A holiday bookended by pickpockets

(A shorter version of this post, which photos, appeared in my professional blog.  This just adds the story of how the evening ended…)

Have you ever noticed how holidays can be one of the most opaque moments in a new culture?  There’s a big festival coming up, everyone knows it’s soon … but no one can quite explain to you what’s going to happen or even when.  It’s maddening.

I’ve known since I arrived that Meskel, a major holiday commemorating the finding of the True Cross by Queen Elani sixteen hundred years ago, was on the horizon.  But no one could quite tell me when it was going to happen – maybe next Wednesday, no Saturday, no definitely Thursday but anyway all the exciting stuff is on Meskel Eve.  And everything will be closed, or it won’t be,  the buses will be full, or they won’t run at all, and the celebrating will happen just at the churches, or maybe out in the streets.  Everyone is very definite and everyone has a different answer.

Madness.

So of course I’m returning to Addis yesterday when a friend calls to tell me that the big Meskel celebrations have already started so I should hurry downtown as soon as my bus gets in.  Sigh.

As we pulled into town in the misting rain, there was a clear sense of holiday.  On street corners and in any spare space people were selling bundles of sticks, bunches of fresh grass, and big piles of bright yellow Meskel daisies, the traditional tools of celebration.  In the middle of alleyways and squares neighborhoods were erecting cross-topped cones of evergreen boughs to burn in the traditional bonfires.  Elani reportedly followed a column of smoke to the cross, resulting in a holiday that feels like a cross between Christmas, Halloween, and the Fourth of July.

Once free of the bus I headed down to Addis’ main gathering place, the aptly named ‘Meskel Square, where vast crowds were gathered to watch church leaders parade around in their holiday finery, accompanied by hundreds of singing, dancing Sunday school students.

Stuck in the back of the pack, I was wondering how I was going to get a shred of useful audio when fate struck, in the form of an unwary hand.

I had my camera up above my head taking pictures when a young man behind me decided to check out the contents of a fortunately empty jacket pocket.  The guy next to us saw it, grabbed him, started hollering, and dragged us both to the front of the crowd.  I’d packed for pickpockets, with my recording gear latched away in my purse and pockets zippered whenever I put anything in them, so I wasn’t very concerned.  Still, the unfortunate would-be thief was my ticket to a front-row view so I followed along as he was dragged away.  Thanks pickpocket.

Alas, my new vantage point just revealed that most of the fun was going on across the square, far past the line of blue policemen keeping our segment of crowd in order.  I tried waving my press credential around, but was met with little sympathy

I soon learned the front of an Ethiopian crowd is a dangerous place to be.  When people behind them surge forward, those in the unlucky front are driven back by police batons.  My pale shins were spared, but the kids around me probably ended the holiday with a few new bruises.  It definitely dampened the holiday atmosphere.

As I crouched there, it slowly became apparent that the rules were different for ferengi, foreigners, than for locals.  Groups of tourists, and individual whites, started to drift out of the crowd, as if by osmosis, and into the square itself.  The people around me noticed this to, complaining loudly to the police.  I wanted to join them in solidarity; the idea of prioritizing tourists over locals just feels so unfair, and more than a bit racist.  But I also had a job to do.  So when I got the nod, I crept guiltily out onto the open asphalt.  Part of what I love about being a reporter is getting to go behind the scenes, into the places ordinary observers can’t, but when it’s not my profession but my nationality that gets me there?  That feels more than a bit icky.

My qualms were quickly forgotten though as I stuck my mic into dancing circles of Sunday school students and interviewed giddy crowd members about the meaning of Meskel.  When they lit the giant bonfire, I was there to catch the crackle and roar.  There’s such a high in hearing interesting sounds and knowing you’ve got them saved for whatever future use you can find for them.

Now it’s no surprise to anyone that holidays which happen after dark, especially ones which involve fire, tend to bring out a wild element.  And sure enough, at some point during the blaze, the barricades came down and the white-clad students gave away to riotous bunches of young men.  They were also singing and jumping, but the vibe was now more mosh-pit than praise circle.  I figured it was time for me to go.

It was at that moment, in the jumping and running, that a guy knocked my shoulder and appeared to become briefly tangled in the side of my anorak, the side with the pocket where moments before I’d foolishly stuffed my camera and forgotten to zip.  I think someone around me shouted ‘Camera! Camera!’  Or maybe it was just my lizard brain hollering.  Maybe someone grabbed the thief or maybe he just found the crowd too thick for an easy getaway.  At this point things were getting blurry with urgency.  I remember having the front of his T-shirt crushed in my fist and I think I swung him around a bit.  I know I was shouting at top volume, more furious at the possibility of losing four days of work photos than for fear of the camera itself.  He was so surprised it was easy to pry it out of his hands.  Some little voice in the back of my head, the one that usually prevents instinctive action, wondered if this was indeed my camera.  What if I was mugging this guy?  Its protest was drowned out by the blood in my ears.

I have over twenty years of martial arts training, but I’ve really never had to use any of it.  I’ve always wondered if, in a bad situation, that knowledge would rush to the fore, or if I’d be paralyze and lose the moment.  This was hardly a case of physical jeopardy, but I was so excited by my instant response and the galvanizing anger flooding my veins, that I wanted to shout with pride.

And then it was over.  I let go, the thief disappeared, and all around me was a circle of very concerned people offering to take me to the police and help me find the thief.

I should say that this helpful crowd, not the snatcher, is so much more my experience of Ethiopia.  For all my complaints about Idle Young Men, the vast majority of the people I’ve met – of all ages and both genders – have been kind, helpful, and almost pathologically concerned that I have a good experience in their country.  Addis, as an African city, is a world away from the things you hear about Nairobi or Johannesburg.  There are pickpockets in every crowd the world over, and even in that short tussle with the thief I never had a moment’s fear for my physical safety.

I had no interest in trying to catch the thief, his face was just a blur in my mind.  So I assigned one concerned young man to walk me to the edge of the crowd and play lookout as I stuffed my recording kit and camera away securely in my bag, and then made my way home.

My legs were jellied adrenaline as I flew up the streets with the departing revelers, poking my tongue against a sore lip (apparently the thief and I bumped more than I’d realized), and giddy with aggressive triumph at my short battle.  Every person who asked “How are you finding ziz holiday?” got a hollered answer back, “Betam tiruh!”  Very good.

Advertisement