🇪🇹  2 DAY STOP IN TRANSIT IN ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA.

Recently, I was privileged to visit Addis Ababa, Ethiopia during a 2 day transit stop on flight to London, England. My flight took off from Abuja Nigeria at 1.10 pm of 24th Movember, 2016 to Addis Ababa by Ethiopian Airlines.
Checking in was quite smooth and staff attitudes at Abuja airport have greatly improved. The whole process of checking in appeared simplified with staff going as far as assisting passengers with filling the necessary documents for boarding.

Immediately we stepped on board I was overwhelmed to notice that we were flying the new modern B787 Dreamliner. It gave me the impression of being big and roomy inside. The neatness and aestheticity of the inner furnishing of the plane impressed on me much.
I flew Economy and the seat arrangements were quite generous with plenty of leg room to stretch oneself and maneuver freely. Spanning three rows of three sits each across the fuselage one feels the freedom of seating within a spacious roomy aircraft and the usual feeling of being sandwiched together completely eliminated. Flight took off at 1.10 pm Nigerian time.

We had such a good and smooth flight all the way. As our Dreamliner landed at Addis Ababa Bole International the cabin staff announced the local time as 1.10 pm. All passengers unanimously shouted in disagreement but I knew she was right in the Ethiopian tradition.

Ethiopians run parallel calendar to the general standard Gregorian Calendar. While the date of our arrival meant 24th Nov 2009 to the Ethiopians, it was in fact 24th November, 2016 in our Gregorian Calendar. Our time of arrival was also meant 1.10 pm local time to the Ethiopians noting that 6.0pm is 12 O'clock by Ethiopian standard thus making 7.0 pm to be 1 O'clock. But the announcer apologized having realized she was running an international flight and our time of arrival should have been announced as 7.10 pm local time.

First impression arrival showed Addis Ababa has grown to be a huge and fast city. The slums that once covered most of the city space of 2 million inhabitants in 1992 is now replaced by modern high rising apartments around which are woven extensive grids of standard roadways on flyover bridges as well as flaunting extensive elevated light rail networks. The city is now twice its former size with almost 5 million inhabitants within its metropolis; the reason for the recent agitation against plan to acquire more right of space to accommodate its fast growing urbanization.
The unprecedented growth of Addis Ababa is easily visible in its road traffic so intense and chaotic. The traffic that confronted me on arrival evidenced unprecedented growth from 1992 characterized by gridlock of traffic holdups across the entire city network. On another hand it's also a reflection of the prosperity the city is currently experiencing, supporting big tourism volume with state of the art infrastructure.
Just Google 'hotels in Addis Ababa' and the whole map of the city would show up with cluster of pinheads on every inch of the city map each representing a modern hotel facility, on the average of 3 to 4 star standard. The high density of modern hotel spaces in the city is evidence of Ethiopia's current popularity as a major tourism destination, and indicative too of peace and prosperity it greatly enjoys.

My guide from Venetian Hotel and Apartment,  Mr. Amanuel Meteke claims Addis now experiences not only influx of the old time European and American aid workers that once turned Ethiopia into their research laborstory but now do so as tourists and includes the Chinese that now form a good proportion of the population of Ethiopia is who come in not only as tourists but also investors in all sectors of the local economy.

The fact that Addis has transformed itself into a modern metropolis and a worthy tourist destination begs no question as this is evidenced in the fast replacement of the old Russian Lada based blue taxis by the modern yellow ' Ze- Lucy" taxis parading side by side in every street. The massive overhead tracks that bisect the busy city carrying slick modern light rail system and connects various districts of Addis also confirms it. There are also multi-lane expressways that criss-cross the city scape as well as a broad multi-lane circular freeway that carries traffic round the entire city.
Despite the congestion and heavy conflicts on the roads I observed no accidents throughout my tour unlike my experiences  on some African city roads for example, and I give credit to the ingenuity of Addis drivers who navigate the congested roadways freely despite high apparent conflicts without hitting each other. I saw glaring evidence of respect for each other thus sharing the roadways with high consideration for one another.

The ability to respect the right of each driver and share the road space with high safety margin is what is never common on streets of most Developing countries. My driver and guide told me that accidents are rare among the drivers because of the high respect they all enjoy from each other.

One aspect I noticed in respect to safety on the roads is the role of the police, in particular their duty consciousness and friendliness towards the driving public and who simply devote their attention to achieving safe driving with smiles on their faces rather than the urge to seek punitive mistakes among drivers. You simply see them but never encounter them in any argument. What a difference with the so- called traffic police of other African cities who are often there to harass drivers.

With just two days' experience around Addis I felt I had enough assessment to claim that Ethiopia is indeed set to lead Africa into tourism, backed by its huge investments in hospitality infrastructure especially the hotel rooms, whose abundance is credited to diaspora investors.

Ethiopia is also blessed with high proportion of skilled population in general and you can readily see that in quality of products in real estate as well as clothing and shoe manufacturing and other consumer goods as well as agricultural products that are locally produced.

I was proud to learn that Dangote a Nigerian who is currently the richest African businessman has industrial free zones to his credit in Ethiopia employing thousands of Ethiopians in cement manufacturing, real estate development, food processing and bottling companies.

