA]

The calla lily is the national flower of Ethiopia, according to this site.