A Web Site For The Young Ethiopian Professional. Volume I   Issue XIl    

 

 

 

 

Exhale

 

 

 

 

 

Not Waiting to Exhale…
By: "Saba"

The radio from the apartment downstairs can faintly be heard from the terrace where I am standing trying to finish my cigarette, much to the horror of the elderly women who are sitting in the living room behind me. I can just imagine the conversation "Yezare set lijoch. Mts mts ."

I turn slightly and see one of them giving me a serious gilmiCHa and a dramatic 'woladite amlak, min aynet mebelasht new' look, all the while shaking her head. It is true what they say about abesha women of a certain age just genetically not being capable of minding their own business. I feel like turning around and blowing smoke rings towards them.

I squinted up at the noon sun as I used my hands to cover my eyes. A warm gust of wind made the cotton of my neTela flutter around me and loosened the delicate wrap I had put around my shoulders. I put the cigarette out and went back into the dragon's den. Ah, if looks could kill, they'd have another leQso on their hands.

They all stop talking and look at me as I take a seat. After about 4 minutes of close inspection, one of them asks me if I was from out of town. My mood was as bright as Alaska in December, so not up to any conversation, I grunt yes and look away. Endet balege hognalehu, I metazeb myself. But only for a fleeting second. Is no one familiar with the chaos theory? I take no responsibility for my actions.

The ladies dismiss my rudeness, turn away, and start chatting on their own. About, what else, how they hate smoking; hate the smell, hate the way smokers have dark and wrinkled lips. What a Qoshasha habit! One of them turns to me and asks me why I smoke.

She says it bitterly, like my smoking was the cause for all the strife in the world. I hesitate for a moment but then decide to let her know why. Well, because I like it. A lot. Watching the curling smoke as I exhale, and the burning tip glow a fiery red during each inhale. The burning sensation of inhaling smoke and nicotine and the coolness of letting it out. It burns, chokes me. I can sense it leaving a nasty charcoal residue in my lungs, but I find inexplicable beauty in it.

They all look up at me. I don't know if they understood the whole tirade, but what a Kodak moment! I was going to continue, but I stop. One of them sucks her teeth and touches her deret. At this point my poor aunt comes into the room and sits by me.

I had crawled out of my Y2K bunker 2 months ago, severely disappointed that the world did survive. There I was, a bitter disillusioned jaded malcontent at large, full of angst, trying to figure out what to do with a dozen boxes of canned beans and how best to disarm the small illegal immigrant militia I had been training in my backyard. My local Ethiopian market doesn't even want to negotiate a refund for the year's supply of beso that I had bought.

Needless to say, I was trying to carry on with 'normal' existence, and enjoying the only new year's gift I got; a picture someone brought back from Addis of an azmari bet that had a "Y2K compliant" sign up. (You never know with those damned digital masinqos.)

The year continued in its screwed up course as 5 people I knew, loved and admired died. All separately. A couple of weeks apart. Ranging from ages of 24 – 89. So try if you will, to understand why I've been letting the fingers do the talking, more than one on a good day, when interacting with other humans. These poor ladies at the leQso caught me at a bad time. Not a good time to be confronted by anyone, on any issue, when I'm dealing with the realities of life and death, the fragility of our world, those around us and our very own existence.

The ladies see as my aunt takes my hands, and one of them asks, 'Lijwot nat ende'? That is all my aunt needed to rattle off my resume. Not much impresses them until she mentions I am an engineer. And then the whole room lights up. Suddenly the women like me. No, they love me. They ask me what I do in detail as a chorus of 'gosh, gosh' hums in the background. For reaction like this, all those sleepless nights in labs and being soul mates with Chinese men who speak 5 words of English and pretty much spending my college days in either libraries or labs…it all seems to have paid off.

Yilugnta be damned, I can do or say the most ridiculous things and it will be chalked up to the eccentricity of a female engineer. In most abesha mothers' eyes, you can't ever really be a bad person if you have an engineering degree, so the world isn't all that bad.

I went back to the balcony to light up another smoke in the "sucking the marrow out of life" tradition of Thoreau.

 

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