In Ethiopia, maintaining beauty amid scarcity

Ethiopian women and girls filled 40-pound water jugs to carry home.
Click here for more sights from the nation's southern region by
photographer Eva-Lotta Jansson and text by Anna Kramer, both of Oxfam America.

Cambridge resident Anna Kramer is a writer and blogger for the international nongovernmental organization Oxfam America.

By Anna Kramer

"So, did you see a lot of starving people?" a friend asked me after I returned from my first-ever trip to Africa. I'd just spent two weeks traveling in southern Ethiopia with Oxfam America colleagues, gathering stories about how people are coping with persistent drought.

I flinched a little at his words, even though I understood the reasoning behind the question. For many Americans, Ethiopia conjures images of the famine that made world headlines 25 years ago this month: “We Are the World,” hungry children, and for many of us, the first, early sense that we lived a life of relative privilege.

Maybe that's why I felt a little nervous about this trip. Packing up the gear recommended by my more seasoned colleagues -- mosquito net, malaria pills -- I braced myself for a difficult journey.
But the truth of a place is nothing like you imagine it.

When people ask me about Ethiopia, I tell them I never expected it to be so beautiful. I never expected to fall in love with the long sunsets, the red-dust-tinged landscape, the smoke-scented air, the night sky crowded with stars. I never expected to meet such amazing people, either: resilient, passionate, brilliant, and dedicated.

Yes, I saw poverty -- and water scarcity -- unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. And, truth be told, I found myself missing hot showers and reliable Internet access. But I also saw a lake of black salt and newly cleared pasture land. I saw the beauty of a house painted in colors of clay, the strength of a young girl lugging a heavy plastic water jug, and the joy of men singing as they pulled buckets from a well.

And, more than any images of hardship, those are the sights that will stay with me for a long time to come.

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