Ethiopia is also blessed with curious and humble people that offer first class services to the tourism industry and offers the best tour guides a tourist would always wish to come across.

Ethippia's cool and mild temperate highland climate makes an ideal environment to spend a calm, stress-free time of one's life. So is also the land scape that is serene alpine-like environment with good transportation to support travels at all times, and its aviation metwork is the most efficient on the continent providing easy access to every nook and corner of the mountainous country.

Ethiopia flaunts some unique tourism destinations that are not found anywhere else in Africa South of the Sahara. They have the oldest historic sites of ancient civilization, such as the ancient Obelisks or Stelae and remains of Queen of Sheba's palace as well as The Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion containing the True Ark of the Covenant in Axum, the ancient Temple of Yeha, the Rock Huon Churches in Lalibella,  remains of ancient Palaces in Gondar, etc. that are mark of Africa's fame as the oldest continent on earth. Some historic artifacts are Millenia older than Egypt such as those of 'Lucy' skeletons shown in the picture from among many I had sampled in the National Museum in Addis Ababa.
Culturally Ethipia is the must-visit destination in Africa. Here, ancient legacy in textile technology has produced fabric designs and manufacturing unique to Ethiopia. If you want to see the fashion unique to the Queen of Sheba as well as Egyptian Queens of antiquity then visit Ethiopia. That ancient technology has been modernized these days to produce the finest fabriques that are woven into modern fashion in the finest of cotton fabriques all produced in industries that mimic its ancient root.
Most people believe that Ethiopian history and culture are shaped around Christian orthodox civilization but the country flaunts one of the oldest Moslem communities and culture in the world. Harrar as its Centre of Muslim culture is one of the historic cities that features about the fifth holiest mosque and pilgrimage site of the Islamic faith in the world and a visit to the bazaar city of Harrar would make any visitor wish to come back on and on again.

As I ended my two day stopover in Addis I was indeed unhappy that it was all over, and stood in amazement wondering why an African would love to travel to Dubai, London, New York, Los Angeles, Paris or Tokyo for holiday while such a magnificent marvel of culture and history of their own lies on their door step.

Ethiopia is within reach of every African nation having been linked up to every corner of the continent by its own efficient air network of 'Ethiopian Airlines' and a member of the global Five Star Alliance. As I departed Addis Ababa for London Heathrow I flew out on Ethiopian Airline's brand new A350 XWB, the latest wide body Jumbo Jet by Airbus and currently the first of African Airlines to own such supper modern Jumbo aircraft. Its price is said to be over $400 million.

VANRICHI and Lireal Limited under the banner of its tour brand, Southern Travels and Tours, has planned to focus its current campaign on 'Africa tourism for Africans' initially based on sale of key Ethiopian destinations, as an authentic 'African heritage' travels' and later to be extended to showcase 'Africa tours' to the world.

VANRICHI believes that the future of economic development in Africa lies in tourism and, for African nations to succeed in opening their doors to the world and tap the global market their journey must begin with their own internal effort then the world will follow.

Our corporate entity, VANRICHI and Lireal Ltd will seek Alliance with Ethiopian tour companies, hospitality agencies as well as Ethiopian Airways to promote a tour programme that will launch our 'Tour Ethiopia 2017' project in Nigeria to lead the way towards our grand focus on African countries, that will soon include Gambia, Kenya, South Africa, Morocco and Eghpt, among many others. Already we have launched our effort in this regard with a regular feature on Ethiopian destinations on our blogging site: www.travelafricablog.com.

As I recollect my recent two day stop-over in Addis Ababa by this article it is posted on the site as a motivator highlighting the vibrant social life of the Ethiopians which greatly supports tourism attraction. The hospitality of the people, the vibrant outdoor life that supports and promotes numerous restaurants of both international and traditional outlook colors every street, and their embrace of music and art in general makes every street a theme of a unique and aesthetic cultural outlook. Their unique designs and love for architectural beauty was developed over millennium of self determination and cultural pride and high degree of self integrity. These are a combination of circumstances that make Ethiopia a true land of beauty with unique love for fashion that sustained development of art and culture over centuries that has today become treasure of true African heritage. Very colorful dances driven by unique mosaic rhythms of traditional African music are irresistible sceneries in traditional coffee houses on every Ethiopian street.
At our hotel, the Venetian, in the heart of porch Bole District of the city, we enjoyed a colorful show and award ceremony of fashion competition in stylish cultural hair dressing skills unique to Ethiopia and of African heritage on Saturday 26, the evening before my departure; shown above.

I was made to understand that Addis Ababa  is full of such ceremonies with almost every hotel exhibiting same at weekends to attract attention of visiting tourists. It is also a regular exhibition in various theater houses around the country to entertain the community at social outings. These are some of the popular exhibitions that characterize core entertainments in the city of Addis Ababa.  Sometimes it takes the form of numerous cultural dance groups that feature at restaurants and hotel functionaries.

Leisure trip to Ethiopia is no doubt an ideal stress management therapy for individuals on holidays.