Search Results for 'ethiopian'

The Classical Theatre of Harlem Presents the Lost Ethiopian Epic Memnon

The Classical Theatre of Harlem brings the mythical Ethiopian hero Memnon to life on stage at Marcus Garvey Park, reimagining an ancient epic with a modern Harlem lens. Performances run July 5–27, 2025. (Photos: Courtesy of CTHNYC)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: June 20th, 2025

New York (TADIAS) – This summer, Harlem’s Marcus Garvey Park becomes the stage for an epic rarely told in Greek mythology: the story of Memnon, the mythical Ethiopian king who rode to Troy’s defense during the Trojan War. Presented by the Classical Theatre of Harlem as part of its annual Uptown Shakespeare in the Park series, the play runs from July 5th through 27th at the Richard Rodgers Amphitheater. Performances are free to the public.

Written by award-winning playwright Will Power and directed by the Classical Theatre of Harlem’s Artistic Director Carl Cofield, Memnon reimagines a nearly forgotten chapter of classical mythology—one rooted in the ancient Greek epic Aethiopis, a lost continuation of Homer’s Iliad.

Scholars have long debated the historical and symbolic significance of Memnon. While often overshadowed by Greco-Roman figures, his presence in mythic texts, ancient art, and historical commentary points to a long-standing cultural acknowledgment of Ethiopian—and by extension, African—agency within the classical imagination.

Memnon tells the story of a king of “Aethiopia”—a term used by the ancient Greeks to describe Africans in general, south of Egypt. The production reimagines this origin story by centering an Ethiopian hero within the Trojan War saga. Set in Harlem, it draws added resonance from the neighborhood’s deep connections to the Diaspora and its legacy as a center of Black culture.

A Hero from Africa

In Greek mythology, Memnon was the son of Eos, the goddess of dawn, and Tithonus, a Trojan prince. Leading an army of Aethiopians, Memnon arrives in Troy following the death of Hector, offering both military might and moral leadership. Known for his valor, humility, and sense of justice, Memnon’s legend parallels—and ultimately collides with—that of Achilles.

Their fateful duel, described in the ancient Posthomerica and visually immortalized in classical vase paintings, ends in Memnon’s death. But the gods, moved by his mother’s grief, grant him immortality—a divine recognition of his nobility and sacrifice.

In this 21st-century retelling, Power’s script combines rhythmic verse, original choreography by Tiffany Rea-Fisher, and live music to deliver a dynamic theatrical experience. The production marks the East Coast premiere of Memnon, which made its debut at the Getty Villa in California last summer to strong acclaim.

A Myth for Our Time

As global audiences reassess the stories that shape civilization, Memnon prompts reflection on who is remembered—and why. The Ethiopian king’s journey from near obscurity in classical curricula to center stage in Harlem highlights the power of art to recover overlooked histories and inspire new conversations about the past and present.


If You Go:
Memnon runs July 5–27, 2025
Marcus Garvey Park, Harlem,
Free admission | Performances Tues–Sun, 8:30 PM (Fridays at 9 PM)
Preshow events on select evenings at 7 PM
Learn more at www.cthnyc.org

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Happy Fasika: DSK Mariam and the Ethiopian Church in D.C. Mark a Generational Milestone

Founded in Washington, D.C. in 1987, Re’ese Adbarat Debre Selam Kidist Mariam—lovingly known as DSK Mariam—now welcomes over 4,000 congregants each week, making it one of the oldest and most vibrant Ethiopian Orthodox churches in the U.S. (AP photo)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: April 19, 2025

New York (TADIAS) — This Fasika weekend, we join the vibrant community at Re’ese Adbarat Debre Selam Kidist Mariam—known lovingly as DSK Mariam—in celebrating not only the holiday, but the remarkable rise of one of the oldest Ethiopian Orthodox churches in the United States. Founded in 1987 in Washington, D.C., DSK Mariam now serves over 4,000 congregants weekly, many of them second- and third-generation Ethiopian Americans raised in the capital region—the heart of the diaspora.

As the community marks 50 years since the first major wave of Ethiopian migration to the U.S., places like DSK Mariam—and similar places of worship across the country and around the world—stand as living archives of faith, language, and belonging. The netela-draped elders, midnight chants in Ge’ez, and children lighting candles beside their parents reflect not only sacred tradition, but a cultural home carried across oceans and generations.

Adapted from a recent AP story by Luis Andres Henao, this Easter reflection spotlights DSK Mariam not simply as a spiritual space, but as a cultural cornerstone—one that continues to evolve, embrace young voices, and preserve an ancient faith in a modern diaspora.


(AP Photos)

For many, DSK Mariam is more than a place of worship. From midnight Tinsae services that stretch until midday, to sermons offered in both Amharic and English, the church reflects a community that honors the old while welcoming the new.

“The Ethiopian Orthodox Church has so many beautiful rituals and services,” said Kannazegelila Mezgebu, a 21-year-old senior at Morgan State University. “It really feels like home.”

Young leaders like Beza Bililigne, who serves in the church, are actively helping preserve the depth and symbolism of the tradition—from the netela symbolizing purity, to the censer’s incense representing the Virgin Mary, to the ancient practice of memorizing prayers as a form of spiritual continuity. “As long as the person is alive, the traditions will stay alive,” he shared.

In a city where the Ethiopian American population plays a vital role in civic, cultural, and economic life, churches like DSK Mariam offer grounding—a sacred space where the diaspora renews both its spiritual and cultural identity. It’s a living reminder that the roots of Ethiopian Orthodoxy run deep—even thousands of miles from Lalibela or Addis Ababa—and continue to blossom in the heart of the diaspora.


Editor’s Note:
This article was adapted from a recent AP story by Luis Andres Henao. You can read the original article on the Associated Press website here.

Wishing our readers a peaceful and joyous Fasika weekend.

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Tadesse Mesfin and Ethiopian Modernism: Bridging Tradition and Innovation

Tadesse Mesfin, Pillars of Life: Guleet VI (2021) and Nibbles (2024). Oil on canvas. © Tadesse Mesfin, Courtesy of the Artist and Addis Fine Art.

Tadias Magazine

Publisher’s Note:

At Tadias, we take pride in highlighting the artistic contributions of Ethiopian visionaries who have not only shaped the cultural landscape in Ethiopia but have also made lasting impressions on the global stage. In this exclusive piece, Alemayehu F. Weldemariam, Managing Editor of Africa Today at Indiana University, Bloomington, offers an insightful exploration of the life and work of Tadesse Mesfin—one of Ethiopia’s most distinguished modernist painters.

Tadesse Mesfin’s career, spanning more than five decades, reflects a rare synthesis of tradition and innovation, mentorship and mastery. As a professor at the Addis Ababa University Alle School of Fine Arts and Design, he has played a pivotal role in shaping generations of Ethiopian artists. His unique aesthetic, influenced by both Ethiopian artistic heritage and his academic studies abroad, has resulted in a visual language that is distinctly his own—one that honors the resilience and dignity of Ethiopian women, a central theme in his acclaimed Pillars of Life and Column of Rhythm series, which he describes as his way of paying homage to them.

Through this article, Weldemariam eloquently captures Mesfin’s enduring impact on Ethiopian modernism. The artist’s celebrated Pillars of Life series stands as a testament to his ability to elevate everyday subjects to the realm of the monumental, ensuring their place in the broader narrative of contemporary African art.

We invite our readers to explore this in-depth analysis of Tadesse Mesfin’s artistic journey and to appreciate the ways in which his work bridges past and present, local and global, realism and abstraction. His story is a reminder that art, at its best, serves as both a mirror of society and a beacon for the future.”

— Liben Eabisa, Publisher, Tadias Magazine

Tadesse Mesfin and Ethiopian Modernism: Bridging Tradition and Innovation

By Alemayehu F. Weldemariam, Indiana University, Bloomington

Updated: June 1st, 2025

TADIAS – Tadesse Mesfin (b. 1953, Woldiya, Ethiopia) is one of the most distinguished figures in Ethiopian modernist painting. His career, spanning more than five decades, has not only enriched Ethiopian visual culture but has also left an indelible mark on generations of artists through his teaching at the Addis Ababa University Alle School of Fine Arts and Design. As both a painter and an educator, Mesfin embodies a dual legacy—one that has shaped the artistic direction of Ethiopian modernism and another that has mentored pioneering Ethiopian painters, including Addis Gezehagn, Ermias Kifleyesus, Fikru Gebremariam, Merikokeb Berhanu, and Tesfaye Urgessa.

Mesfin’s early studies at the Alle School of Fine Arts and Design placed him under the mentorship of Gebre Kristos Desta, the venerated Ethiopian modernist whose synthesis of European abstraction and Ethiopian iconography profoundly influenced Mesfin’s aesthetic trajectory. During this formative period, Mesfin also engaged with Skunder Boghossian’s innovative use of parchment scrolls, a technique that significantly impacted Ethiopian modernism (Giorgis 2019, 162). His artistic journey was ultimately shaped by two pivotal educational experiences that bridged Ethiopian modernism and Soviet-era Russian academic training.

Expanding his artistic foundations, Tadesse Mesfin pursued advanced training at the Soviet Union’s Leningrad Academy of Painting, Architecture, and Sculpture (now the Repin Institute of Arts), where he earned his MFA in painting. For Mesfin, his studies in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) marked the realization of a long-held artistic aspiration—a rare opportunity to immerse himself in the works of Vasily Surikov and Ilya Repin, two of the most formidable figures in Russian academic realism. Renowned for their monumental historical compositions, Surikov and Repin fused technical precision with narrative complexity, capturing the struggles, resilience, and collective experiences of ordinary people. Their ability to render history with emotive immediacy and psychological depth left an indelible impression on Mesfin, shaping his understanding of the artist’s social and moral responsibilities.

Immersed in both Russian academic realism and modernist abstraction, Mesfin refined his technical mastery while deepening his engagement with form and structure. Upon his return to Ethiopia in 1984, he embarked on a long and influential tenure as a professor at the Alle School of Fine Arts and Design, where he played a critical role in shaping subsequent generations of Ethiopian artists.

Mesfin’s artistic trajectory is deeply intertwined with Ethiopia’s shifting political and ideological landscape, particularly under the Derg regime. As Elizabeth W. Giorgis (2019, 209) notes, he and his contemporary Esseye Gebremedhin experienced firsthand the constraints imposed on artistic expression by a government that sought to align art with its revolutionary ideology. Works that failed to reflect the state’s ideological commitment were rejected.

During the height of repression from 1978 to 1991, Mesfin and his contemporaries, including Gebremedhin, developed two distinct bodies of work: official propaganda art that conformed to the government’s expectations and private studio works that remained outside state control (Giorgis 2019, 210). This duality reflects the broader tension between state control and artistic autonomy, as artists outwardly complied with the demands of the regime while privately exploring themes beyond the revolutionary aesthetic. However, much of this personal work has been lost to time and political upheaval, leaving an incomplete record of their artistic resistance. Despite the constraints imposed during the Derg era, Mesfin’s artistic legacy transcends official commissions and ideological restrictions. His later artworks, particularly the Pillars of Life and the Column of Rythm series, reflect a profound return to his deeper artistic concerns—celebrating the resilience and dignity of Ethiopian women in market spaces, a subject he describes as “his way of paying homage to Ethiopian women.”

Tadesse Mesfin emphasizes that an artist is always making choices, unlike a camera that indiscriminately captures everything in a scene. Rather than passively recording, an artist carefully selects figures, poses, and compositions to create a powerful and intentional image. He points to Ethiopian open-air market areas like the Mercato as an example of constant motion, where nothing remains still. Goods are always arriving, and people move energetically through space. The environment is filled with vibrant colors, fine lines, and intricate textures. According to Tadesse Mesfin, capturing not just the visual details but also the energy and essence of such a place in a painting can make it truly impactful.

Mesfin’s sustained engagement with the female figure reflects both an artistic preoccupation and a conceptual framework through which he explores form, movement, and expression. He articulates this fascination, stating: “The whole history of art is the history of the human figure because it's the most dynamic nature—you know, the feet, the hands, the facial expression, everything is an endless expression. The figure never ends.” For Mesfin, the female body in particular serves as a solution to the problem of plasticity in art, offering a richness of gesture, rhythm, and structural composition that allows for infinite exploration. His work does not merely depict the female form but rather elevates it as a fundamental element of artistic inquiry, bridging representation and abstraction while paying homage to the resilience and presence of Ethiopian women.

Distinct Visual Language and Cultural Continuity

Tadesse Mesfin’s mature work reflects a profound synthesis of figuration, abstraction, and Ethiopian visual traditions, establishing a distinctive language that bridges cultural heritage and modernist innovation. His celebrated Pillars of Life series, arguably his most defining body of work, delves into themes of womanhood, labor, and resilience, focusing particularly on market women—small-holder vendors whose essential yet often overlooked presence forms the backbone of Ethiopian urban life. Rendered with elongated, graceful forms, these figures defy gravity, evoking an architectural rhythm reminiscent of Ethiopian church pillars and ancient stelae. This deliberate distortion of form and perspective is informed by both the Ethiopian iconographic tradition—which consciously rejects Western linear perspective—and the modernist experiments of artists like Amedeo Modigliani and Diego Rivera. Yet, Mesfin’s aesthetic vision remains unmistakably Ethiopian, deeply embedded in local aesthetics, cultural symbols, and a rich artistic lineage.

A particularly distinctive aspect of Mesfin’s approach is his integration of Amharic script into his figurative compositions, a practice rooted in Ethiopia’s modernist traditions. His figures, rendered with rhythmic linearity, often evoke the fluid contours of Amharic letters—a deliberate fusion of language and form that underscores the interplay between visual art and textual expression. This calligraphic abstraction transforms the human figure into a poetic inscription of cultural identity. As Mesfin himself states: “The figures are the most important aspect of my work because of this—they are distinctly Ethiopian in every way. They are my alphabet and my language, and I will continue to master them in my paintings.”

Mesfin’s painterly technique combines loosely defined brushstrokes with refined compositions that preserve the dignity and expressiveness of his subjects. His color palette, inspired by the Ethiopian landscape and traditional textiles, oscillates between earthy ochres, deep siennas, vivid blues, and vibrant greens. These hues are not merely aesthetic choices but symbolic emblems of history, resilience, and cultural continuity, anchoring his compositions within a specific narrative while elevating them to a universal plane.

His backgrounds, often distilled into abstracted color fields, create an atmosphere of timelessness, suspending his figures in an ambiguous, meditative space. This flattening of depth echoes Ethiopian church murals, where spatial hierarchy is dictated not by perspective but by symbolic importance. In Mesfin’s paintings, the market women are not confined within conventional settings; rather, they hover between presence and monumentality, embodying an eternal, almost mythic quality.

At the heart of Mesfin’s artistic vision lies a commitment to cultural preservation, a reverence for tradition amid the pressures of globalization and modernity. His paintings function as visual archives, chronicling the lives of Ethiopian market women not merely as subjects of observation but as the economic and social pillars of their communities. By rendering these women on a monumental scale, he reclaims their visibility and affirms their dignity, positioning them as symbols of resilience and continuity.

This thematic dedication to cultural preservation was profoundly shaped by Mesfin’s travels across Southern and Eastern Ethiopia following his return from Russia in 1984. Immersing himself in the region’s vibrant market culture, he encountered women adorned in bright colors, selling agricultural produce in bustling town squares that also functioned as social hubs—spaces where stories were shared, friendships rekindled, and communal ties reinforced. The multisensory vibrancy of these markets left a deep impression on him, compelling him to translate these experiences into his paintings.

Mesfin’s artistic inquiry extended beyond observational studies; his participation in the People- People Cultural World Tour organized by the Derg, during which he conducted research on textile traditions, traditional attire, and indigenous artistic practices, further enriched his ethnographic sensibility. This immersion sharpened his approach to representation, transforming his work into a powerful meditation on the endurance and cultural significance of Ethiopian women.

His thematic focus places him in dialogue with global modernists who have dignified everyday laborers—whether in Rivera’s heroic murals of Mexican workers or Alice Neel’s psychologically astute portraits of working-class individuals. Yet, while Rivera’s murals are charged with political rhetoric and Neel’s portraits delve into psychological introspection, Mesfin’s approach is one of quiet reverence. His work asserts presence itself as a form of resistance, celebrating the strength and cultural continuity of Ethiopian women within a rapidly changing world. Through this nuanced visual language, Mesfin affirms the capacity of art to reclaim cultural memory, transforming the ordinary into the monumental.


Tadesse Mesfin, Column of Rhythm II (2022) and Column of Rhythm VII (2022). Oil on canvas. Column of Rhythm II: 76 3⁄4 x 44 7⁄8 in. (195.00 x 114.00 cm); Column of Rhythm VII: 57 1⁄2 x 44 7⁄8 in. (146.00 x 114.00 cm). © Tadesse Mesfin, Courtesy of the Artist and Addis Fine Art.

Tadesse Mesfin’s Column of Rhythm II exemplifies his masterful approach to figurative composition, transforming scenes of everyday life into profound meditations on dignity, resilience, and communal identity. The painting’s central figures—three women standing in quiet, contemplative poses—exude a monumental grace reminiscent of classical portraiture, yet their simplified, elongated forms resonate with the modernist tendency to strip away the superfluous in pursuit of essential truths. Against a warm, ochre backdrop rendered in softly blurred abstraction, the women emerge as pillars of strength, their bodies delicately shaded to suggest both volume and vulnerability without succumbing to harsh contrast. Their colorful attire—muted reds, blues, pinks, and greens offers a striking yet harmonious counterpoint to the earthy tones enveloping them, evoking both the vibrancy of cultural identity and the enduring beauty of simplicity. Mesfin’s treatment of the background, dissolving into a haze of gentle ambiguity, serves to intensify the presence of the figures, positioning them as timeless embodiments of solidarity and grace. While the clay pots at their feet allude to domestic labor, their assured, upright posture transcends the quotidian, elevating them to the status of cultural icons. This synthesis of the everyday and the eternal reflects Mesfin’s broader thematic preoccupation with female empowerment—an aesthetic homage to the strength and elegance of Ethiopian women that echoes both modernist ideals and indigenous visual traditions. In Column of Rhythm II, Mesfin reimagines ordinary figures as majestic columns of endurance and beauty, capturing not only the physical presence of his subjects but the ineffable rhythm of their shared existence.

Tadesse Mesfin’s Column of Rhythm VII is a compelling testament to his ability to transform scenes of ordinary sociality into works of profound aesthetic and cultural resonance. The painting presents a group of women arranged in a seemingly casual yet meticulously balanced composition, their interlocking postures and expressions conveying a subtle dynamism within stillness. The artist’s preference for elongated, simplified forms lends the figures a statuesque quality, emphasizing their presence as pillars of strength and unity against a richly textured, abstracted background. This background, composed of layered blocks of cool blues, greens, and earthy browns, dissolves into an atmospheric haze that simultaneously hints at both urban complexity and pastoral tranquility.

Mesfin’s mastery of color is particularly striking here, as he juxtaposes the women’s muted yet vivid attire yellows, blues, whites, and dark hues—against the diffused, mosaic-like backdrop. The careful modulation of light and shadow imbues the figures with a soft, almost ethereal glow, their skin tones harmonizing with the surrounding environment while remaining distinctly vibrant. The expressions of the women range from calm confidence to contemplative seriousness, suggesting a narrative of collective resilience and quiet defiance.

