U2!

"The secret is in yourself
The secret is in your pain "

That's the answer, to THE QUESTION in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. They invented Earth to find the answer from ... drum roll .... U2!

I went to their concert in E Rutherford today. Wow! My favorite part was, of course, when the background was lighted with green drapes, with red maps of Africa in the middle, foreground drapes with flashing flags of mostly countries in Africa, and some in Asia and others. Bono said a few words about Africa. There must have been exactly 4 black people in the entire place :) But ah, it was some good music, and some good inspiring words. What can I say - One!

The elections! Things have gotten more confusing with the opposition also claiming to have won. Or at least predicting that they will win. Initially we thought EPRDF was claiming a landslide win because the news was flooded by the oppositions victory in the urban areas. The opposition gets the cities, EPRDF gets rural areas. It sounded like a believable deal, a balancing act. The EU slammed EPRDF for announcing unconfirmed wins too early. The opposition whined. But we actually believed that EPRDF was winning. That was Tuesday.

Come Wednesday morning, EST, the opposition claims victory. Ok. Be careful what you wish, for it may come true. I can easily applaud damaging EPRDF's control of the parliament. I cannot, however, wish for a sweeping win by the opposition. It's a bit too early. Meles and company fought a bit too hard, too long to give it up so quickly. The opposition winning in the polls is almost asking for some sort of violence. I'd like to think that Meles would probably go for it and hand over the government. He has a reputation to upkeep. Plus he does have traits of a decent guy ... sometimes. But he's surrounded by trigger happy, short sighted, power loving ... idiots, for most part. Who's to say they'll consider life after a loss.

It's getting frustrating to read Ethiopian news. Lots of conspiracy theories flying around. Some are so outrageous, it's amazing to see adults considering them news worthy. I guess nothing official has come out yet, so some people will hang on to whatever is available.

Western Media

Western media is hungry for misery in Africa. I've been watching the progression of news development in Africa and their lack of interest in Ethiopia is disturbing. New York Times is yet to acknowledge that any elections are happening in Ethiopia at all. BBC finally put the statement from the ruling party claiming that they've a landslide victory on the front of their Africa news page. The whole of yesterday they had some horrid news about some gunmen and government officials being taken to court. On CNN you have to dig in some 10 pages before you find anything on Ethiopia.

Look, I understand. It could be that Ethiopia is a useless country, as far as the needs of the West are concerned. But again, considering it has the 3rd highest population in Africa, and is the core of stability in Eastern Africa, one would think that these so called journalists would show face to throw in a few miserly comments.

Perhaps I'm complaining in vain. It's so hard to troubleshoot the perspective of the west anyway. They've been hanging on to every word of the observers, telling us that the elections have been fair. I just read unconfirmed reports from Ethiopia saying that the observers are being fickle. One man mentioned that Jimmy Carter showed up at his station for 5 minutes. The Ethiopians' reaction to them was, "iyetazebachihun new? iNam iyetazebnachu new." Playing ...sem'na worq on election day, I guess :)

I guess this will be a blog for random things Ethiopian, African, and American. In that order.