This work continues Mesfin’s ongoing exploration of female empowerment, portraying Ethiopian women as the embodiment of grace, strength, and cultural continuity. The prominence of their figures against the fragmented background speaks to their enduring significance amid societal changes and disruptions. Moreover, the subtle variations in posture and gaze evoke a communal dialogue, a shared yet unspoken understanding that transcends the individual.

In Column of Rhythm VII, Mesfin transcends mere representation to capture something deeper—an assertion of dignity and presence that elevates the everyday to the realm of the timeless. The painting is not only a celebration of the beauty and resilience of Ethiopian women but also a testament to the artist’s ability to distill universal themes from the particularities of local experience.


Left: Tadesse Mesfin, Column of Rhythm VIII, 2022 Oil on canvas, 57 1⁄2 x 44 7⁄8 in. (146.00 x 114.00 cm). Right: Tadesse Mesfin, Nibbles, 2024 Oil on canvas, 70 7⁄8 x 47 1⁄4 in. (180.00 x 120.00 cm) © Tadesse Mesfin, Courtesy of the Artist and Addis Fine Art.

Tadesse Mesfin’s Column of Rhythm VIII continues his eloquent visual meditation on female solidarity, dignity, and cultural resilience. The painting features a striking composition of women seated in calm, deliberate postures, their bodies arranged with an effortless symmetry that evokes both unity and individuality. At the center, a woman with a red headscarf gazes directly at the viewer, her expression a blend of quiet strength and gentle defiance, suggesting leadership or a protective presence within the group. The figures' elongated forms, a hallmark of Mesfin’s style, are rendered with a sculptural solidity that simultaneously conveys grace and steadfastness. Their minimalist attire—white, red, green—contrasts subtly against the deep, earthy tones of the background, which dissolves into a mosaic of abstracted faces and figures, hinting at a broader social context or perhaps the weight of collective memory. Mesfin’s sophisticated use of color, light, and shadow imbues the figures with a luminous presence, elevating them beyond mere representation to symbols of resilience and communal identity. The subtle interplay of gazes and gestures between the women evokes a dialogue of mutual understanding and shared purpose, their serenity suggesting an unyielding inner strength despite the complexities hinted at by the fragmented, textured backdrop. Once again, Mesfin transforms the ordinary into the monumental, creating a visual symphony that asserts the centrality of Ethiopian women as pillars of cultural continuity and emotional fortitude in an ever shifting world.

Tadesse Mesfin’s Nibbles (2024), an oil on canvas masterpiece measuring 70 7⁄8 x 47 1⁄4 inches (180 x 120 cm), captures his refined ability to monumentalize the ordinary with a painterly elegance that radiates both warmth and dignity. Set against a luminous ochre background reminiscent of sunlit village squares or vibrant marketplaces, three women stand in graceful conversation, their elongated figures rendered with the sculptural precision that has become Mesfin’s signature. Their postures, subtly varied yet harmoniously balanced, convey both individuality and collective strength, as if embodying a quiet resilience cultivated through communal ties and labor. The artist’s palette, composed of muted pinks, blues, yellows, and whites, interacts beautifully with the sun-soaked environment, suggesting the timeless vitality of daily life. The bowls they carry—offered with calm determination symbolize both sustenance and labor, hinting at themes of nourishment, exchange, and social interconnectedness. Mesfin’s sensitive treatment of light and shadow lends the figures a serene, almost ethereal quality, their composed expressions exuding a dignified authority rooted in shared experience and cultural continuity. By elevating the everyday ritual of offering and exchange to the level of artistic grandeur, Mesfin continues his celebration of Ethiopian women as pillars of strength and beauty, affirming their central place within both their immediate communities and the broader cultural landscape. Nibbles is a testament to Mesfin’s mastery of form and color, as well as his profound empathy for his subjects, rendered with a sensitivity that transcends the canvas and speaks directly to the human condition.

Tadesse Mesfin’s Pillars of Life: Guleet VI (2021), featured on the cover, epitomizes his masterful ability to infuse the everyday with a sense of timeless grandeur. Rendered with his signature elongated forms, the painting presents three women aligned vertically, their serene postures and contemplative expressions conveying both individual grace and collective resilience. The figures’ elegant simplicity is enhanced by Mesfin’s exquisite handling of color, shadow, and light, lending them a luminous presence against a minimalistic, almost ethereal background of soft beiges, whites, and faint blues. This understated backdrop serves not only to emphasize the figures’ solidity and grace but also to suggest a delicate tension between presence and absence, permanence and change. The subtle, abstracted forms scattered at their feet possibly stones or earthen structures—hint at themes of cultural continuity, groundedness, and rootedness. Mesfin’s choice of palette and composition draws the viewer’s attention to the calm strength of the women, who appear both part of and distinct from the landscape they inhabit. The vertical arrangement of their bodies evokes both unity and hierarchy, transforming them into pillars of life and cultural resilience. Once again, Mesfin demonstrates his ability to elevate ordinary moments into visual poetry, presenting Ethiopian women as embodiments of grace, strength, and endurance standing gracefully against the inevitable currents of time and circumstance. Pillars of Life: Guleet VI confirms Mesfin’s place as a leading voice in contemporary African art, his work serving as both a celebration of beauty and a meditation on the profound cultural significance of everyday life.

Legacy and Global Recognition

Tadesse Mesfin’s impact on Ethiopian art extends far beyond his own masterful compositions. As a revered teacher at the Alle School of Fine Arts and Design (1984–2019), he has mentored generations of Ethiopian artists, most notably Fikru Gebremariam, one of the country’s most celebrated contemporary painters. Under Mesfin’s guidance, Gebremariam developed his own distinct visual language while drawing from the foundational skills imparted by his mentor.

In Gebremariam’s words: “Tadesse Mesfin became my teacher, mentor, guiding light, a friend, and source of inspiration since I met him while I was a third-year student at the Addis Ababa School of Fine Arts. Through his guidance, as an artist, not only did I internalize the subjects taught but was also able to develop essential life skills.”

The late Donald Levine, a renowned sociologist and Ethiopianist from the University of Chicago, aptly described Gebremariam’s art as a masterful blend of geometric abstraction and Ethiopian visual traditions, enriched by Mesfin’s teachings. Levine noted that Gebremariam’s paintings convey “a blend of rich hues, emotional intensity, immediacy of impact, and a touch of austerity… hints of Ethiopian miniatures and church paintings, imbued with African earth tones, incorporating the vibrant garments of Harari women, and capturing the somber mood of much Ethiopian life.” Levine’s observations underscore Mesfin’s enduring influence, not only in imparting technical skill but in nurturing an artistic vision rooted in Ethiopian cultural identity. Mesfin’s pedagogical approach has been one of guiding rather than imposing, allowing his students to cultivate their own artistic voices while remaining deeply connected to Ethiopian traditions. This capacity to foster individuality within a cultural framework remains one of his most significant contributions to Ethiopian modernism. Artists such as Addis Gezehagn, Ermias Kifleyesus, and Tesfaye Urgessa also owe aspects of their artistic evolution to Mesfin’s mentorship, carrying forward his synthesis of heritage and modernist experimentation.

For much of his career, Mesfin’s influence was most keenly felt within Ethiopian artistic circles, where he was revered as both an artist and a mentor. However, his international recognition remained limited until his association with Rakeb Sile and Mesai Haileleul’s Addis Fine Art, which introduced his work to the global art market. Mesfin’s words poignantly capture the historical isolation of Ethiopian modernists: “We weren’t introduced to the outside world when they arrived because we were simply locked up in Addis. Nobody knew us except each other. But I think they have given us a chance to enter the mainstream—or whatever they call it—to connect with the outside world.”

This partnership with Addis Fine Art marked a transformative moment in Mesfin’s career, facilitating his participation in prestigious platforms such as Artsy and renowned art fairs like Art Dubai and the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair. His solo exhibitions, including Where We Coalesce (2024) at Addis Fine Art in Addis Ababa and Vigo Gallery in London, and Column of Rhythm (2022) at Addis Fine Art in London, have been pivotal in establishing his international reputation. Through these exhibitions, Mesfin’s paintings—rooted in Ethiopian cultural narratives yet resonant with universal themes of resilience, dignity, and communal identity—have reached audiences far beyond national borders. Mesfin’s legacy now stands firmly on both national and international stages. His work, once confined to Ethiopian artistic circles, has become a vital contribution to modernist discourse worldwide. As a painter, he has expanded the formal and conceptual possibilities of Ethiopian modernism, while as a mentor, he has ensured the continuity and evolution of the country’s artistic traditions. His ability to distill complex cultural narratives into simple yet profound forms marks him as one of the most significant voices in contemporary African art.

In a rapidly changing world where traditional identities are increasingly under threat, Mesfin’s art serves as both a monument and a meditation—a testament to the quiet dignity of ordinary figures whose presence resonates with the strength of history and beauty. Through his lens, Ethiopian women are not merely subjects; they are symbols of endurance, cultural memory, and grace—pillars of life in every sense of the word.

About the Author:

Alemayehu (Alex) Weldemariam is the Managing Editor of Africa Today, a leading journal at Indiana University that focuses on African studies and contemporary issues. He also serves as the Assistant Editor for the IACL-AIDC Blog and is a Fellow at the Center for Constitutional Democracy at the Maurer School of Law. With extensive experience in African affairs, his work bridges academia and real-world impact.

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Tadias Q&A: Beejhy Barhany, Author of the New Ethiopian Cookbook Gursha

Beejhy Barhany, author of Gursha: Timeless Recipes for Modern Kitchens, brings her rich culinary journey to life in her debut cookbook. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

Publisher’s Note:

At Tadias Magazine, we have had the pleasure of following Beejhy Barhany’s inspiring journey for many years, from the opening of Tsion Café in Harlem to her continued work as a cultural ambassador of Ethiopian and Beta Israel cuisine. Her new cookbook, Gursha: Timeless Recipes for Modern Kitchens, is a natural extension of her passion for storytelling through food, blending flavors from Ethiopia, Israel, Harlem, and beyond.

We first featured Beejhy in a 2015 Q&A when Tsion Café was still a new and exciting addition to Harlem’s vibrant culinary scene. A decade later, her vision has expanded beyond the restaurant, bringing the warmth and communal spirit of Ethiopian dining to a broader audience through this beautifully designed and presented book. Gursha is more than a collection of recipes—it’s a personal and cultural narrative, a tribute to the people and places that shaped Beejhy’s culinary identity.

In the following Q&A, Beejhy shares the journey behind Gursha, the emotions that went into writing it, and the stories behind some of its most unique dishes. We hope you enjoy this conversation as much as we did.”

— Liben Eabisa, Publisher, Tadias Magazine

Q&A: Beejhy Barhany, Author of the New Ethiopian Cookbook Gursha

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 24th, 2025

TADIAS: Beejhy, congratulations on Gursha! It’s a beautifully crafted book—both visually and in the way it tells your story through food. We thoroughly enjoyed going through it. How does it feel to finally have this cookbook out in the world?

Beejhy Barhany: Thank you, Liben. It was exciting to hold the cover and feel the texture of the physical book. It truly was a labor of love. Writing a book is not easy. I went through a range of emotions while finishing this book. The pain of revisiting some of the more difficult times of my life, the pride in learning more about my family, and the happiness of navigating such a huge task and getting it done. Ultimately, I want to share the rich flavors of Ethiopian cuisine, the grace of my community, and the highs-and-lows of my journey with the world.

TADIAS: You’ve taken readers on a journey across continents, from Ethiopia to Sudan, Israel, and Harlem, with dishes that reflect those experiences. How did you decide which recipes to include? Was there one that felt particularly meaningful to you?

B: Food is a very easy way to engage with people. I want to share the flavors and the aromas that left a mark on my being and give a glimpse into the lives of the people and places that were graceful and hospitable to me and my family.

TADIAS: The book isn’t just about food—it’s filled with stories, tributes to family members, and even heroes from your journey. Was there a particular story or person you knew had to be in the book from the very beginning?

B: Ethiopian food is ancient, adaptable, and versatile. If you have onion, garlic, ginger and chili pepper (berbere) add this to chicken or beef and you can make a delicious Ethiopian wot. Many of the vegan stews that are placed on our injera are legumes and vegetables (gomen, cabbage, bamya, fasolia) that are utilized all around the world and are very adaptable to any particular cuisine. Of course the taste will be different to what we as Ethiopians are accustomed to, but I think it highlights just how much our diverse cultures have so much in common.

TADIAS: There are some fantastic twists in the book—Berbere Fried Fish, Injera Fish Tacos, and even influences from Sudanese and Yemenite cuisine. Can you talk about how these flavors found their way into your kitchen?

B: The beauty about food is that, not only is it delicious when consumed but it forms powerful memories about the places where you were when you tasted that flavor. These items had an impact on my life in significant ways and I want to capture those moments by creating those culinary offerings. In Israel, my Yemenite neighbors introduced me to wholesome flavors like malawach. Sudan, where I spent enough time to pick up Arabic, is where I learned to love the smell of flavorful donuts legamat that were eaten for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The Injera Fish Tacos are a result of my time travelling through South America and living and working in NYC, with its strong Spanish cuisine. My kids love Mexican food so much that I wanted to mimic the look and feel of tacos, without compromising Ethiopian flavours. Cutting the Injera into two small bites and then making tacos out of them was my way of exploring a different cuisine yet holding on tight to my native flavors.

TADIAS: Gursha itself is such a warm and communal concept. If you could host a dream dinner with guests from across your journey, who would be at the table, and what would you serve?

B: That is an ultimate dream question. At my table, I would invite my mom and grandma, Nelson Mandela, Edna Lewis, Julia Child, James Beard, Bob Marley, Che Guevara, Harriet Tubman, and Ras Alula. On the menu, we would have teff injera, hanza, doro wot, gomen, beg wot, Kai wot, spicy tomato tilapia, fasolia, ayib, avocado salad, messer wot, Jollof rice, tej, negesti saba chocolate cardamom cake, carrot and coconut ginger celebration cake, and bunna.


(Courtesy photos)

TADIAS: You’ve been an ambassador for Ethiopian and Beta Israel cuisine for years, especially through Tsion Café. How do you see Gursha contributing to that larger mission?

B: Gursha hopefully allows us to take the message of Ethiopian cuisine, community, and culture to a larger audience, beyond the confines of the restaurant. Much as Tsion Cafe has provided us with a sacred space to have dialogue, break bread, and learn about the stories, tradition, and customs of Ethiopia and the Ethiopian Jewish community, we hope to create that same space wherever the reader may be. Now that the recipes are at their fingertips, readers can engage with stories aligned with traditions and hopefully have a better understanding of my story and community.

TADIAS: Finally, for someone picking up Gursha and cooking from it for the first time, what’s one recipe you’d recommend they start with—and why?

B: For someone who has never cooked Ethiopian food and does not know how to start I would recommend making your berbere spice, it is one of the key ingredients in Ethiopian cuisine, and can be added to any other foods. The next best step is to use the berbere spice to make the kulet/silsi, which is the base to any aromatic/spicy stew. Once you have these foundations, you are prepared to make any item – whether meat, seafood, or vegetarian dishes – into a traditional Ethiopian delicacy.

Gursha is set to be released on April 1, 2025. Learn more and pre-order through Penguin Random House.

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Gursha: A Noteworthy New Ethiopian Cookbook in America

Beejhy Barhany is the founding owner and executive chef of Tsion Cafe, an Ethiopian and Israeli restaurant in Harlem’s historic Sugar Hill neighborhood. (Alfred A. Knopf | Penguin Random House)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 11th, 2025

New York (TADIAS) — Tadias Magazine is thrilled to highlight the forthcoming cookbook Gursha – Timeless Recipes for Modern Kitchens, from Ethiopia, Israel, Harlem, and Beyond by chef and restaurateur Beejhy Barhany, in collaboration with Elisa Ung. This new work is a vibrant celebration of Ethiopian cuisine and Beejhy Barhany’s Beta Israel heritage, interweaving more than a hundred recipes with personal stories and cultural reflections from her remarkable journey across continents

For those familiar with Beejhy’s inspiring work, this book is a natural extension of her culinary and cultural storytelling. We have proudly featured her several times in the past, including a Q&A in 2015 when she opened Tsion Café in Harlem—an establishment that has since become a cherished gathering place, blending Ethiopian and Israeli flavors in a historic setting. Gursha continues this narrative, offering readers an opportunity to experience the deep flavors and traditions of Beta Israel, the Ethiopian Jewish community.


A Taste of Gursha: A Visual Journey Through the Vibrant Flavors and Traditions of Ethiopian Cuisine. Beejhy Barhany’s new cookbook brings heritage to life with cultural reflections and timeless recipes. (Courtesy photos)

The term “gursha” itself encapsulates a deeply rooted Ethiopian mealtime tradition—an affectionate act of feeding one another, often shared among relatives, friends, or romantic partners. This gesture of hospitality and connection serves as the thematic heartbeat of the book, which brings together traditional Ethiopian dishes alongside inventive creations like Berbere Fried Fish and Injera Fish Tacos. From Ethiopia to Israel to Harlem, Beejhy Barhany’s journey has been one of resilience, creativity, and an enduring passion for cultural connection. Gursha is more than just a cookbook—it is an invitation to explore history through food, to embrace the art of sharing meals, and to celebrate the intersections of African and Jewish diasporas in the kitchen.

Stay tuned for our full review of the book and an upcoming interview with Beejhy Barhany, where we will dive deeper into the inspirations behind Gursha and her continued impact on the culinary world.


Gursha is set to be released on April 1, 2025. Learn more and pre-order through Penguin Random House.

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Affini: A Powerful Ethiopian Film Showcasing Sidama’s Conflict Resolution Tradition

Amanuel Habtamu as Talo in Affini—a rogue figure with a dark past, central to the film’s gripping narrative on justice and reconciliation. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 4, 2025

New York (TADIAS) — As Affini prepares for its highly anticipated screenings at the New African Film Festival (NAFF) in Silver Spring, Maryland the film is drawing attention for its powerful portrayal of Sidama’s unique conflict resolution traditions. Directed by Tariku Mekonnen, this gripping drama delves into themes of justice, reconciliation, and resilience, offering audiences a rare cinematic glimpse into the cultural fabric of the region.

As Ethiopian cinema continues to gain international recognition, Affini stands out for its powerful storytelling, breathtaking cinematography, and compelling performances. More than just a film, it serves as a cultural experience that delves deep into the delicate balance between justice, vengeance, and reconciliation within a close-knit community. The film is set to screen twice at NAFF, on March 15 and March 18, marking another milestone for Ethiopian filmmaking on the global stage.

A Tale of Justice, Loss, and Reconciliation

The film’s title, Affini, translates to “Have you heard?”—a reference to the communal reconciliation process deeply rooted in Sidama traditions. The narrative follows Digo Fasi, a grieving farmer portrayed by Girum Ermiyas, who is consumed by a quest for justice after the tragic murder of his son. As he seeks revenge against the suspected killer, Talo—played by Amanuel Habtamu—Digo is faced with a moral and emotional dilemma when he must also protect his daughter from abduction.


Girum and Amanuel (Courtesy photo)


The film depicts Digo’s struggle to protect his daughter from being abducted by Talo, who is also
suspected of the murder. (Courtesy photo)


(Courtesy photo)

The film’s strength lies in its nuanced depiction of cultural traditions that prioritize healing over prolonged conflict. By incorporating Sidama’s historic mediation practices, Affini offers a rare cinematic window into Ethiopia’s indigenous systems of justice. This cultural depth, combined with a gripping plot and stellar performances, makes Affini one of the most talked-about Ethiopian films in recent years.

From Ethiopia to the Global Stage

Despite being Tariku Mekonnen’s full-length directorial debut, Affini has already left an impressive mark on the international film circuit. It premiered at the 1st Film Festival in Malta in 2024 as the opening film and later captivated audiences at the 5th Ethiopian Film Festival in London. With its inclusion in NAFF, Affini continues to reach new audiences, showcasing Ethiopian cinema’s growing impact.

According to Tigist Kebede, Operations Director at Habeshaview Technology and Multimedia, Affini is a groundbreaking achievement in Ethiopian filmmaking. “Compared to other films produced so far in Ethiopia, Affini is truly amazing. It deserves a strong exposure because of its cinematic excellence and cultural significance.”

A Must-Watch Film at NAFF

As audiences prepare for this year’s NAFF lineup, Affini is already generating buzz as a festival highlight. Its ability to blend traditional storytelling with modern filmmaking techniques makes it a standout selection. The film is not just an exploration of Sidama’s rich culture but also a universal story of human resilience, making it relatable to audiences worldwide.

Don’t miss the opportunity to experience Affini on the big screen at the New African Film Festival.

If you Go

Affini will screen at the New African Film Festival on March 15 and March 18. You can reserve Your Tickets here.

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Ethiopian Films Take Center Stage at the 2025 New African Film Festival

Spotlight on Ethiopian Cinema at the New African Film Festival 2025: Affini, Made in Ethiopia, and Tizita take center stage at AFI Silver Theatre, bringing stories of resilience, globalization, and love to the big screen.

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 2nd, 2025

Silver Spring, Maryland (TADIAS) — The annual New African Film Festival (NAFF) at AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center has long been a platform for showcasing the richness and diversity of African cinema. This year’s lineup features three Ethiopian films, each offering a unique lens into the country’s evolving storytelling landscape. Leading the selections is Affini, a powerful drama set in the Sidama region, followed by the documentary Made in Ethiopia, which explores the intersection of globalization and local communities, and the romantic thriller Tizita, a tale of love and memory lost.

Affini: A Gripping Drama Set in Sidama

Among the standout features of this year’s festival is Affini, a gripping drama directed by Tariku Mekonnen (adapted from Habeshaview). Set in a tight-knit Sidama community, the film follows a grieving farmer who embarks on a quest for justice after his son’s murder. As he struggles to shield his daughter from a similar fate, his world is further disrupted by an unexpected connection with a free-spirited American anthropology student. The film’s exploration of tradition, vengeance, and cross-cultural relationships makes it a compelling and thought-provoking piece.

Affini will screen on Saturday, March 15, 2025.

Made in Ethiopia: A Documentary on Globalization’s Local Impact

Audiences will have the opportunity to engage in a Q&A with producer Tamara Mariam Dawit following the screening on Sunday, March 16, 2025.

Directed by Xinyan Yu and Max Duncan and executive produced by Mehret Mandefro, Made in Ethiopia takes a deep dive into the far-reaching effects of China’s industrial investments in Ethiopia. The documentary follows the lives of three women—a Chinese factory director, an Ethiopian farmer, and a young factory worker—as they navigate the economic and social changes brought about by the arrival of a massive Chinese industrial park. Filmed over four years, this timely documentary provides an intimate look at the complexities of development, progress, and the challenges faced by communities at the heart of globalization.

Tizita: Love, Loss, and the Power of Memory

The romantic drama Tizita, directed by Daniel Anmaw, presents a gripping story of love lost and rediscovered. When two soldiers—Mesfin and Samrawit—are separated by war, fate leads them back to each other years later. However, with Mesfin’s memory erased, Samrawit must confront the emotions of the past while balancing the life she has built in his absence. The film blends romance with action, making for an emotional and suspenseful experience.

Tizita is set to screen on Saturday, March 22, 2025.

As the New African Film Festival celebrates its 21st year, the inclusion of these three Ethiopian films highlights the country’s growing influence in African cinema. From gripping narratives to insightful documentaries, this year’s selections offer festivalgoers a chance to experience Ethiopia’s dynamic storytelling traditions on the big screen.

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The Sound of Now: Ethiopian American Artists Making Waves in 2025

A New Wave of Sound: Ethiopian American Artists Defining the Moment: From Mereba’s soul-stirring reflections to Kelela’s jazz-infused reinventions, Chxrry22’s pop-R&B blend, and The Weeknd’s cinematic storytelling—this feature explores the voices shaping today’s music scene. (Getty Images/Instagram)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 2nd, 2025

New York (TADIAS) — Tadias is highlighting the latest releases from Ethiopian American musicians who are making an impact across genres. From soul and R&B to folk and hip-hop, these artists are blending cultural influences with contemporary sounds, bringing fresh perspectives and sonic innovation to the industry. Here’s a look at some of the most exciting new music making waves.

Mereba – The Breeze Grew a Fire

Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Mereba just released her highly anticipated sophomore album, The Breeze Grew a Fire, a deeply personal work that blends soul, folk, and alternative R&B. In her own words, “I hope this album lives inside your life in a special way.” The album has already garnered praise, with Pitchfork describing it as “hushed, incandescent soul and pop-folk songs full of reverence for the people and experiences that sustain her.”

Kelela – In The Blue Light

Kelela transports listeners to the heart of an intimate jazz club with In The Blue Light, a live album recorded at The Blue Note in New York. The album reimagines her signature electronic and R&B sound with lush, organic instrumentation, including harps and strings. The accompanying documentary gives a behind-the-scenes look at the creative process.

Chxrry22 – Rising Star on the Global Stage

Toronto-born Ethiopian Canadian singer Chxrry22, the first woman signed to The Weeknd’s XO Records, has been making waves with her unique blend of R&B and pop. Fresh off an Australian tour opening for The Weeknd, she’s teasing new music following her breakout EP Siren and her latest single, “Poppin Out (Mistakes).”

The Weeknd – Hurry Up Tomorrow

Superstar The Weeknd continues to push artistic boundaries with his latest album, Hurry Up Tomorrow, the concluding chapter in his musical trilogy. His new video for “Red Terror” has sparked conversation, drawing inspiration from historical themes while maintaining his signature cinematic storytelling.

With so much incredible music coming from Ethiopian American artists, this could be the start of a series exploring their impact across genres. Stay tuned for more!


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From Ethiopia to New York: A Gandhian Moment in Ethiopian and African American Encounters

Dr. Malaku E. Bayen: A Pioneering Voice for Ethiopia and the Global Black Community. (Photo: Tadias file)

Tadias Magazine

Publisher’s Note:

As part of our Black History Month highlight, Tadias is honored to present this insightful article by Dr. Fikru Negash Gebrekidan, Professor of History at St. Thomas University in Canada and author of Bond without Blood: A History of Ethiopian and New World Black Relations, 1896-1991. In this exclusive piece, titled From Ethiopia to New York: A Gandhian Moment in Ethiopian and African American Encounters, Dr. Gebrekidan examines a pivotal yet often overlooked moment in history—Dr. Malaku E. Bayen’s arrival in the United States in 1936 and the defining experiences that shaped his advocacy.

Drawing parallels between Bayen’s journey and Mahatma Gandhi’s formative years in South Africa, this article highlights a turning point in Ethiopian and African American connections, revealing how moments of adversity sparked new possibilities for leadership, solidarity, and global engagement.

We are grateful to Dr. Gebrekidan for his meticulous research and contribution to this important and timely conversation.

— Liben Eabisa, Publisher, Tadias Magazine

—-

A Gandhian Moment in Ethiopian and African American Encounters

By Fikru Negash Gebrekidan, Ph.D.

February 11th, 2025

TADIAS – Among the arrivals at Ellis Island on 23 September 1936 was a family of three Black refugees: Dr. Malaku E. Bayen, his wife Dorothy Hadley Bayen, and their four-year-old son Malaku, Jr. Although Italy’s genocidal war on Ethiopia was the reason for their flight out of East Africa, first to Britain and then to the United States, the Bayens were not ordinary refugees. With Emperor Haile Selassie’s appointment of the physician as his personal envoy to Black people in the Western Hemisphere, the Bayens came to New York City as de facto extension of the exiled Ethiopian government, making them a proxy of the ancient African monarchy.

Born in 1900 in the Warrailu district of Wollo, Malaku grew up in Harar and Addis Ababa as a distant cousin in the large Ras Tefari household. In 1921, following a failed scholarship trip to India, he moved to the United States to study chemistry and medicine, and during which he married Dorothy Hadley of Howard University. When Italy invaded Ethiopia in October 1935, he served as a medical doctor both in the eastern and northern fronts; and had it not been for the emperor’s controversial decision to form a government in exile, he would have continued the resistance from Gore, the makeshift capital in the southwest after the fall of Addis Ababa. Yet, nothing prepared Malaku for his experience in New York on the fateful day of September 1936, which was reminiscent of the life-changing event that Gandhi encountered at a South African train station four decades earlier.

Ahead of the Bayens’ arrival, a reservation had been booked at the Manhattan Hotel Delano by Dr. Philip Savory of the United Aid for Ethiopia (UAE). On the morning of 23 September, the guests were picked up from the liner St. Louis by the West Indian Savory, and then driven to Delano at 108 West 43rd Street, where the rest of UAE’s executive board members were waiting. Like Malaku, Savory was a medical doctor by profession, but it was because of his integrity as co-owner of the New York Amsterdam News, Harlem’s leading Black Newspaper, that he was entrusted with the role of UAE treasurer. The other board members included Cyril Phillips, UAE organization secretary; Rev. William Lloyd Imes, pastor of St. James Presbyterian Church; and Theodore Bassett, labor organizer.

Introductions must have remained perfunctory, for all but one of the committee members were known to the Bayens from a previous encounter in Europe. That was in early August 1936, when Savory, Philips, and Imes visited Emperor Haile Selassie at his exile home in Bath, England, in their capacity as UAE representatives. Since Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia a year earlier, American cities had experienced a flurry of fundraising activities by imposters, prompting certain respectable voices of Harlem to come together and form the United Aid for Ethiopia. In Bath, the UAE delegates would impress on the exiled king of the need to bring the disparate relief efforts under a credible central leadership, which was how the unique family of the Bayens was handpicked for the said mission in North America.


Then & Now: The New York Amsterdam News – A Legacy of advocacy journalism in Harlem and a historic platform for Black voices and global connections. (Photo: Wikimedia and Amsterdam News)

The scene at Delano began with the Bayens having to wait until their room was made available, not an unreasonable request during busy hours of the day. Afterall, as a sign of courtesy, a hotel porter was sent to the liner to fetch the passengers’ bags. What the guests did not know, or pretended not to notice, was the consternation felt by the desk clerk the moment they presented themselves. After two hours of limbo, they learned from the chief clerk Frank Mazetti that the hotel was fully booked. Questions why the reservation was not honored, or how a porter could have been sent to the harbor in this case, produced inconsistent answers: the family suite was already rented; or it was being painted and the guests had to wait; or it was being painted but may not be ready anytime soon. After more hours of waiting, by which time Mrs. Bayen and Malaku, Jr., had left for the Savory’s by cab to rest and freshen, Mazetti would resort to a more subtle tack. He offered a single room on the eleventh floor and another on the mezzanine, which the family of three was bound to find unworkable.

What should have been a routine business transaction had thus dragged into a long, drawn-out spectacle. Lawyers from the powerful International Labor Defense, ILD, as well as activists from the Harlem’s All People’s Party had converged at the scene by late afternoon. Picketing and boycott options against the Delano were considered, and papers were contacted to make sure that the civil rights violation did not go unreported. The day concluded with the Bayens having settled in the nearby Rex Hotel, 106 West 47th Street, which would double as family lodging and makeshift office for the next several weeks.


Dr. Malaku E. Bayen. (Photo: Tadias file)

Once the scandal leaked into the media, Delano denied flatly the Jim Crow accusation. Later, its explanation shifted to the fact that the Bayens were registered as prince and princess. Some time back, a Broadway fixer had schemed with a little-known Harlem showwoman, Islin Harvey, promoting her to clubs and the media as a native Falasha princess turned a globe-trotting artist. With that farcical scandal still in memory, the hotel staff insisted that Prince Malaku and Princess Dorothy were turned away because their aristocratic credentials seemed contrived. The alibi convinced few. Even if de guerre segregation was absent north of the Mason-Dixon, it was common knowledge that white establishments fell back on unwritten social codes to turn away Black patrons.

While Malaku rejected any legal recourse so as to stay focused on his fundraising mission, the public uproar took a life of its own. Harlem’s All People’s Party wired a strong message to the State Department, demanding for an appropriate redress for the insult suffered by a foreign dignitary. Even as he advised that the matter be taken up with local authorities as the victim bore no formal diplomatic status, Secretary Cardell Hull expressed regrets over the “discourtesy.” Hull’s response, while outwardly neutral, gave the scandal a national recognition that other actors could not easily ignore. The American Labor Party, an inter-racial group affiliated with the Democratic Party, transferred its county convention on 11 October from Delano to Labor Stage Theater, 106 West 39th Street. The Federation of American Musicians followed suit, choosing to sever any business ties with the now disgraced establishment. By years end, the struggling hostelry had rechristened itself as Hotel Center, a plain sounding name without a controversial history.

For the Bayens, too, the hotel rebuff had transformative consequences. It was where and when Malaku’s preoccupation with fascism began to shape into a broader and more militant cause of global anticolonialism. The liberation of Ethiopia from Italy was no longer an end in and of itself, but a vital component of the international struggle for racial justice and colonial freedom.

A few days after the Delano low point, Malaku’s first public appearance at Rockland Palace would attract over two thousand residents of Harlem, a prelude to extensive travel and countless lectures nationwide. With Malaku as vice president and Pastor Lorenzo King of St. Mark’s Methodist Church as president, the various aid groups would merge as the Ethiopian World Federation, Inc., and the movement’s propaganda campaign would rest on the Voice of Ethiopia, a weekly newspaper the Bayens ran uninterrupted for several years. Writing in 1939 in the March of Black Men, a booklet published by the Voice of Ethiopia Press, Malaku would describe the Rockland Palace gathering as a milestone in Ethiopian and African American relations. “The audience went wild with joy,” he would remember, “and from that night on they have been working with me in the interest of Ethiopia and the Black Race, up to this day.”

Because of his sudden death at the prime age of forty, coupled by the insulated nature of Ethiopian studies, Malaku has yet to find his rightful place in the pantheon of Pan-African leaders. Only an authoritative biography, which is long overdue, may change that. Until that happens, however, rescuing Malaku from further erasure calls for occasional acts of commemoration. Thanks to extensive media coverage of the incident, rereading the Delano ordeal as a Gandhian turning point is an example of that.

Indeed, what happened to the medical doctor on 23 September resonates closely with the injustice suffered by Gandhi on the fateful train ride in South Africa several decades earlier. Both Malaku and Gandhi began their diaspora careers at the height of their patrician aspirations. Gandhi, British-educated Indian barrister, had traveled to South Africa to promote Indian rights; while Malaku, a U.S.-trained medical doctor and member of the young Ethiopian intelligentsia, had returned to the United States to raise funds to help his country’s war refugees. Gandhi’s epiphany took place on 7 June 1893, the day he spent a chilly winter night at the Pietermaritzburg train station, having resisted his removal from the first-class car to which his ticket had entitled him. Likewise, Malaku’s check-in at the Delano concluded with a life- changing Jim Crow humiliation, an act that stripped class pretentions and plunged him at the center of American race politics. Gandhi, a nationalist turned spiritual leader, would succumb to an assassin bullet only a few months after India’s independence. Malaku, who spent the next four years in Harlem as an antifascist crusader, fundraiser, newspaper editor, and Pan-African activist, would die in a New York State mental hospital on 4 May 1940, exactly one year before the restoration of his country’s independence.


About the Author:

Dr. Fikru Negash Gebrekidan is a Professor of History at St. Thomas University in Canada.

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Ethiopian Heritage Day Brings Culture and Community Together in Montclair, NJ

Children enjoying the bubble show at Ethiopian Heritage Day in Montclair, NJ on January 11, 2025—an evening filled with culture, laughter, and community spirit. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: January 27th, 2025

New York (TADIAS) — On January 11, 2025, families and friends gathered in Montclair, New Jersey, for Ethiopian Heritage Day, a vibrant celebration of culture, tradition, and community spirit. Organized by local entrepreneurs and community members, the family-friendly event provided an engaging afternoon filled with music, food, games, and cultural showcases that delighted attendees of all ages.

The event featured an array of activities designed to highlight Ethiopia’s rich cultural heritage. Children enjoyed an exciting bubble show, which proved to be a major hit, as well as balloon twisting and interactive games. Meanwhile, adults participated in “Teret ena Misale Chewata,” a lively competition that tested their knowledge of Ethiopian wisdom sayings and proverbs, celebrating the country’s ancient literary traditions and its unique Ge’ez script.

No Ethiopian gathering would be complete without the traditional coffee ceremony, which brought people together to savor the rich aroma and taste of coffee, honoring Ethiopia’s proud history as the birthplace of the beloved beverage. Guests were also treated to a diverse selection of Ethiopian dishes and live music that had everyone on their feet, dancing to the rhythms of their heritage.

The evening’s entertainment lineup featured a well-received stand-up comedy performance by Tewodros Daniel, who was born and raised in the U.S. His witty take on Ethiopian traditions and cultural quirks brought laughter and joy to the festivities, making it a highlight of the night.


Stand-up comedy performance by Tewodros Daniel. (Courtesy photo)


(Courtesy photo

Realtor Tezeta “Tez” Roro speaking at the Ethiopian Heritage Day event in Montclair, NJ on January 11, 2025. (Courtesy photo


Courtesy photo


At Ethiopian Heritage Day event in Montclair, NJ on January 11, 2025. (Courtesy photo)


Courtesy photo


Courtesy photo


Courtesy photo

Organized by Abeba Taye and Martha Shafo, with the support of local sponsors such as Cass Realtors of West Orange and community members, the event successfully fostered a warm and welcoming atmosphere, strengthening bonds within the Ethiopian-American community and beyond.

Looking ahead, the organizers have announced an upcoming Ethiopian Heritage Day summer edition, set to take place on August 2, 2025, promising another exciting day of cultural immersion and fun.

If You Go:
For businesses and organizations looking to connect with the Ethiopian-American community, sponsorship opportunities are available for the summer event. Contact the organizers at (908) 977-6452 to learn how you can be part of this unique celebration.

Stay tuned for more updates and mark your calendars for August 2! Read more at Tadias.com »

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The Abyssinians: Banna Desta Brings an Ancient Ethiopian Queen to Life for Modern Times

The Abyssinians: A groundbreaking play by author Banna Desta, right, weaves ancient history with contemporary diaspora dynamics, featuring Ethio-jazz score by DA Mekonnen and Andrew Orkin. (Courtesy photos)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: January 5th, 2025

New York (TADIAS) — Banna Desta, a New York-based Eritrean and Ethiopian-American playwright, continues to captivate audiences with her latest work, The Abyssinians, an Audible Original audiobook that fuses historical intrigue with modern sensibilities. Desta’s masterful storytelling immerses listeners in the vibrant world of the ancient Aksumite Kingdom, a powerful empire spanning present-day Ethiopia and Eritrea.

The drama, set in the aftermath of King Ezana’s death, centers on Queen Yodit, a character brought to life by BAFTA-nominated actress Danielle Deadwyler (Till, The Harder They Fall). Yodit’s struggle to navigate the treacherous political landscape while deciding which of her twin sons will ascend the throne highlights universal themes of power, family, and identity.

But The Abyssinians is more than a historical tale; it’s a reflection of contemporary global and diaspora dynamics. The queen’s cunning yet vulnerable portrayal evokes parallels with modern political characters who navigate—or create—fractured societies, making her as relevant today as in ancient times. Desta’s use of humor-laced dialogue and a fresh Ethio-jazz score by DA Mekonnen and Andrew Orkin bridges past and present, delivering a richly layered experience.

Desta, who teaches at NYU and is an alumna of its MFA Dramatic Writing program, is no stranger to trailblazing work. We last featured her during the Women in Theatre Festival, where her play Bygone Fruit celebrated diasporic stories. Now, with The Abyssinians, Desta continues to shape how the Ethiopian and Eritrean diaspora reflects on its shared history, crafting narratives that rise above today’s polarized conversations on ethnicity, identity, and divisive politics, inviting audiences to delve into the richness and complexities of cultural memory through a unifying lens.


(Image courtesy of Audible)

In an era of fragmented discourse, The Abyssinians serves as a beacon, bringing the diaspora together through universal artistic language. As Desta herself notes, storytelling is about capturing the emotional and spiritual essence of human history. This audiobook, with its rich performances and textured soundscapes, does precisely that.

Whether you’re drawn by its historical depth, its complex characters, or its cutting-edge production, The Abyssinians is a must-listen—a compelling reminder of how art can unite, enlighten, and entertain.


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Watch: Jomo Tariku, Ethiopian-American Industrial Designer, Showcases His Innovative Furniture in VOA Africa Feature

Watch Ethiopian-American industrial designer Jomo Tariku showcase his innovative furniture designs in this VOA Africa feature. (Photo:Jomo furniture)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: December 21st, 2024

New York (TADIAS) — We’re thrilled to share this inspiring video from VOA Africa featuring Ethiopian-American industrial designer Jomo Tariku. Known for blending traditional African forms with a minimalist aesthetic, Jomo has gained significant recognition in the design world.

In this feature, he showcases his innovative furniture pieces, shedding light on his passion for design and creativity. His work, including iconic pieces like the Meedo and Nyala chairs, has garnered attention from major institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the film sets of Black Panther.

Check out the video to explore Jomo’s unique designs and learn more about his journey as an artist shaping the future of industrial design.

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Amsalu Kassaw Becomes First Ethiopian American to Serve in Public Office in Colorado

Amsalu Kassaw addresses Aurora City Council during deliberations for his appointment to the at-large seat, marking a historic moment as the first Ethiopian American to hold public office in Colorado. (Photo: Sentinel)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: December 18, 2024

New York (TADIAS) – In a historic appointment, Amsalu Kassaw, an Ethiopian immigrant and long-time resident of Aurora, has been selected to fill an at-large vacancy on the Aurora City Council. This makes Kassaw the first Ethiopian American to hold public office in the state of Colorado and the first immigrant of color to serve on Aurora’s council.

Kassaw’s appointment was finalized on December 16, 2024, following a 6-4 vote by the city council to replace Dustin Zvonek, who resigned in October to pursue other professional opportunities. Kassaw, a Republican, was chosen over two other finalists: Danielle Lammon, a small business owner, and Jonathan McMillan, a community leader in violence prevention. He will be sworn in on January 13, 2025, and will serve until the completion of Zvonek’s term next fall.

“Aurora is more than a city to me,” Kassaw said. “It is a symbol of opportunity and diversity. I am deeply honored to serve the community that has been my home for the past 17 years.”

A Historic Milestone

Kassaw’s appointment marks a significant moment for Aurora, one of the most diverse cities in the United States, where one in five residents is foreign-born. While previous council members have been immigrants, Kassaw is the first from Ethiopia, reflecting the city’s diversity. His supporters have hailed his appointment as a milestone for representation in local government.

“This isn’t just about breaking barriers,” said Nebiyu Asfaw, a community leader in Aurora. “It’s about ensuring that our city council truly reflects the dynamism and inclusivity of Aurora itself.”

A Diverse Background

Kassaw, a lieutenant at the GEO Group-operated Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Aurora, brings a unique perspective to the council. His professional background includes leadership roles and advocacy for civic engagement, small business support, and international partnerships, such as fostering a sister-city relationship between Aurora and Adama, Ethiopia. His platform prioritizes public safety, homelessness, affordable housing, and community engagement.

A Contentious Appointment

Despite the historic nature of his appointment, Kassaw’s selection has not been without controversy. Partisan divisions have become a hallmark of Aurora’s officially nonpartisan council, and Kassaw’s Republican affiliation drew both praise and criticism. Councilmember Crystal Murillo, a Democrat, expressed her support for another candidate, citing their extensive experience in local government.

Kassaw’s stance on key issues such as homelessness and public safety aligns with the conservative “work-first” model advocated by Aurora’s Mayor Mike Coffman. However, he has also emphasized the importance of building trust between law enforcement and communities of color, acknowledging the need for increased communication and understanding.

Looking Ahead

Kassaw’s appointment comes at a time of heightened tension in Aurora, with the city grappling with issues such as police accountability and community division. During his remarks, he called for bipartisan collaboration and reaffirmed his commitment to serving all residents of Aurora.

“We still need that community connection,” Kassaw said. “That’s how we make progress together.”

As he prepares to take office, Kassaw’s supporters and detractors alike will be watching closely to see how he navigates Aurora’s complex political landscape and delivers on his promise to prioritize inclusion and progress.

International Implications

Kassaw’s rise to public office has also drawn attention from Ethiopian and immigrant communities nationwide and abroad. His appointment serves as a symbol of what is possible for immigrants in the United States and highlights the increasing visibility of Ethiopian Americans in civic leadership roles.

Kassaw’s swearing-in ceremony on January 13 is expected to draw significant local and national interest, as many view his story as an embodiment of Aurora’s spirit of opportunity and diversity.


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Kamasi Washington & Ethiopian Dancers Groove to “Lesanu” on The Tonight Show

Kamasi Washington and Ethiopian Dancers light up The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon in a stunning blend of Jazz, Eskista, and Heritage, on Dec 12, 2024. (Photo: NBC)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: December 13th, 2024

New York (TADIAS) — Did you catch Kamasi Washington’s electrifying performance of “Lesanu” on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon? If not, let us fill you in—because this wasn’t just any performance; it was a stunning celebration of Ethiopian culture on a global stage!

Accompanied by Ethiopian dancers performing eskista—the iconic dance that never fails to hype up a room—Washington’s music took on a new life. The choreography, created by Dereje Bekele and Bethlehem Bekele, beautifully showcased the diversity of Ethiopian dance traditions, with movements inspired by regions across the country.

The dancers were organized by Kinet Bet, a cultural organization founded by Bethlehem Bekele, which started as a passion project to teach Ethiopian cultural dances to youth while celebrating their heritage, identity, and wellness.

“Lesanu” is more than a jazz track—it’s a heartfelt tribute. Kamasi opens the song with a prayer in Amharic, dedicating it to a late friend. For Washington, Fearless Movement, the album featuring “Lesanu,” is all about embracing life, legacy, and the fluid connection between music and movement.

“My music isn’t typically associated with dance, but I wanted to push boundaries,” Washington said. And push them he did! Alongside his father Rickey Washington on flute and a powerhouse band, Washington created a fusion of jazz and Ethiopian rhythm that had Fallon’s audience mesmerized.

Whether you came for the eskista, the saxophone, or the soul, this performance was a moment of pride for Ethiopian Americans and music lovers alike.

Don’t miss the magic—watch the performance here and join the celebration of culture, connection, and Kamasi’s fearless movement!


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Tsedaye Makonnen: Ethiopian American Artist Illuminates the Smithsonian with Sanctuary ‘Mekdes’

Tsedaye Makonnen’s 'Sanctuary :: መቅደስ :: Mekdes' exhibition at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art honors resilience, motherhood, and solidarity, weaving connections across generations and cultures. (Photo by Brad Simpson, 2024, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: December 8th, 2024

New York (TADIAS) – Tadias Magazine is thrilled to highlight the upcoming exhibition Sanctuary :: መቅደስ :: Mekdes by acclaimed Ethiopian American artist Tsedaye Makonnen, opening at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art on December 13. This powerful exhibition explores the themes of invisibility, resilience, and the enduring strength of Black women and their communities.

Makonnen’s work, featuring seven light-tower sculptures composed of 50 enshrined names, reflects on violence, motherhood, and solidarity. It presents a hopeful reimagining of a just and compassionate future. The artist skillfully bridges history and contemporary narratives, with her installation Senait & Nahom | ሰናይት :: እና :: ናሆም | The Peacemaker & The Comforter engaging directly with Ethiopian artifacts from the museum’s collection.

Exploring Tsedaye Makonnen’s Vision of Art, Community, and Cultural Legacy

Earlier this year, Tadias had the privilege of featuring Tsedaye Makonnen in our Ethiopia at the MET interview series, where we celebrated the groundbreaking representation of Ethiopian art in major U.S. museums. At the time, Makonnen aptly declared, “This is Ethiopia’s moment.”

Hailing from the vibrant Ethiopian community in the Washington, D.C. area—home to the largest Ethiopian diaspora outside of Ethiopia—Makonnen represents a unique intersection of Ethiopian and Black American cultural narratives. In her conversation with Tadias, she emphasized how this dual identity informs her approach to creating and curating art, resulting in deeply resonant works like Sanctuary.

A Milestone for Ethiopian Art and Representation

The exhibition’s significance extends beyond its artistic brilliance. It marks a milestone for Ethiopian representation at the Smithsonian, a global institution celebrating African art. Makonnen’s inclusion reaffirms the cultural and historical richness of Ethiopian narratives while addressing critical social issues such as migration, reproductive health and a holistic approach to equity.

Heran Sereke-Brhan, Deputy Director of the National Museum of African Art, highlights the importance of this moment: “Outside of Ethiopia, the DC metropolitan area has the largest Ethiopian diaspora. As an Ethiopian-born woman and longtime champion of DC artists, it is deeply meaningful that this is the exhibition opening coincides with the start of my tenure at the National Museum of African Art. Having Tsedaye’s work exhibited at the Smithsonian is a powerful way to center stories of oppression and resilience while countering underrepresentation in the arts.”

Building on a Legacy of Excellence

Tsedaye Makonnen’s trajectory has been extraordinary. From her groundbreaking contributions at the Venice Biennale to curating the contemporary section of the Walters Art Museum’s Ethiopia at the Crossroads and her involvement with The Met’s Africa and Byzantium, Makonnen continues to push boundaries and redefine the space for Ethiopian and African art on the global stage.

Her work as a Smithsonian Artist Research Fellow and her ongoing oral history project, Documenting the Ethiopian Communities of DC, underscore her commitment to storytelling that uplifts and preserves cultural legacies.

Join the Celebration

This exhibition is an invitation to explore the transformative power of art as a tool for healing, solidarity, and cross-cultural dialogue. For those in the D.C. metropolitan area or planning a visit, Sanctuary :: መቅደስ :: Mekdes offers a unique opportunity to engage with Makonnen’s deeply moving work and celebrate the richness of Ethiopian heritage within a global context.

As Makonnen’s journey illustrates, this is indeed Ethiopia’s moment. Tadias is honored to continue spotlighting her achievements and the broader cultural narratives that inspire and connect us all.

Related:

Ethiopia at the MET: Interview Series on its Breakthrough in Major U.S. Museums

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Ethiopian War Hero’s Gold Star Medal Sparks International Debate on Stolen Heritage

A Symbol of Valor and Heritage: Ras Desta Damtew’s Imperial Order of the Star of Ethiopia, at the heart of a family’s quest for restoration and a nation’s call for historical preservation. (Photos: Wikimedia)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: December 10th, 2024

The descendants of Ras Desta Damtew fight for the return of a national relic

New York (TADIAS) – The resurfacing of a looted gold medal, belonging to Ethiopian war hero Ras Desta Damtew, has sparked an emotional battle between his descendants and an international auction house. The Imperial Order of the Star of Ethiopia, described as a rare and historically significant piece, was recently listed for sale by a Swiss auction house, igniting debates about cultural restitution and wartime looting.

The medal, reportedly stolen during the Second Italo-Ethiopian War (1935-1937), represents more than just a family heirloom for the descendants of Ras Desta Damtew. For them, it embodies Ethiopia’s history of resistance against foreign aggression and the sacrifices made by leaders like Ras Desta, who was executed by Italian troops in 1937.

“We view this as a matter of national dignity,” said Amaha Kassa, a grandson of Ras Desta Damtew, in an interview. “This medal, looted during a period of conflict, should not be sold for profit but preserved for Ethiopia’s people in a museum where it belongs.”


Ras Desta Damtew whose legacy and sacrifice during the Second Italo-Ethiopian War are symbolized by the contested Imperial Order of the Star of Ethiopia medal. ((Photos: Wikimedia)

The situation also sheds light on Ethiopia’s ongoing efforts to reclaim its cultural and historical artifacts. The Kassa family’s efforts echo previous successful campaigns, such as the halting of Haile Selassie’s wristwatch auction in 2015. These incidents highlight a growing recognition of the importance of restitution, as African nations and diasporas seek to reclaim narratives around their heritage and honor the resilience of their ancestors.

As the debate over Ras Desta Damtew’s medal unfolds, it serves as a poignant reminder of the lingering effects of wartime plundering and the resilience of Ethiopians in preserving their histories. For many, the fight to recover the medal is as much about justice for the past as it is about building a future grounded in cultural pride and historical truth.


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YEP Honors TIME’s 2024 Kid of the Year & Ethiopian Professionals at 14th Anniversary Event

Heman Bekele, TIME’s 2024 Kid of the Year, and Dr. Tesfaye A. Telila, Founder of Heart Attack Ethiopia, headline YEP’s 14th Anniversary Gala in Springfield, Virginia, celebrating innovation, empowerment, and impact within the Ethiopian diaspora. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

December 6th, 2024

Celebrating 14 Years of Impact: YEP Honors TIME’s 2024 Kid of the Year & Ethiopian Professionals

TADIAS (New York) – Your Ethiopian Professionals Network (YEP) marks its 14-Year Anniversary Celebration on Saturday, December 7th, 2024, at the Waterford Event Center in Springfield, Virginia. Themed “14 Years of Impact: Building Bridges, Inspiring Change,” the gala promises to be a night of inspiration, connection, and celebration of excellence within the Ethiopian diaspora.

This year’s milestone event is headlined by Heman Bekele, TIME Magazine’s 2024 Kid of the Year, whose groundbreaking invention to fight skin cancer has captured global attention. Heman’s recognition as a young innovator perfectly aligns with YEP’s mission of empowering leaders who inspire change.

The evening’s keynote speaker is the distinguished Dr. Tesfaye A. Telila, an Interventional Cardiologist at Piedmont Healthcare in Atlanta and Founder of Heart Attack Ethiopia, Inc. Dr. Telila’s pioneering work in cardiovascular care has not only transformed lives in Ethiopia but also strengthened connections between the diaspora and their homeland.

Since its founding in 2010, YEP has been a driving force in uniting Ethiopian professionals across industries and continents. Over 14 years, YEP has hosted over 100 events, fostering leadership, collaboration, and career advancement. This gala celebrates these accomplishments and looks ahead to a brighter future shaped by community-driven innovation.

What to Expect:

Inspiring Stories: Insights from awardees and speakers who embody the spirit of change and bridge-building.
Awards & Recognition: Honoring individuals and organizations making a difference within and beyond the Ethiopian community.
Networking Opportunities: A chance to connect with professionals across industries and expand your horizons.
Entertainment & Cuisine: Enjoy live performances, cultural showcases, and a curated menu of Ethiopian dishes.

This black-tie event invites attendees from the Washington, DC metropolitan area and beyond to reflect on YEP’s shared journey, celebrate its achievements, and envision the next chapter of impact and innovation.

Whether you’re a long-time supporter or new to YEP, this is an evening not to miss—a celebration of our shared heritage, a tribute to our accomplishments, and a step toward a brighter future together.


If You Go:

For more information and tickets, visit and RSVP here.

Let’s honor 14 years of impact, celebrate trailblazers like Heman Bekele and Dr. Tesfaye A. Telila, and continue building bridges that inspire change!

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Daily Flights to NYC: Ethiopian Airlines Elevates U.S. Service

Ethiopian Airlines launches daily flights to New York, enhancing links between Africa and the U.S. (Photo: Ethiopian Airlines)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: December 1st, 2024

New York (TADIAS) — Ethiopian Airlines has announced a significant milestone: starting today, December 1, 2024, the airline will offer daily flights between Addis Ababa and New York City. This expansion represents a major step in strengthening connectivity between Africa and the United States, addressing the growing travel demands of both business and leisure passengers.

.Strengthening Ties Between Africa and New York

New York, a global hub and home to a vibrant Ethiopian and larger African diaspora, holds strategic importance for Ethiopian Airlines. By increasing service from four weekly flights to daily operations, the airline not only solidifies its North American presence but also reaffirms its commitment to providing seamless travel experiences. This expansion is set to offer travelers greater flexibility, minimize layovers, and simplify trip planning.

Connecting the Diaspora and Beyond

New York is one of six U.S. destinations served by Ethiopian Airlines, alongside Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Chicago, Newark, and Miami (cargo only). The daily flights offer improved access for members of the Ethiopian Diaspora and strengthen Ethiopia’s position as a gateway to Africa for North American travelers. These routes also open opportunities for trade, tourism, and cultural exchange, bridging communities across continents.

Expanding a Global Network


For the Ethiopian Diaspora, Ethiopian Airlines’ new daily service to New York is more than just a flight—it’s a direct connection to home. (Photo: Ethiopian Airlines)

With over 130 international destinations, Ethiopian Airlines is a pioneer in connecting Africa to the world. Operating one of the youngest and most advanced fleets, including the Boeing 787 Dreamliner and Airbus A350, the airline ensures a top-tier travel experience. Passengers on the New York route can expect superior in-flight services, including authentic Ethiopian cuisine, a rich entertainment system, and the airline’s signature hospitality.

A Strategic Leap Forward

The increased frequency aligns with Ethiopian Airlines’ broader vision of becoming a global aviation leader. The airline continues to leverage Addis Ababa’s Bole International Airport as a critical hub, offering seamless connections to cities across Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. This hub-and-spoke model ensures that passengers from New York can easily connect to destinations like Nairobi, Johannesburg, and Accra.

A Boost for Tourism and Business

Daily flights are expected to stimulate tourism and business travel between the two regions. Ethiopia’s rich history, cultural landmarks, and emerging economy make it an attractive destination for American travelers. Likewise, the increased frequency supports Ethiopia’s growing appeal as a transit hub for African and international travelers.

Ethiopian Airlines: A Legacy of Excellence


(Photo: Ethiopian Airlines)

Founded in 1945, Ethiopian Airlines has become a beacon of aviation excellence, recognized for its expansive network, cutting-edge fleet, and customer-centric services. The airline’s commitment to innovation and sustainability ensures its position as a trusted choice for millions of passengers annually.


(Photo: Ethiopian Airlines)

As Ethiopian Airlines ushers in daily service to New York, it sets the stage for stronger connections, expanded opportunities, and enhanced experiences for travelers. For the Ethiopian Diaspora, the new service is more than a route—it’s a bridge home.


Related:

Captain Mohammed Ahmed: The Visionary Who Guided Ethiopian Airlines Through Turbulent Skies

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Captain Mohammed Ahmed: The Visionary Who Guided Ethiopian Airlines Through Turbulent Skies

Captain Mohammed Ahmed, a trailblazer in African aviation, led Ethiopian Airlines through transformative times, cementing its place as a leading carrier while safeguarding its independence and innovation. (Photo: Wikimedia/Ethiopian Airlines - Original publication: Ethiopia 1980s, immediate source Addis Insight)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: November 28th, 2024

Captain Mohammed Ahmed: A Visionary Who Soared Beyond Boundaries

New York (TADIAS) — As Ethiopia and the global aviation community bid farewell to Captain Mohammed Ahmed (1932–2024), his remarkable legacy reminds us of the heights a visionary leader can achieve, even in the face of formidable challenges.

Born in Harar and educated in aeronautical engineering at Saint Louis University, Captain Mohammed dedicated his life to the skies. Starting his career as Ethiopian Airlines’ chief aeronautical engineer in the 1960s, he rose to the position of CEO in 1980, during a turbulent era marked by political and economic instability. Under his leadership, Ethiopian Airlines not only survived but thrived, becoming a symbol of resilience and excellence.

Captain Mohammed skillfully navigated Cold War pressures, preserving the airline’s independence while securing its global competitiveness. His courageous decision to resist the adoption of Soviet aircraft ensured that Ethiopian Airlines remained a key player on the international stage. By the late 1980s, the airline had entered a period of prosperity, a testament to his transformative leadership.

Beyond Ethiopian Airlines, Captain Mohammed’s contributions extended to the broader African aviation sector. As Secretary General of the African Airlines Association, he championed collaboration and innovation across the continent. His efforts earned him accolades, including the African Aviation Award in 1999.

Captain Mohammed’s story is one of resilience, innovation, and dedication. He will be remembered not only for steering Ethiopian Airlines through some of its most challenging times but also for inspiring a generation of African aviation professionals.

As we celebrate his life and mourn his passing, we are reminded of his enduring impact on Ethiopian and African aviation. Captain Mohammed Ahmed’s legacy soars high, embodying the spirit of perseverance and excellence that continues to inspire.


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Flower Power: Ethiopian Wolves’ Sweet Secret Revealed

Sweet Surprises in Ethiopia’s Highlands: The Rare Ethiopian Wolf Pollinates in Style – Discover the Magic of Bale Mountains. (Photo: The Ethiopian wolf conservation program)

Tadias Magazine

November 24th, 2024

TADIAS (New York) – Ethiopia, often referred to as the Roof of Africa, is home to a stunning array of wildlife and breathtaking landscapes found nowhere else on Earth. From the ancient remains of Lucy, our earliest human ancestor, to the peaks of the Simien and Bale Mountains, the country’s natural wonders continue to captivate scientists, adventurers, and nature enthusiasts alike.

Among its unique inhabitants, the Ethiopian wolf, or Simien fox, stands out as a true symbol of the country’s rich biodiversity. The rarest canid in the world and Africa’s most endangered carnivore, the Ethiopian wolf is found only in the high-altitude grasslands of Ethiopia. With fewer than 500 individuals remaining, this elusive predator has adapted to life in the Afroalpine habitat, hunting rodents and navigating some of the harshest terrains.

Yet, this week, the Ethiopian wolf made headlines not for its hunting prowess but for an unexpectedly sweet discovery: it has been spotted licking nectar from Ethiopian red hot poker flowers. This behavior, documented by researchers from the Ethiopian Wolf Conservation Program and the University of Oxford, marks the first recorded instance of a large carnivore feeding on nectar.

Sweet as Honey


(Photo: The Ethiopian wolf conservation program)

Imagine this elegant predator delicately sipping nectar from the fiery blooms of the red hot poker flower. While locals have long known about the flower’s sugary nectar—shepherd children in the Bale Mountains often enjoy it as a natural treat—scientists were thrilled to find wolves indulging in the same delicacy. Not only does this behavior showcase the wolf’s adaptability, but it also hints at a fascinating ecological role: pollination.

With their muzzles coated in pollen, these wolves may be helping the flowers reproduce, bridging the gap between predator and pollinator in a way never observed before. As Dr. Sandra Lai, a senior scientist at the Ethiopian Wolf Conservation Programme, aptly put it, this discovery highlights how much we still have to learn about these remarkable animals and their interactions with the ecosystem.

Why It Matters

Ethiopia is home to an extraordinary array of endemic animals, including the Gelada baboon, Walia ibex, Black lion, and the Mountain nyala. Each species is a testament to the unique evolutionary story of the Ethiopian Highlands. However, many of these creatures, like the Ethiopian wolf, face threats from habitat loss, disease, and human encroachment.

The wolf’s newfound “sweet tooth” not only adds a delightful twist to its story but also underscores the importance of preserving Ethiopia’s Afroalpine habitats. These high-altitude landscapes are teeming with life, offering travelers an unparalleled glimpse into the beauty and diversity of Ethiopia’s natural world.

Visit the Roof of Africa

For those looking for an adventure, a trip to the Bale Mountains is a chance to witness these incredible animals in their natural habitat. Whether you’re trekking through the stunning alpine meadows or spotting rare wildlife like the Ethiopian wolf, it’s an experience that connects you to the heart of Ethiopia’s unique ecosystem.

So, the next time you see a red hot poker flower, remember: even the fiercest predators can have a soft spot for something sweet. Who knows? Perhaps this discovery will inspire more travelers to visit Ethiopia and contribute to the conservation of its rare and wonderful creatures.


Related:

Sweet tooth- Ethiopian wolves seen feeding on nectar (Peer-Reviewed Publication University of Oxford)

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Realtor Profile: Tezeta ‘Tez’ Roro—Ethiopian Changemaker Building Community, One Home at a Time

Meet Tezeta "Tez" Roro: A New Jersey-based realtor, community leader, and changemaker committed to fostering connections and making homeownership accessible to all. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

By Liben Eabisa

November 20th, 2024

TADIAS (New York) – When I think about individuals in our community who embody the spirit of service, resilience, and inspiration, Tezeta “Tez” Roro immediately comes to mind. Over the years, my work with Tadias Magazine has brought me into contact with countless change-makers in the Ethiopian diaspora. But few have left as lasting an impression as Tez.

I first met her years ago at a cultural event in New York, where she was actively supporting the Ethiopian Community Mutual Assistance Association (ECMAA). Her warmth and sincerity immediately stood out, but what struck me even more was her unique ability to seamlessly bridge her professional pursuits with her commitment to uplifting others. Tez isn’t just a real estate broker—she’s a community builder, a role model, and an advocate for empowerment

Rooted in Values, Driven by Purpose


Tezeta “Tez” Roro leads a real estate workshop in Addis Ababa, sharing insights with architects, developers, and industry professionals in collaboration with Urban Center. (Courtesy photo)

Tez’s journey is one of grit and gratitude. Growing up in Addis Ababa, she was shaped by a culture that prioritizes family, community, and connection. These values stayed with her when she immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager, where she quickly took on the dual roles of student and family supporter.

Her early challenges—working multiple jobs while attending Montclair State University—taught her the value of perseverance and adaptability. It’s no surprise that when she pivoted to real estate, she brought these qualities with her. Motivated by her own experience as a first-time homebuyer, Tez was determined to make the process less intimidating for others. Her mission became clear: to empower individuals to achieve their homeownership dreams with empathy and understanding.

A Champion for Community Progress


Tezeta presenting to PTA leaders in New Jersey, highlighting how her campaign successfully brought free pre-K to her West Orange community at a state PTA convention. (Courtesy photo)


Advocacy award for the Pre-K work. (Courtesy photo)

What makes Tez’s work in real estate truly special is her holistic approach. She doesn’t see her role as limited to buying and selling homes; she views it as a way to create opportunities and expand access. For instance, her work advocating for FHA certification in her local community opened doors for many first-time buyers, often overlooked due to biases in the housing market.

Tez’s leadership extends beyond her profession. As President of the West Orange Chamber of Commerce and Council of PTAs, a board member of the YMCA, and a dedicated volunteer with ECMAA, she has a hand in countless community-building efforts. One of her most inspiring accomplishments is her grassroots campaign to bring free, full-day pre-kindergarten to West Orange. Seeing this initiative benefit nearly 500 families is a testament to her belief in collective action and problem-solving.


Tezeta addressing the audience as President of the West Orange Chamber of Commerce. (Courtesy photo)

A Personal Reflection on Tez

Whenever I meet with Tez, I’m reminded of the quiet strength it takes to lead by example. She’s someone who doesn’t just talk about values like family and community—she lives them. Whether mentoring young professionals, advocating for housing equity, or organizing cultural events, Tez carries her Ethiopian heritage with pride and channels it into everything she does.

Her favorite phrase, borrowed from John Lewis, about making “good trouble” resonates deeply. Tez isn’t afraid to challenge the status quo, whether that’s corporate culture, real estate practices, or local governance. She inspires those around her to rethink what’s possible and to act with courage.


Tezeta At ECMAA (Ethiopian Community Mutual Assistance Association) picnic. (Courtesy photo)

For me, Tez represents the best of what the Ethiopian diaspora has to offer: a blend of resilience, ambition, and a deeply ingrained sense of responsibility to uplift others. Her story is a reminder that success isn’t just about personal milestones but about how much we give back along the way.

Tezeta “Tez” Roro isn’t just shaping the real estate market; she’s shaping the future of our communities, one good deed—and one home—at a time.

—-
Explore More
To learn more about Tezeta “Tez” Roro’s inspiring journey and explore her real estate listings, visit her website at TezRoro.com. Whether you’re buying, selling, or simply seeking advice, Tez’s expertise and passion for building community are just a click away!

About the Author
Liben Eabisa is the Co-Founder and Publisher of Tadias Magazine and a licensed realtor based in New York City, passionate about connecting stories, communities, and opportunities.

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Holiday Highlight: Wegene Ethiopian Foundation & Its Inspiring Youth Club

Wegene’s 24th Anniversary Gala, held on October 19, 2024, in Springfield, VA, was an unforgettable evening, with proceeds dedicated to expanding the foundation’s impactful programs. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: November 14, 2024

New York (TADIAS) – As the holiday season approaches, we turn the spotlight on the Wegene Ethiopian Foundation (WEF), a dedicated nonprofit founded in 2000 by Ethiopian Americans in the Washington, D.C. area. Led by social entrepreneur Nini Legesse, WEF has made remarkable strides in improving lives across Ethiopia through education and community support. Now celebrating its 24th anniversary, Wegene is not only committed to its transformative work in Ethiopia but has also fostered a dynamic youth engagement program here in the U.S., encouraging the next generation to stay connected to their roots.

WEF’s impact in Ethiopia is multifaceted, with the organization providing academic scholarships, small business grants, and essential support to vulnerable families. By focusing on sustainable, community-based solutions, Wegene addresses the root causes of poverty and fosters lasting change. Wegene’s work empowers young people with educational opportunities, giving them a foundation to build brighter futures and contribute meaningfully to their communities.

In the U.S., the Wegene Youth Club brings together second-generation Ethiopian Americans to raise funds, spread awareness, and volunteer in local community service projects. This group is passionate about supporting Wegene’s mission, and through activities like D.C. homeless shelter feedings, gardening projects, and annual Veteran’s Day card-making events, the Youth Club instills a spirit of giving and community engagement in the next generation. These young volunteers also play an instrumental role in WEF’s annual fundraising events, such as the Annual Fundraising Gala, Brunch with Santa, and Oldies Night, all of which support vital programs in Ethiopia.


The Wegene Youth Club unites second-generation Ethiopian Americans to actively engage in local community service projects. (Courtesy photo/Wegene Foundation’s Facebook)

Each year, WEF hosts a series of engaging and meaningful events, bringing the Ethiopian American diaspora together in a powerful show of unity and support. This October’s fundraising gala, held in Springfield, VA, was a night to remember, with proceeds dedicated to expanding Wegene’s programs. Attendees enjoyed cultural performances, auctions, and craft displays that celebrated Ethiopian heritage, while legendary Ethiopian guitarist Selam Seyoum Woldemariam provided memorable entertainment.

For those looking to contribute, WEF offers multiple ways to get involved, from memberships and monthly donations to participation in annual drives and federal employee giving campaigns. Notably, WEF encourages its members and community to share their talents, skills, and resources, helping to propel Ethiopia forward and bring positive change to the lives of countless families.

As WEF looks toward the future, they are committed to expanding their reach, both in Ethiopia and among the Ethiopian American community in the U.S. With the Youth Club’s enthusiasm and the broader community’s dedication, Wegene continues to build a legacy of empowerment and opportunity, one family at a time.


To learn more about WEF’s impactful work, upcoming events, or how to contribute, visit www.wegene.org. This holiday season, consider supporting Wegene Ethiopian Foundation’s mission and being part of a meaningful journey of transformation and community upliftment.

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Enkutatash! Celebrating Ethiopian New Year with Joy and Culture

In honor of this special day, we share this beautiful piece from Teen Vogue titled "On Ethiopian New Year, 'Meskel Flower' Is a Love Letter to Our Culture." (Photo via een Vogue)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: September 11th, 2024

New York (TADIAS) — As we welcome the Ethiopian New Year with hope and joy, we also celebrate the rich culture and heritage that binds us together. In honor of this special day, we’re excited to share a beautiful piece from Teen Vogue titled “On Ethiopian New Year, ‘Meskel Flower’ Is a Love Letter to Our Culture.” This article captures the essence of our traditions, the vibrant spirit of our community, and the love for our homeland. We hope it inspires you as much as it has inspired us. Wishing you all a healthy, peaceful, and prosperous New Year!

On Ethiopian New Year, “Meskel Flower” Is a Love Letter to Our Culture

Teen Vogue
By Ruhama Wolle
September 11, 2024

Every September 11—as the rains retreat and the earth drinks its final drops—the golden petals of the Meskel flower are blooming across Ethiopia. They blanket the highlands in yellow brilliance, a living tapestry that signals the dawn of a new year: Enkutatash, the Ethiopian New Year. While the world waits for the cold grip of winter to mark the start of its calendar, Ethiopia steps into 2017, holding onto a unique timeline rooted in its own heritage. In a world hurtling toward 2025, Ethiopia stands anchored in its own rhythm, a subtle reminder that time moves differently here, steeped in the kind of history and culture that refuses to be rushed.

This isn’t just another New Year. It’s a reclamation. A renaissance. As Ghana’s ‘Year of Return’ turned the eyes of the African diaspora back to the continent, Ethiopia has quietly been sparking its own cultural revival, one that transcends tourism. It is a deep reconnection with roots, an affirmation that despite conflict and struggle, this ancient land is not only surviving—it is thriving.

Ethiopia has always set the stage for global influence—starting with Lucy, the oldest human ancestor, who marked the very beginning of humanity. One of the only African nations that was never colonized, as Ethiopia remained unbroken, the world took notice. The red, yellow, and green of its flag didn’t just represent a nation; they became the symbol for independence movements across the globe.

Read the full article and see photos at teenvogue.com »


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Election 2024: Ethiopian American Voters, Transition Teams, and the Road Ahead

Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump face off in their first presidential debate at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia today. (Photos via X: @KamalaHarris and @realDonaldTrump)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: September 10th, 2024

New York (TADIAS) – As the 2024 U.S. presidential election approaches, both major party candidates are set to debate in Philadelphia tonight. Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump will face off for the first time since Harris became the Democratic nominee. The debate is expected to focus on key issues such as the economy, immigration, foreign policy, and other domestic matters, providing a critical opportunity for each candidate to appeal to voters and clarify their positions.

This debate comes at a pivotal moment in the campaign season. Vice President Harris, who accepted the Democratic nomination last month after President Biden dropped out, is looking to build on recent gains in swing state polls. Former President Trump, who secured the GOP nomination despite an assassination attempt earlier this year, will seek to solidify his base while reaching out to undecided voters. Both candidates are expected to make their case to the American people at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia.

Key Developments Leading Up to the Debate:

Harris Transition Team Takes Shape: The Harris campaign has appointed Yohannes Abraham, the U.S. Ambassador to ASEAN, to lead the presidential transition team should Harris win the election. Abraham, a seasoned political strategist who previously led the Biden transition in 2020, will be stepping down from his current post in Jakarta to take on this critical role.

Trump Campaign Prepares for Transition: In a similar move, the Trump campaign has also announced its transition team, headed by Linda McMahon, former head of the Small Business Administration, and Howard Lutnick, CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald. The team aims to distance itself from more controversial elements associated with Project 2025, a policy initiative by conservative groups. Additionally, former President Donald Trump has added his onetime campaign rival Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard to the transition team.

Former VP Dick Cheney’s Defection: In a surprising turn of events, former Vice President Dick Cheney, a prominent Republican figure, announced he would not support the Republican ticket in the 2024 election. This marks the most high-profile defection of a Republican to Harris’s side, highlighting growing divisions within the GOP establishment. Cheney’s endorsement follows his daughter, Liz Cheney, who also publicly confirmed her father’s decision not to support Trump, further raising questions about how other Republicans will position themselves in this election cycle.

Multicultural Voter Shifts: Recent data shows shifting dynamics among multicultural voters heading into the 2024 election. According to a new report by My Code™, there has been an increase in support for Vice President Harris among multicultural men, highlighting a trend that could impact the election outcome. The report emphasizes the need for candidates to connect with diverse communities through targeted messaging and concrete policy actions.

Habeshas for Harris Campaign Gains Momentum: The “Habeshas for Harris” coalition, representing Ethiopian and Eritrean Americans, is mobilizing support for Vice President Harris, emphasizing the importance of political representation and advocating for community concerns at both the national and local levels.

As the election draws nearer, these developments reflect the broader strategies of both campaigns to engage key voter groups and address pressing national issues. With the debate stage set in Philadelphia, the focus will now turn to how effectively each candidate can communicate their vision for the country’s future.


Related:

Harris-Trump presidential debate: How to watch live (Yahoo News)

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Group Exhibition Showcasing Ethiopian and Diaspora Artists Opens in New York

Tadesse Mesfin, Column of Rhythm I, 2022. (Courtesy of Addis Fine Art)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: May 7th, 2024

New York (TADIAS) — This week a captivating group exhibition featuring paintings, textiles, and mixed-media works by artists from Ethiopia and its diasporas will take place at the NADA Exhibition Space in New York City. The exhibition’s private view kicks off on May 8th from 6 to 9 pm.

Hosted by the New Art Dealers Alliance (NADA) at their gallery in the Lower East Side, this showcase brings together a diverse array of artists at various stages of their careers. Among the talents featured are Dawit Adnew, Adiskidan Ambaye, Tesfaye Bekele, Merikokeb Berhanu, Tizta Berhanu, Noah Beyene, Henok Getachew, Engdaye Lemma, Tadesse Mesfin, Helina Metaferia, Selome Muleta, Nirit Takele, and Tesfaye Urgessa.

This exhibition serves as a poignant tribute to the enduring contributions of artists from the Horn of Africa, both within the region and across the globe. At a time when Ethiopia’s rich artistic heritage is gaining widespread recognition, this showcase provides a platform for dialogue and celebration. It is an exciting opportunity to showcase the diverse talent and cultural wealth emanating from the region, characterized by its transnational and cross-generational connections.

Don’t miss the chance to immerse yourself in this vibrant exhibition, which promises to be a testament to the richness and dynamism of contemporary Ethiopian art.

If You Go:

8 May – 31 May 2024
Private View: 8 May, 6 – 9 pm
NADA Exhibition Space
311 E Broadway, Floor 2, New York, NY
Tuesday – Saturday, 11 am – 6 pm
CCONNECTED THREADS: NADA EXHIBITION PREVIEW

Related:

Julie Mehretu’s BMW Art Car to Make its World Premiere in Paris

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Dr. Lia Tadesse: Former Ethiopian Health Minister to Head Harvard Leadership Program

Dr. Lia Tadesse Gebremedhin. (Photo: Kent Dayton/Harvard)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: March 12, 2024

New York (TADIAS) – Dr. Lia Tadesse emerged as a pivotal leader in Ethiopia’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, assuming her role on March 12, 2020, the day after the virus was classified as a global health emergency. In the face of adversity, she swiftly moved to announce the country’s first confirmed case of coronavirus and outlined the various measures her office was implementing to mitigate the emerging crisis, showcasing her adept leadership. Dr. Lia is credited for approaching the pandemic not only as a challenge but also as a chance to improve the nation’s healthcare infrastructure. “We aimed to respond not just in the short-term, but also for the long-term,” she explained. “It was an opportunity to bolster the entire health system.”

Ethiopia’s proactive measures, including the expansion of the public health workforce and enhanced access to critical care, proved instrumental in mitigating the virus’s impact.

This month, Harvard University announced that Dr. Lia would lead its Ministerial Program, a collaborative initiative involving the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard Kennedy School, and Harvard Graduate School of Education. Dr. Lia, an OB/GYN by training, brings a wealth of experience to her new role, having previously served as Ethiopia’s Deputy Minister of Health, a provost at St. Paul’s Hospital Millennium Medical College in Addis Ababa, and a program director for various international maternal and child health projects. Before assuming her role at the Ministry of Health, Dr. Lia Tadesse held the position of Program Director at the University of Michigan’s Center for International Reproductive Health Training (CIRHT) in Ann Arbor, Michigan. During her tenure, she effectively collaborated with various institutions in Ethiopia and Rwanda to enhance the quality of reproductive health services and training.

Reflecting on her extensive leadership experience, Dr. Lia emphasized the importance of visionary leadership in bringing about meaningful transformation. I” know that the ability to make positive change is related to how strong a leader is,” she said. “Anything I can contribute to improving leadership around the world truly excites me.”

Read more »

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DC: The Kennedy Center Presents Historic Musical Tribute to Ethiopian Icon Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru

(Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: September 26th, 2023

New York (TADIAS) – This fall, The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. will host an extraordinary musical tribute in commemoration of the 100th birthday of the late Ethiopian pianist and composer, Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru. Emahoy, who passed away earlier this year at the age of 99, left an indelible mark on the world of classical music.

This historic event, scheduled for Tuesday, November 7th in the illustrious Terrace Theater, promises to be an unforgettable evening of classical music celebrating the legacy of a remarkable artist. The highlight is the debut of never-before-performed compositions by the late pianist and composer Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru. Audiences will also be treated to the premiere of a previously unreleased recording featuring selections performed by the virtuoso herself.

At the heart of this celebration is Thomas Feng, a renowned classical pianist and composer. Mr. Feng has dedicated himself to the preservation of Emahoy’s extensive archive of written and recorded music. During the event, he will provide insights into the technological marvels employed to safeguard and showcase this musical treasure trove.

The stage will be graced by exceptional performers, each with their own connection to Ethiopia and classical music:

John Paul McGee, a Jazz Pianist of remarkable talent.
Meklit Hadero, a Jazz/Blues Vocalist whose voice captivates hearts.
Thomas Feng, the Classical Pianist devoted to honoring Emahoy’s legacy.

If You Go:
TICKETS AVAILABLE OCTOBER 2nd, 10:00am!

Related

Watch: Labyrinth of Belonging – Documentary about Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru

Pianist & Composer Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru Passes Away at Age 99

Tadias Magazine

Updated: March 28th, 2023

New York (TADIAS) — Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru, the renowned Ethiopian nun Pianist & Composer, has passed away at the age of 99 in Jerusalem, where she had been living at the Ethiopian Monastery for almost 40 years. According to Fana Broadcasting, she died on March 23rd.

Emahoy Tsege Mariam was born as Yewubdar Gebru in Addis Abeba on December 12, 1923. She was sent to Switzerland at a young age, where she studied the violin and then the piano at a girls’ boarding school. After returning to Ethiopia, she was taken prisoner of war with her family during the Italian occupation and deported to the island of Asinara, north of Sardinia, and later to Mercogliano near Naples.

After the war, Yewubdar resumed her musical studies in Cairo and returned to Ethiopia accompanied by her teacher, the Polish violinist Alexander Kontorowicz. She then became a nun and took the title Emahoy and her name was changed to Tsege Mariam.


Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru. (Photo: Emahoy music foundation)


Left: Yewubdar Gebru, 1940s. (Photo: Emahoy music foundation)


Yewubdar Gebru as prisoner of War on the Italian Island of Azinara. (Photo: Emahoy music foundation)

Although she was raised in privilege with her father, Kantiba Gebru Desta, a former mayor of Gonder and Addis Abeba, Emahoy’s life was marked by struggles beyond her musical pursuits. She was taken as a prisoner of war by the Italian forces, and after their defeat, she faced obstacle from Ethiopian officials, who blocked her from obtaining a scholarship to study music in London.

Despite these challenges, she maintained a resilient attitude and famously remarked:

“We can’t always choose what life brings. But we can choose how to respond.”


(Photo: Emahoy music foundation)

After releasing her debut album in 1967, Emahoy Tsege Mariam dedicated the proceeds to charitable causes benefiting children. With the assistance of her family members residing in the United States, she eventually established the Emahoy Tsege Mariam Music Foundation, which aimed to provide children with opportunities to study music.

Emahoy gained international recognition through her solo compositions, which were published in the “Ethiopiques 21″ CD series by the French label Buda Musique in 2006. She is known for her classical and jazz music compositions, which are reflective and pensive, with ‘Homeless Wanderer’ being one of her most notable works.

Emahoy Tsege Mariam’s life has been one of resilience and commitment to her art. When she was denied the chance to study music in London, she entered the Guishen Mariam monastery in the Wello region at the age of 19. Within two years, she was ordained as a nun. During the 1960s, she studied the music of Saint Yared in Gonder, and in 1967, her first album was released in Germany.

Album: Éthiopiques 21 – Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru ‘The Homeless Wanderer’

Later Emahoy survived Ethiopia’s Marxist revolution in the 1970s and continued to create music, with her piano compositions being released in 1973 to raise funds for orphanages.

Her niece Hanna M. Kebbede emphasizes the teaching moments that can be drawn from Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru’s life, stating that “It is a uniquely Ethiopian story, but at the same time the lessons are universal.”

Emahoy’s music has been featured in several films, including the Oscar-nominated documentary Time and Rebecca Hall’s Netflix drama Passing. Journalist and author Kate Molleson made a documentary about Emahoy Tsege Mariam for BBC Radio Four called ‘The Honky Tonk Nun.’

In her interview with Alula Kebede on his Amharic radio program on the Voice of America, Emahoy said, “Although I did not have money to give them, I was determined to use my music to help these and other young people to get an education.”

The music and life of Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru continue to inspire young people, artists, and students around the world. Her unwavering commitment to using her talents for the betterment of others is a legacy that will endure.

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Ethiopian Airlines to Take Off to New US Destination: Atlanta!

This month Atlanta will become Ethiopian Airlines' latest passenger destination in the United States, joining the ranks of Chicago, Newark, New York, and Washington. (Photo: @flyethiopian)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: May 2nd, 2023

New York (TADIAS) — Ethiopian Airlines is all set to commence its new service connecting Atlanta with Addis Ababa this month.

The airline, which is the biggest in Africa and already operates over 130 international passenger and cargo destinations, has announced that it will provide four flights per week on the new U.S. route starting May 16th.

According to Ethiopian Airlines Group CEO Mesfin Tasew, the new service will boost tourism, investment, and socio-economic ties between the two regions. Atlanta will become the airline’s latest passenger destination in the United States, joining the ranks of Chicago, Newark, New York, and Washington.

Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens welcomed the move, calling the new connection a “win for our City” and expressing optimism about a successful partnership with Ethiopian Airlines.


The General Manager of the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport Balram “B” Bheodari added: “We are thrilled to welcome Ethiopian Airlines to ATL.” (Photo: @flyethiopian)


Ethiopian Airlines is the fastest growing Airline in Africa. (Photo: @flyethiopian)

“We are truly delighted to open our sixth gateway in North America with the new flight to Atlanta,” said Ethiopian CEO Mesfin Tasew, “We have been connecting the U.S. and Africa for 25 years now, and the new service will help boost investment, tourism, diplomatic, and socioeconomic bonds between the two regions. As a pan-African carrier, we are committed to further expanding our global network and connecting Africa with the rest of the world. We are also keen to better serve the U.S. by increasing our destinations and flight frequencies.”

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This Ethiopian Brand Is Brightening Homes With Its Colorful Textiles

(Courtesy of Bolé Road Textiles)

The Spruce

Updated: April 5th, 2023

Hana Getachew turned her passion for home textiles that were both vibrant and meaningful into a home decor brand, Bolé Road Textiles. Getachew combines her own style of sketching and knowledge of fine arts with the traditional motifs from her home country of Ethiopia to create her one-of-a-kind home decor collections. Each collection is curated through a process of playing with different color schemes and thoughtful motifs.

In collaboration with her local group of skilled artisans in Ethiopia, they bring Getachew’s designs to life using ancient weaving traditions. Each individual product is handwoven one by one, making it as unique and personal as it can be.

What’s the Story Behind Bolé Road Textiles?

Hana Getachew: I worked in commercial interiors for ten years, it was a career I loved. However, I was curious about what it would be like to carve a path of my own based on my background and interests. It was a huge leap of faith but I’ve always enjoyed sharing my culture, now it’s part of what I do!

Where Did the Name Bolé Road Textiles Originate From?

HG: I was born in Ethiopia, and I lived in a neighborhood called Bole (no accent but pronounced the same). Bole Road was a main street that connected our neighborhood to the rest of Addis Ababa.


(Courtesy of Bolé Road Textiles)

What Kind of Cultural Impact Do Your Products Have?

HG: I hope our textiles could be a conduit for cultural connection. I love telling stories of Ethiopia through our collections and I love that our clients get to share that and have a little piece of Ethiopian tradition in their homes.

What’s the Creative Process of Making Designs?

HG: I focus each collection around a concept or idea inspired by Ethiopia. Sometimes it’s about a particular region, as with the Heritage, Konso, and Harar Collections; sometimes, it’s about a landscape, such as the Admas Collection. The patterns and colors are all derived from the initial inspiration and concept.

Read more »

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Spotlight: Jomo Tariku, Ethiopian American Industrial Designer and Data Scientist

Tadias first featured Jomo Tariku's work nearly 20 years ago, and since then, he has become one of the leading Black furniture designers in America. (Photo: ©Gediyon Kifle/www.PhotoGK.com)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: March 29th, 2023

New York (TADIAS) — One of the most rewarding aspect of publishing Tadias is to track the continued progress of professionals from diverse fields, including artists, entrepreneurs, and scientists whose work and future aspiration we’ve profiled from an early stage of their career.

Jomo Tariku, an industrial designer and data scientist, is a prime example of this success story. Tadias first featured Jomo’s work nearly 20 years ago, and since then, he has become one of the leading Black furniture designers in America.

Recently, The New York Times asked Jomo to compile a list of designers from the African Diaspora that he believed deserved international attention. Out of over 80 designers, Jomo selected nine, which were featured in The Times earlier this month.

“It took me 30 years to get here, and I don’t want it to die with me.” Jomo told the Times. “We keep saying design is a global language. Well, it did not include us.” He added: “What’s the global part?”

As the Newspaper noted he is determined to boost the careers of other Black designers, including those associated with the Black Artists + Designers Guild, a nonprofit platform and mentorship organization that he helped establish in 2018.

Jomo’s own designs have also received a well-deserved widespread recognition. His Meedo chair, inspired by a hair pick, was acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and his Nyala chair, modeled after an antelope found in high altitude woodlands in Ethiopia, was featured in the film sets of “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.”

As Jomo continues to push boundaries in his field, he is also lifting up those around him, creating opportunities for emerging talent and ensuring that their potential is not overlooked.

Read his list at nytimes.com »

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Spotlight: The Texas BBQ Joint with Ethiopian Twist

Fasicka and Patrick Hicks, owners of Smoke’N Ash BBQ - Tex-Ethiopian Smokehouse, in Arlington, Texas. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

Updated: March 29th, 2023

New York (TADIAS) — How does injera with Texas barbecue sound?

Well, that’s exactly what you get at Smoke’N Ash BBQ – Tex-Ethiopian Smokehouse, a one-of-a-kind restaurant in Texas.

Owned by Fasicka and Patrick Hicks, this joint serves up traditional American BBQ with a unique Ethiopian twist: With a creative menu featuring dishes like Rib tibs, Shiro, brisket, Doro Wat, and Ethiopian veggie combos, it’s no wonder Smoke’N Ash was named one of the top 50 restaurants in America by the New York Times last year.

The couple’s journey started with Patrick’s passion for barbecuing, which soon turned into a thriving business. Customers couldn’t get enough, and the couple decided to take the leap and open their own restaurant.

According to their website: Fasicka, who was born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and Patrick, a native of Waco, Texas, met in 1997 and quickly discovered their shared love of barbecuing. They began with a smoker trailer, selling BBQ dishes at weekend pop-ups, and eventually moved into a brick and mortar restaurant as their customer base grew.

As the business expanded, Fasicka added traditional Ethiopian family dishes to the menu, blending the flavors of Ethiopia with Texas-style smoked meats to create Tex-Ethiopian barbecue. Smoke’N Ash BBQ is now the first restaurant in the world to offer this unique cuisine.

Now, customers from all 50 states flock to try their famous Tex-Ethiopian BBQ.

Watch: Smoke N Ash restaurant combines Texas barbecue with Ethiopian spices

Related:

Texas barbecue with an Ethiopian twist: Meet the Arlington couple behind the fusion being recognized nationwide

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New York Exhibition Features Ethiopian Artists at the Africa Center in Harlem

The traveling exhibition that’s currently on view at The Africa Center in Harlem is curated by Fitsum Shebeshe, a former assistant curator at the National Museum of Ethiopia. The show titled the 'States of Becoming,'features 17 artists from the Diaspora, including several Ethiopian-Americans, who reside and work in various places across the United States. (Photo: The Africa Center in New York)

Okay Africa

Having grown up in Ethiopia all his life, Fitsum Shebeshe had never known what it was like to travel outside of Hawassa where he was born. When he went outside the country for the first time, on a visit to Mozambique for an informal arts training program, his eyes were opened to brand new experiences and he wanted to learn more about the possibilities that were waiting for him beyond the borders of his home country, and, indeed, outside of Africa. While working as an assistant curator at the National Museum of Ethiopia, he applied to arts school in the US. Upon acceptance, he was given a scholarship to complete his Masters of Fine Arts in Curatorial Practice at Maryland Institute College of Art.

Based in the Washington DC area, Shebeshe work has centered on roles as both a curator and painter. He is currently the gallery director at Harmony Hall Regional Center in Fort Washington, Maryland, where he spoke to OkayAfrica about his hopes for the exhibition.

Read the interview at okayafrica.com »

Press release

The Africa Center

States of Becoming On view through February 26, 2023

The concept for States of Becoming evolved from curator Fitsum Shebeshe’s lived experience following his 2016 move from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to Baltimore, Maryland and his subsequent firsthand knowledge of the weight of cultural assimilation. Confronted with a different society, Shebeshe encountered a wide range of existential questions that shaped his relationship to institutions and culture. Shebeshe also had the realization for the first time that he was viewed as belonging to a minority because of the color of his skin, and a newfound awareness of the profound impact the traditional and conservative culture he grew up with in Ethiopia had on his personal sense of individuality.

Having found kinship among cultural practitioners from the African Diaspora who shared his experience, Shebeshe has united 17 artists with States of Becoming who either came to the United States over the past thirty years or who are first-generation born. The artists represented in States of Becoming relocated from twelve countries in Africa and one in the Caribbean–Ethiopia, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Liberia, Mauritania, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, and Zimbabwe–with roots in cities across the U.S., including New York, Washington, D.C., New Haven, Detroit, and Los Angeles.


Video screen shot of artwork by one of the featured Ethiopian artists Kibrom Araya. Other Ethiopian artists highlighted in the show include Helina Metaferia, Amare Selfu and Tariku Shiferaw. (The Africa Center)

Like Shebeshe, each artist in the exhibition has had a unique relationship to the U.S. context, which is reflected in their work. States of Becoming explores these artists’ perpetual process of identifying, redefining, and becoming themselves in both local and global contexts, opening up perspectives into multiple states both geographic and emotional in a constant flux of social and cultural adaptations. The exhibition presents work across mediums including painting, photography, sculpture, installation, and video, that express the many different ways in which identity is remade and reimagined. For instance, Nontsikelelo Mutiti looks to hair braiding salons of the African Diaspora, and Amare Selfu moves from figuration to abstraction to express transformation as a result of relocation. These distinct experiences produce a sense of hybrid culture emerging out of real and imagined genealogies of cultural, racial, national, and geographic belonging.

Artists: Gabriel C. Amadi-Emina, Kearra Amaya Gopee, Kibrom Araya, Nadia Ayari, Vamba Bility, Elshafei Dafalla, Masimba Hwati, Chido Johnson, Miatta Kawinzi, Dora King, Helina Metaferia, Nontsikelelo Mutiti, Yvonne Osei, Kern Samuel, Amare Selfu, Tariku Shiferaw, and Yacine Tilala Fall.

Learn more at www.theafricacenter.org.

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Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund Announces Board Vacancy

The Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund is a U.S.-based non-profit organization established to mobilize the Ethiopian Diaspora to raise funds and support Ethiopian projects at home. (Courtesy image)

Tadias Magazine

Published: Friday, November 18th, 2022

New York (TADIAS) – The Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund (EDTF) is recruiting new board members.

The U.S.-based non-profit said in an announcement that it’s currently seeking applicants who wish to serve on its board.

EDTF was established four years ago to mobilize the Ethiopian Diaspora to raise funds and support“inclusive development projects” in Ethiopia.

According to the press release the organization said it’s looking for “experience and skills necessary for board level positions, which may include, but not limited to, prior board or nonprofit experience, professional leadership, etc. Additionally, demonstration of skills consistent with the needs of the board, including fundraising, project management, finance, governance, etc.”

Anyone interested in applying for a position on EDTF’s board should visit their website at www.ethiopiatrustfund.org

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Ethiopia Reads Co-founder Jane Kurtz Receives IBBY Award For Her Work With Ethiopian Children

Jane Kurtz (right), who grew up in Ethiopia, is the Co-Founder of Ethiopia Reads, a U.S.-based non-profit that has been promoting a culture of reading in Ethiopia for more than two-decades. Since it was established in 1998 Ethiopia Reads has published hundreds of popular local children's books and English translations for Diaspora children in addition to opening over 70 libraries in every part of Ethiopia. (Courtesy photos)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 25th, 2022

New York (TADIAS) — The International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) has named Jane Kurtz, the Co-Founder of Ethiopia Reads, the winner of the 2022 iRead Outstanding Reading Promoter Award.

In a press release announcing the award IBBY said the winners “are inspiring examples of reading promoters who show us how one person can truly make a difference, especially when we work together.”

According to its website IBBY “is a non-profit organization, which represents an international network of people from all over the world who are committed to bringing books and children together.”

Jane, who was raised in Ethiopia, co-founded Ethiopia Reads in 1998 to promote “a culture of reading in Ethiopia” and to serve as “a model for others to follow in support of the next generation of Ethiopian parents, teachers, and leaders.”

Since it was established more than two-decades ago Ethiopia Reads has published hundreds of popular local children’s books (in several Ethiopian languages) and English translations for Diaspora children in addition to opening over 70 libraries in every part of Ethiopia.

In a statement Ethiopia Reads said its proud of it’s founder’s accomplishments:

60+ years ago, a young Jane Kurtz was raised with her siblings in a far away magical place called Maji in southwest Ethiopia. She grew up to become one of the ultimate creative minds and literacy champion for Ethiopian children! We couldn’t be prouder of Ethiopia Reads’ Cofounder, longtime leader and Advisor @JaneKurtz on her award by @IBBYINT as IBBY-iRead Outstanding Reader Promoter for her 30+ years of consistent work supporting children reading in Ethiopia. We look forward to the second round of 100 Ethiopian local language books coming soon. Please support Jane’s work by checking out #ReadySetGo titles by Open Hearts Big Dreams on Amazon.”

The award announcement added:

Jane Kurtz grew up in Ethiopia and has spent the last 25 years helping to develop indigenous authors and illustrators in Ethiopia—and in multiple languages—while also establishing an infrastructure for publishing books and promoting literacy with training for teachers and librarians. Her work began in 1998 when she co-founded Ethiopia Reads and developed a strategy for starting libraries to support literacy development. In early 2016, Jane initiated a workshop in Ethiopia with artists, children and adult volunteers, which resulted in a prototype for Ready Set Go books—colourful, easy-to-read, culturally appropriate, and published in English and one local language. Jane’s work with literacy addresses the challenges of multiple official languages; lack of books reflecting Ethiopian culture, history, and landscape; obstacles in the translation, publication, and distribution process; and insufficient professional opportunities for educators and librarians. With her vision and collaboration with others, she has planted the seeds of literacy all over Ethiopia.”

For more information, about the winners and about IBBY go to www.ibby.org. And learn more about Ethiopia Reads at www.ethiopiareads.org.

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Ethiopian Airlines Confirms CEO’s Early Retirement Due to Health Issues

Ethiopian Airlines has confirmed that its CEO Tewolde Gebremariam, who is currently in the U.S. receiving medical treatment, has stepped down from his position. In a statement the airline said Mr. Tewolde, who has worked at Ethiopian for 37 years including as CEO for the past decade, "requested early retirement in order for him to focus his full attention to his medical treatment." Below is the full statement. (Getty Images)

Ethiopian Airlines Statement

March 23rd, 2022

Early Retirement of Mr. Tewolde GebreMariam, Ethiopian Group Chief Executive Officer.

Mr. Tewolde GebreMariam has been under medical treatment in the USA for the last six months. As he needs to focus on his personal health issues, he is unable to continue leading the airline as a Group CEO, a duty which demands closer presence and full attention round the clock. Accordingly, Mr. Tewolde GebreMariam requested the Board of Management of Ethiopian Airlines Group(the “Board”), for early retirement in order for him to focus his full attention to his medical treatment.

The Board, in its ordinary meeting held on Wednesday, March 23, 2022, has accepted Mr. Tewolde’s request for early retirement.

Mr. Tewolde led the Airline for over a decade with remarkable success reflected in its exceptional performance in all parameters including but not limited to exponential growth from one Billion USD annual turn-over to 4.5 Billion, from 33 airplanes to 130 airplanes and from 3 million passengers to 12 million passengers (pre-COVID).

Under his leadership, the airline group has grown by four fold in all measurements building more than USD 700 million worth of vital infrastructure like Africa’s biggest hotel, Cargo terminal, MRO hangars and shops, Aviation Academy and Full Flight Simulators. The Board, the Senior Management, employees and the whole Ethiopian Airlines family express their gratefulness for his contribution and wish him full recovery soon.

The Board will announce the new Group CEO and successor to Ato Tewolde GebreMariam shortly. Mr. Girma Wake, former CEO of Ethiopian Airlines, has been appointed recently as a new Chairman of the Board of Management of Ethiopian Airlines Group by the Ethiopian Public Enterprises Holding & Administration Agency.

Mr. Girma Wake is a highly experienced, successful and well-regarded business leader and a well-known figure in the aviation industry who previously led Ethiopian Airlines for 7 years as a CEO and laid the foundation for the fast and profitable growth of the airline. The combination of his experience, work-culture and drive makes him capable of chairing the board and take the airline to the next level. Mr. Girma’s decision-making skills are tested and well proved.”

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Spotlight: Three Ethiopian Titles at the 2022 New African Film Festival in Maryland

This year's New African Film Festival features three Ethiopian films including 'A Fire Within [ፍትህ],' the groundbreaking Ethiopian-American courtroom drama executive produced by Liya Kebede, as well as two new documentaries made in Ethiopia: 'Among Us Women' & 'Stand Up My Beauty.' (Photo: @AFireWithinDoc)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 9th, 2022

New York (TADIAS) — The U.S. debut of two recently released Ethiopian documentary movies and an historic Ethiopian-American courtroom drama are part of the lineup at the 2022 New African Film Festival, which is set to kick-off this month in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Organizers announced the “American premieres of powerful Ethiopian documentaries Among us Women and Stand Up My Beauty” in a press release highlighting this year’s program that promises to showcase “the vibrancy of African filmmaking from all corners of the continent and across the diaspora to the Washington, DC, area.”

The annual festival, which celebrates its 18th anniversary this year, takes place from March 18 to 31 at AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center in downtown Silver Spring.

The press release added: “This year’s fully in-person festival features 28 films from 17 countries, including five U.S. or North American premieres.”

The featured films include A Fire Within [ፍትህ], the groundbreaking Ethiopian-American courtroom drama executive produced by Liya Kebede and directed by acclaimed filmmaker Christopher Chambers. Organizers note that the screening of A Fire Within will feature a Q&A with Chambers.

Below are descriptions and trailers of the Ethiopian films courtesy of AFI Silver Theatre.

A FIRE WITHIN

Special Features: Q&A with filmmaker Christopher Chambers following the March 20 screening

[ፍትህ]

After suffering through the Red Terror, a dark time in Ethiopia’s history during which many educated young people were tortured and murdered, Edgegayehu “Edge” Taye fled to the United States in 1989 as a refugee. Settling in Atlanta, she found work at a hotel, only to discover that the very man who was responsible for her torture in Ethiopia was also working there. Along with several friends who were victims of the same man and are now all living in the U.S., Taye embarks on a landmark human rights case to bring their tormentor to trial. Executive produced by Ethiopian actress and activist Liya Kebede, this incredible and chilling true crime documentary shines a light on a painful time in Ethiopia’s history and reveals the healing power of restorative justice. Winner, Audience Award, Best Documentary, 2021 Atlanta, Naples and North Dakota Human Rights film festivals. DIR/SCR/PROD Christopher Chambers; PROD Ermias Woldeamlak. U.S./Canada/Ethiopia, 2021, color, 85 min. In English and Amharic with English subtitles. NOT RATED

No AFI Member passes accepted.

Run Time: 85 Minutes
Genre: Documentary
Opening Date: Sunday, March 20, 2022

U.S. Premiere

AMONG US WOMEN

Sat, March 26, 12:25 p.m.; Wed, March 30, 7:00 p.m.

The first feature-length documentary by German director Sarah Noa Bozenhardt and Ethiopian filmmaker Daniel Abate Tilahun follows Hulu Endeshaw, a young Ethiopian farmer who is awaiting the birth of her fourth child and finds herself caught between the modern and traditional systems of midwifery in place in her rural village of Megendi. On one hand, she regularly attends checkups at the local health center, where staff are fighting high maternal mortality rates. On the other, Hulu is apprehensive of a system in which she feels unheard and turns to the traditional midwife Endal Gedif for support and comfort. Surrounded by many varying female perspectives, Hulu wrestles with the roles she is expected to play as a mother, a wife and a woman. To unravel her personal wants and needs, she takes the film’s narrative into her own hands, exploring her burning past and her uncertain future. Both because of her fellow women and despite them, Hulu holds onto the desire to define her own path, and gradually unveils the secrets she has kept close to her chest. In English and Amharic with English subtitles. NOT RATED

STAND UP MY BEAUTY

Special Features: North American Premiere

Nardos, an Azmari singer from Addis Ababa, dreams of telling stories about the lives of ordinary people through her music. In her search for stories for her songs, she meets Gennet, a poet who lives on the streets with her children. As Nardos puts the lives of Ethiopian women, their visions and power at the center of her creation, the documentary dives deeper and deeper into a rapidly changing country. (Note courtesy of Deckert Distribution.) Official Selection, 2021 Locarno Film Festival. DIR Heidi Specogna; PROD Heino Deckert, Rolf Schmid. Switzerland/Germany, 2021, color, 110 min. In Amharic with English subtitles. NOT RATED

Run Time: 110 Minutes
Genre: Documentary – music
Opening Date: Saturday, March 26, 2022

Learn more about the festival at AFI.com

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Warning to Democrats: Ethiopian American Voters Ready to Bolt Over Foreign Policy

Across America Ethiopian American voters, who are traditionally a reliable democratic base, are mobilizing on social media and other platforms - as they did in Virginia this past November -- to support the Republican take over of the U.S. Congress next year. As the following report from North Carolina indicate the community at large feels deeply disappointed as well as ignored and betrayed by the Biden administration's now ridiculous approach towards Ethiopia. (Photo: Ethiopians protest in Raleigh, North Carolina/Indy week).

Indy week

Ethiopian Americans Dissatisfied with the Biden Administration’s Foreign Policy Positions Towards the African Nation Could Mean Democrats Can’t Rely on Their Votes in Next Year’s Elections

Last month, Teshale Gebremichael helped organize a protest for members of North Carolina’s Ethiopian American communities who condemned the U.S. government’s support of what they describe as a “terrorist” group that is attempting to usurp their country’s democratically elected government.

On November 21, the demonstrators assembled in front of the old state capitol grounds near the intersection of Hillsborough and Salisbury Streets at about three p.m. before marching to the front of the old Wake County Courthouse on Fayetteville Street. There, a man with a bullhorn exhorted the crowd to a call-and-response protest.

“African solutions for African problems!” he shouted into the bullhorn.

“African solutions for African problems!” his countrymen and women replied in unison.

“We are united!”

“No more! We say no more!”

“We stand with Ethiopia!”

“We stand with the Ethiopian government!”

Gebremichael, an Ethiopian American, has been living in the Triangle for over a decade.

“Why is the Biden administration standing with bad people? Why is Biden standing with gangsters?” Gebremichael asked, while speaking with the INDY last week. “And now our country is about to fall apart.”

Nearly 200 Ethiopian Americans, many of them wrapped in the red-green-and-gold flags of one of the world’s oldest nations, assembled at the old state capitol and voiced their disapproval on a day when similar protests were taking place across the globe.

The Ethiopian American protesters were joined by expatriates from neighboring Eritrea and gathered under a banner stating #NoMore to denounce what they described as the Biden administration’s “disastrous foreign policy” by way of sanctions that have hurt their country; the threat of sending U.S. ground troops into the country, and a disinformation campaign carried out by Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) to discredit the current government.

It’s a complicated issue.

A civil war erupted late last year between the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia and inhabitants of the country’s Tigray region…

That conflict is more than 8,000 miles away in the country’s northern region. The fighting and subsequent U.S. government sanctions could have dire consequences for Democratic Party candidates during the 2022 election. If President Joe Biden does not lift the sanctions, Ethiopian Americans here and across the United States are threatening to vote for Republicans next year.

Ethiopian Americans typically cast their votes for Democratic Party candidates, but they are deeply hurt by the Biden administration’s decision on September 17 to authorize sanctions that do not single out specific factions but hold the governments of Ethiopia and Eritrea and the Tigray forces responsible for participating in a civil war that has left “nearly one million people living in famine-like conditions” while “millions more face acute food insecurity as a direct consequence of the violence,” according to a White House statement.

“I am appalled by the reports of mass murder, rape, and other sexual violence to terrorize civilian populations,” stated President Biden, who added that the “sanctions are not directed at the people of Ethiopia or Eritrea but rather the individuals and entities perpetrating the violence and driving a humanitarian disaster.”

But Ethiopian Americans here in the Triangle, and across the globe, say the sanctions are hurting their families and neighbors back home in an impoverished country that ranks 173 out of 189 countries and territories in human development, according to the 2020 Human Development Report.

On November 2, Biden suspended Ethiopia from the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) “for gross violations of internationally recognised human rights,” according to Reuters. Days later, officials with the global fashion giant PVH Corp. announced that the company was shutting down a manufacturing factory in Ethiopia, owing to the loss of duty-free access to the United States because of the war.

Muna Mengesha, one of the organizers of the Raleigh protest and a real estate agent and mother of two, told the INDY the factory closing has left 150,000 people without work, but according to Reuters, officials in her homeland warned the shutdown “could take away 1 million jobs, disproportionately hurting poor women, who are the majority of garment workers.”

Mengesha says that in addition to factory workers losing their jobs in Addis Ababa, the country’s suspension from AGOA is also being felt in the rural parts of the country.

“Without AGOA, small farmers can’t send what they produce to the United States tax free,” she explains. “That’s their livelihood. That’s how they send their kids to school. That’s how they provide for their family.” Raleigh’s protest organizers say there’s currently a global movement among Ethiopia expatriates to heed Prime Minister Abiy’s call to return home for the Christmas holidays with the aim of supporting their country’s economy to offset the Biden administration’s sanctions.

“It’s a big movement right now,” Gebremichael said. “I’m not going because I went back last year. But I wish I could.”

Ethiopian expatriates point to last month’s gubernatorial election in Virginia where the Republican candidate, Glenn Youngkin, narrowly beat incumbent governor Terry McAuliffe. According to reports, a coordinated effort from Ethiopian expatriate voters helped contribute to Youngkin’s narrow margin of victory.

“That’s the plan here, too,” Mengesha said. “Personally, I don’t want to vote Republican, but at the end of the day that’s my homeland. In Virginia, people who don’t ever vote voted just because of the Biden administration and the way they handled the situation.”

Another Raleigh protest organizer, Fitsum Kedebe, 37, is a native of Ethiopia now living in Durham. During the past presidential election, Kedebe helped Democratic Party candidates by canvassing in Bull City neighborhoods.

“Donald Trump was saying things no world leader should ever say,” Kedebe, a married father of two children, told the INDY. “But I was never expecting Biden to go this extreme. I never expected him to go this far to support Tigray. Even [the U.S. government] has been saying since 1992 that the Tigray People’s Liberation Front is a terrorist group.”

Kedebe acknowledged the Sisyphean irony of casting a vote for an American political party enamored with misinformation to help bring about the downfall of a political party in his native country that also thrives in a false news ecosystem. He brushes aside the suggestion that a Republican administration may feel more comfortable with TPLF holding the reins of power in his country.

“The Democratic Party says it looks out for the poor, but it’s fractured,” he said. “It’s losing ground. The only reason Biden was elected was because of Black Lives Matter, and 79 million people still voted for Trump. We should be united. We see freedom losing.”

Read the full article at indyweek.com »

Related:

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Pictures: The Wall Street Journal on Ethiopia’s volunteer ‘citizens’ army.’

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US policies on Ethiopia, Nigeria, and Covid in Africa come under fire in Congress

UPDATE: Ethiopia Recaptures World Heritage Site Lalibela From TPLF

China’s Top Diplomat Visits Addis, Takes a Jab at Foreign Interference in Ethiopia’s ‘Domestic Affairs’

US halts decision on genocide designation to pursue diplomacy in Ethiopia

Ethiopia to U.S.: Stop Misinformation

Announcement by Olympic Legends Haile & Feyisa Capture Ethiopia’s Mood

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Ethiopia Struggles to Find Its Voice in Western Media Amid Misinformation

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In Africa, America’s Hysterical Western Media Driven Ethiopia Policy Reaches Dead End

What’s Wrong With Blinken? Goes to Africa to Talk Ethiopia, But Skips Addis & AU?

In U.S Ethiopian American Voters Send Biden a Message, Flipping Virginia Red

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In U.S Ethiopian American Voters Send Biden a Message, Flipping Virginia Red

Just as they did in 2008 when Ethiopian American voters helped to flip Virginia for the Democrats, The Washington Post reports that this year the community swung for Republican candidates sending a message to the Biden administration about its rather belligerent and failed foreign policy towards Ethiopia. (Photo: Protesters rallied outside of the White House on Nov. 8 to denounce President Biden's approach to the conflict in Ethiopia/The Washington Post)

The Washington Post

Why some Ethiopian voters in Virginia swung for Youngkin — and how it may spell trouble for Democrats elsewhere

Girma Makonnen had long considered himself a loyal Democrat. Since emigrating from Ethiopia and then settling in Northern Virginia more than two decades ago, he donated, phone-banked and door-knocked for a long list of liberal candidates.

Except this year, when the 52-year-old voted for Glenn Youngkin — and other Republicans down the ticket.

“The Democratic Party right now is the Biden administration, and they blindsided us on foreign policy,” said Makonnen, an engineer who lives in Ashburn. “We were Democrats because we believed in the system. But everybody in the Ethiopian community is feeling the pain of neglect.”

Like him, some Ethiopian Americans in Virginia heeded calls to cast a vote for the GOP at the polls earlier this month amid a coordinated effort to express disapproval with how President Biden has handled growing conflict in the East African nation.

Those involved in the effort support Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who won the Nobel Peace Prize two years ago but has since led the country into an escalating civil war, vowing to “bury this enemy with our blood and bones.”

Leaders of the effort say that by authorizing sanctions on Ethiopia and cutting off trade benefits, Biden has effectively empowered the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), a repressive regime that led the country before Abiy.

And with seemingly no response to their concerns from the White House, organizers said, Abiy supporters in Virginia took their message to the polls — despite, or perhaps because of, the Ethiopian community’s long allegiance with Democrats.

“The government’s approach is so illogical at this point that we have to show we are disappointed in an area that can potentially hurt the Democratic Party,” said Mesfin Tegenu, chairman of the American-Ethiopian Public Affairs Committee (AEPAC).

Organizers with the group said they put out mass messaging on social media, canvassed at Ethiopian Orthodox churches and restaurants in the D.C. suburbs, and texted thousands of people in hopes of rallying community members to vote for Youngkin.

Whether it made a difference in the election is difficult, if not outright impossible, to quantify. Although the Northern Virginia suburbs are home to one of the largest Ethiopian communities in the country, there is little data on how it functions as a voting bloc — or how members of the Ethiopian diaspora voted in Youngkin’s narrow victory over former governor Terry McAuliffe (D) earlier this month.

Virginia is home to about 30,000 immigrants from Ethiopia — about 1 in 8 of all Ethiopians nationwide, according to estimates from the Migration Policy Institute. Fairfax County and Alexandria have some of the highest concentrations of Ethiopians in the country.

A look at heavily East African precincts in the area, including those in Woodbridge and West End Alexandria, does not show a strong swing to Youngkin compared with previous years or other precincts in heavily blue Northern Virginia.

Still, community leaders from across the political spectrum — including some who campaigned for McAuliffe — say it was impossible to ignore an unprecedented set of rumblings, one that may offer a warning to Democratic campaigns elsewhere.

“It was pretty widespread,” said Bert Bayou, an Ethiopian American who helped canvass for McAuliffe as the vice president of Unite Here Local 23. “Ethiopians felt betrayed by the U.S., but specifically by the party.”

Read more »

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Spotlight: In NYC ECMAA Hosts Ethiopian Day Picnic, Celebrates 40th Anniversary

Photo: Courtesy of the Ethiopian Community Mutual Assistance Association (ECMAA)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: September 15th, 2021

New York (TADIAS) — As the Ethiopian Community Mutual Assistance Association (ECMAA) celebrates its 40th anniversary this year, the organization announced that it will host its popular annual Ethiopian Day Picnic on September 19th in New York City — marking its first live public event since the pandemic.

In a newsletter ECMAA said the gathering this month is a symbol of our capacity to recover from difficulties and persist as a community. “Resilience and perseverance are not valued highly enough [and] we don’t celebrate managing challenges and still standing and growing,” the press release said. “We will celebrate this and ECMAA’s 40th anniversary at the annual Ethiopian Day Picnic.”

The announcement added:

In 1981, a group of refugees who felt that they could decided to gather and figure out how to help those who’ve newly arrived. In 2021, we’re Ethiopians of significantly varying backgrounds living in the tri-state area still creating a community while we rush and struggle through day to day life in New York City.

We’ll get together as a full community in this large setting for the first time since March of 2020…We celebrate still standing after many ups and downs for ECMAA from its inception, we celebrate still standing as a we face a global pandemic that forced us to separate and yet still grow stronger in support of each other, we celebrate our place of birth or heritage even as it struggles with multiple challenges that can shake us, we celebrate the flowers that still bloom, our children that still grow and our community to keeps working at being a resource to the community. We celebrate as we also mourn the losses our community and our country has sustained. We’re long-distance runners – marathoners who keep going despite the challenges that come our way. We are ECMAA and invite you to come honor our past, celebrate life and solidify our future.


(Photo: Courtesy of ECMAA)


(Photo: Courtesy of ECMAA)

The Ethiopian Day Picnic will take place on Sunday at Sakura Park in Manhattan. Organizers urge participants to be respectful and abide by current CDC guidelines in regards to COVID-19. “Although the picnic takes place outside we advise everyone to maintain social distancing and wear masks when not eating or drinking,” ECMAA said. “We all want to have fun and be safe.”

According to the program scheduled activities at the family-friendly outdoor event include fun and games featuring Sem Ena Werk quiz for adults while children “enjoy some dancing and tunes, catch up, with old friends, challenge the kids to tug-of-war, but make sure you’ve met someone you’ve not met before and have some cake.”

If You Go:

Ethiopian Day Picnic,
Sunday, September 19, at 2pm in Sakura Park in Manhattan.
More info at www.ecmaany.org

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Remembering Alemayehu Eshete: Ethiopian Music Legend Passes Away at 80

Born in 1941 Alemayehu Eshete rose to fame in the 60s, matching his Ethiopian heritage against jazz improvisation and soulful appeal...Multiple reports from Ethiopia have confirmed the passing of Alemayehu Eshete. (Getty Images)

Clash Music

Ethiopian artist Alemayehu Eshete has died, it has been reported.

Born in 1941 the singer rose to fame in the 60s, matching his Ethiopian heritage against jazz improvisation and soulful appeal.

Performing with the famed Police Orchestra in Addis Ababa, Alemayehu Eshete enjoyed his first hit ‘Seul’ in 1961 before forming his own Alem-Girma Band.

Releasing 30 singles across a 15 year period, Alemayehu Eshete became one of the defining Ethiopian artists of his era – at one point dubbed the Ethiopian Elvis.

Political shifts in the country substantively altered the cultural climate, but a new generation of crate-diggers – spurred on by the Ethiopiques compilation series – embraced his music.

Writing, recording, and touring until the very end, multiple reports from Ethiopia have confirmed the passing of Alemayehu Eshete.

Ethiopia: Popular Ethiopian Music Legend Alemayehu Eshete Dies (Allafrica)


Legendary Ethiopian singer Alemayehu Eshete, 80, died in Addis Ababa on Thursday.

Nicknamed “the Ethiopian Elvis”, the musician died of a heart attack shortly after he was admitted to hospital, bringing to an end a musical career that spanned four different political epochs in the country.

He had, five years ago, undergone a heart surgery in Italy to fix blockages in arteries. This forced him to limit his performances.

Born in 1941, the singer was one of the most popular musicians to emerge in the early 1960s. He also played modern Ethiopian music.

Eshete highly influenced Ethiopian modern music through his outstanding pieces that were loved by many. He was actively involved in Ethio-jazz music from the 1960s.

Compose songs

He was among the first Ethiopian singers to compose songs in English and other foreign languages.

“Temar Lije” or “My Son, You Had Better Learn” is one of his popular songs that motivated many to acquire modern education.

The popular song is still used by Ethiopian parents to discipline and counsel their children, and to raise awareness on the importance of education.

In 2015, the song won an award in Germany.

He also won the Lifetime Achievement Award for his work in Ethiopia. His stylish dress code and hairstyle made him popular among the youth in the 1960s and 1970s.

Eshete was one of the first musicians to record music to vinyl in Ethiopia.

Since his death, his colleagues and fans have continued to send messages of condolence.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said: “I’m saddened to hear that Alemayehu Eshete, a role model for many singers, has passed away.”

“Ethiopia will always be honored in his works. Those who worked for Ethiopia will not die, but will rest in glory,” the Prime Minister added.

Timeless tunes

Selam, a Swedish Independent Cultural Organisation, which has an office in Addis Ababa, also paid tribute to Eshete: “We are deeply saddened by the death of Alemayehu Eshete. Known for his best timeless tunes, ‘Temar Lije’ and ‘Addis Ababa Bete’, Eshete was one of the most popular legendary Ethiopian singers. Our most heartfelt condolences to his family and friends”

Born and raised in Jimma, Eshete who was fascinated by Hollywood films. He attempted to go to Hollywood with his friend at a younger age.

He started his journey to Hollywood with his friend with a hundred birr ($ 2) he picked from his father’s pocket. However, before he could achieve his goal, he was caught at Eritrea’s Massawa Port and sent back home. He loved Rock music.

He played much of the English vocals of American vocalists Pat Bonn, Bill Haley and Elvis Presley.

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Ethiopians Headline the Women’s and Men’s Elite Fields for the Boston Marathon

Ethiopia’s Yebrgual Melese and Mare Dibaba are among the star international female athletes competing in the upcoming 2021 Boston Marathon, while the men's elite category also includes Ethiopians Asefa Mengstu, Lemi Berhanu Hayle and Jemal Yimer. (Getty Images)

The Boston Globe

A pair of Ethiopian runners with the fastest men’s and women’s times in the field headline the elite runner entry list for the 2021 Boston Marathon that was announced Wednesday by the Boston Athletic Association.

Because of the pandemic, the race was postponed from April and will be run Oct. 11.

Nine women who have run faster than 2:22:00 will line up in Hopkinton, including Ethiopia’s Yebrgual Melese, whose 2:19:36 personal best ranks fastest in the field. Melese will have some tough competition from fellow Ethiopian Mare Dibaba, the 2015 world champion and 2016 Olympic bronze medalist.

Dibaba has broken 2:20 twice, running 2:19:52 in 2012 and 2015, but she has not run that fast since. Also, Edina Kiplagat of Kenya, a two-time world champion and Olympic silver medalist who finished second at Boston in 2019, will challenge for the top spot.

American Jordan Hasay is familiar with the course, finishing third twice. She is the third-fastest US woman in history with a personal best of 2:20:57.

On the men’s side, Ethiopian Asefa Mengstu has the fastest personal best and the 23rd- fastest marathon ever at 2:04:06. Fellow Ethiopians Lemi Berhanu Hayle, the 2015 Boston champion, and Dejene Debela, who has run a sub-2:06, will join him. Berhanu’s personal best is just behind Mengstu’s at 2:04:33.

After much success over the half marathon and in cross-country, Kenya’s Leonard Barsoton and Ethiopia’s Jemal Yimer will make their marathon debuts. Barsoton earned a silver medal at the World Cross-Country Championships in 2017, and Yimer owns the Ethiopian national record of 58:33 in the half marathon.

Eight of the top 12 finishers from the US Olympic marathon trials will compete in Boston, including Abdi Abdirahman, who finished 41st at the Tokyo Games last week.

In the women’s wheelchair field, course record-holder Manuela Schär of Switzerland is the favorite, but she will be challenged by five-time Boston champion Tatyana McFadden. Team USA Paralympians Susannah Scaroni and Jenna Fesemyer also will compete.

The men’s wheelchair field features four former champions: Daniel Romanchuk, Marcel Hug, Ernst van Dyk, and Josh Cassidy, who have a combined 16 Boston titles. Aaron Pike, who will compete for Team USA in the Paralympic marathon, also will be in the field.

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Spotlight: A New Documentary ‘Free Art Felega 5 – Disrupt’ Celebrates Ethiopian Artists

Organizers note that a virtual launch of the documentary 'Free Art Felega 5 - Disrupt' is scheduled for Sunday, August, 15th, 2021 featuring all participating artists. (Photos courtesy of Free Art Felega)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: August 11th, 2021

New York (TADIAS) — You may remember our story last year highlighting a “positive and optimistic” art project amid the gloom of the COVID-19 era called Free Art Felega, an online space organized by German-based Ethiopian artist Yenatfenta Abate that gave Ethiopian artists, both in Ethiopia and the Diaspora, a place to gather and exhibit their work for audiences around the world.

This week organizers announced that they will release a new documentary film titled ‘Free Art Felega 5 – Disrupt showing “the result of six months of hard work from the 32 participating Ethiopian artists in times of CoVid-19, including the personal artist statements.”


Photos courtesy of Free Art Felega

The announcement added: “You will receive deeper insights into the motivations and thoughts of every participating artist and, very important, their way of finding their artistic identity.”

Organizers note that a virtual launch of the documentary is scheduled for this coming Sunday, August, 15th, featuring all participating artists.

If You Go:

A virtual launch: Documentary of Free Art Felega 5 – Disrupt
Sunday 15th August 2021 5 p.m. CET.
More info: www.freeartfelega.com

Related:

Spotlight: ‘Free Art Felega,’ A Virtual Ethiopia Exhibition by Yenatfenta Abate

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Meron Hadero Becomes 1st Ethiopian Author to Win Prestigious AKO Caine Prize

Meron Hadero's winning short story is about an Ethiopian boy called Getu, who has to navigate the fraught power dynamics of NGOs and foreign aid in Addis Ababa. It impressed the judges who found it "utterly without self-pity" and said it "turns the lens" on the usual clichés. The author was born in Ethiopia and raised in the US by parents who are both medical doctors. Her sister is the singer Meklit Hadero. (BBC News)

BBC News

AKO Caine Prize: Meron Hadero named first Ethiopian winner

“I’m absolutely thrilled, I’m in shock – being shortlisted in itself was a huge honour,” she told the BBC.

Her winning short story is about an Ethiopian boy called Getu, who has to navigate the fraught power dynamics of NGOs and foreign aid in Addis Ababa.

It impressed the judges who found it “utterly without self-pity” and said it “turns the lens” on the usual clichés.

Hadero will take home £10,000 ($13,000) in prize money.

The author was born in Ethiopia and raised in the US by parents who are both medical doctors. Her sister is the singer Meklit Hadero, whose support was “absolutely essential” to her success, Hadero says.

She says stories of “refugees, immigrants and those at risk of being displaced” are always the “entry-point emotionally” to her work.

“With The Street Sweep, he has that threat looming. He’s facing losing his ancestral home, and that’s the real driver of the story that makes him take charge and try to re-write that outcome that seems kind of inevitable,” Hadero told BBC Focus on Africa.

Much of The Street Sweep is set in Addis Ababa’s Sheraton hotel, where Getu is invited for a party.

“Looking through his eyes it’s almost a culture shock when he goes there,” Hadero said.

“I did want to paint that contrast… What does that access mean? And what does that bestow? That’s the bigger question of what those open doors represent.”

Writing short stories has been “it’s own love” for the author, who likened the form to a “contained laboratory” from which “pared down and elegant” tales can emerge.

Her next challenge is her debut novel, which “is really fun to work on in a different way.

“You’re adding and you’re exploring mess.”

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Listen: Family, Ethiopian Roots Inspire Seattle Youth Poet Laureate’s New Book

Bitaniya Giday is finishing her tenure at Seattle Youth Poet Laureate and publishing a book of her poetry. In the following audio Bitaniya speaks with KNKX Morning Edition about her new book and the inspiration for her poetry, and she reads one of her poems. (SEATTLE ARTS & LECTURES)

KNKX

Seattle’s Youth Poet Laureate has just published her first book of poetry. “Motherland” is Bitaniya Giday’s exploration of Blackness, womanhood and family history as an Ethiopian-American youth.

You might be familiar with Giday from her appearance in KNKX’s Take the Mic youth voices series, and she was part of our virtual town hall event. She was also featured in this interview with Seattle Arts & Lectures.

Giday, who is finishing her one-year term as youth poet laureate, spoke with KNKX Morning Edition host Kirsten Kendrick about her new book and what inspires her work. Listen to the interview and hear Giday read one of her poems.

Read more and listen to the audio at knkx.org »

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Seattle Arts & Lectures names Bitaniya Giday as the next Youth Poet Laureate

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This Ethiopian Hopes To Blaze Trail For More Diversity In Wealth Management

Araya Mesfin, Senior Vice President–Wealth Management, UBS Wealth Management (UBS)

Forbes

Name: Araya Mesfin

Firm: UBS Wealth Management

Location: Atlanta, Georgia

AUM: $763 million

Background: Mesfin, 45, grew up in Ethiopia and immigrated to the United States at age 14. After getting a degree in biology and physics from Berry College in Rome, Georgia he spent time as a tutor for private school students and working on fundraising with his alma mater. In his late 20s he decided he wanted a career change.

An interview with an advisor from Merrill Lynch, where he never end up working, piqued his interest in the wealth management field. In 2008, he started at Morgan Stanley in a rookie program before heading to UBS five years later.

Competitive Edge: For Mesfin his biggest advantage is his resourcefulness, built upon joining the industry with no resources.

Early in his career, without a large network, he started cold calling corporations. One on of those calls, a prospect said that many of the his colleagues were close to retirement and could use financial advice. In order to try to capture that potential client base, Mesfin created a spreadsheet, and in the evenings called every extension to get client names from voicemails. He would then follow up on this homemade lead list in the morning. In his first few years of work, he estimates he was working up to 200 hours a week.

Biggest Challenge: The biggest challenges in Mesfin’s career came early on when he faced lots of rejection, some he believes as a result of his race. With so much discussion around representation coming in the last year, he says many large firms have good intentions. However, the problem is that these conglomerates do not determine who is successful in wealth management.

“If you’re IBM and want to diversify your workforce, you hire more people of color and women, but an advisors success isn’t dependent upon their employer, it is dependent upon Mr. and Mrs. Smith hiring them as an advisor,” Mesfin says. “People only like to work with those they trust so they look to those in their network for recommendations and that’s how the cycle works. That’s why, in my personal experience, women and minorities have a harder time.”

Mentors: Edward Williams, the president of Baltimore-based RIA DEW Financial Management was the training manager at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney when Mesfin first met him. Mesfin credits his mentorship for setting an example that a Black man could be successful as a financial advisor.

Lessons Learned: While acknowledging that the United States in 2021 is far from perfect, Mesfin says that hard work and perseverance can still lead to success in this country.

“It’s amazing how much you can accomplish when your back is against the wall,” he adds. “I had to learn English. Then I had to learn how to get clients because it was a matter of survival. I don’t know that my story is possible anywhere else in the world.”

Biggest Misunderstanding: The biggest misunderstanding Mesfin has with clients is around politics, with many people falling into the trap of allowing their political leanings to color how they view their portfolio.

Many of his progressive clients saw scary information on MSNBC over the last four years and spent the Trump presidency worried about the market and the same thing is happening with conservative clients watching Fox News under President Biden. Mesfin says this is all a product of outsize polarization.

Investment Outlook: Mesfin is extremely bullish on the markets, highlighting the accommodative actions of the Federal Reserve as well as pent up demand that reminds him the Spanish Flu Pandemic in 1918 which led directly into the roaring twenties.

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NASA Earth Observatory Image of the Day: Lake Tana and the Ethiopian Highlands

NASA Earth Observatory Image of the Day for July 12, 2021: Lake Tana and the Ethiopian Highlands. The rugged volcanic terrain creates a temperate climate in a mostly dry place. (Photo: Appears in the Astronaut photography Collection)

NASA Earth Observatory

While in orbit over central Sudan, an astronaut on the International Space Station took this photograph featuring Lake Tana and the Ethiopian Highlands. The oblique angle and shadows help emphasize the rugged terrain of the Ethiopian Plateau, while Lake Tana, the largest lake in Ethiopia, appears mirror-like due to sunglint. The low-lying, tectonically active East African Rift Valley is bounded by the eastern edge of the Ethiopian Highlands.

The Semien (or Simien) Mountains tower over the plateau. With a peak rising 4,533 meters (14,926 feet) above sea level, Ras Dashen is the highest point in Ethiopia. Much of the Ethiopian Highlands are part of a large igneous province—a region with a significant accumulation of large lava rocks. The Semien Range was formed due to volcanic activity about 31 million years ago.

Although the highlands are surrounded by deserts, their elevation results in a temperate climate with ample rainfall. Lake Tana and its tributaries support an important fishing industry, in addition to agriculture in the surrounding wetlands. The lake also feeds the Blue Nile, which runs through northern Ethiopia and southern Sudan and delivers water to many communities. The river flows out of the south side of Lake Tana, through lower canyon areas south of the lake, and then east to ultimately join the White Nile in Sudan.

Astronaut photograph ISS061-E-113632 was acquired on January 3, 2020, with a Nikon D5 digital camera using a focal length of 50 millimeters. It is provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations Facility and the Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit, Johnson Space Center. The image was taken by a member of the Expedition 61 crew. The image has been cropped and enhanced to improve contrast, and lens artifacts have been removed. The International Space Station Program supports the laboratory as part of the ISS National Lab to help astronauts take pictures of Earth that will be of the greatest value to scientists and the public, and to make those images freely available on the Internet. Additional images taken by astronauts and cosmonauts can be viewed at the NASA/JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth. Caption by Sara Schmidt, GeoControl Systems, JETS Contract at NASA-JSC.

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643 Ethiopian Peacekeepers Receive Prestigious UN Medals for Service

86 women were among the 643 peacekeepers recently honored with the prestigious United Nations Medal for their service in South Sudan. (Photo by Mach Samuel/UNMISS)

UNITED NATIONS

643 ETHIOPIAN PEACEKEEPERS RECEIVE UNITED NATIONS MEDALS FOR THEIR SERVICE IN SOUTH SUDAN

“I have left my two young sons at home and have been serving as a Blue Helmet with UNMISS for almost two years,” says Major Wondimagegn Araya, a peacekeeper from Ethiopia who is deployed to conflict-ridden Jonglei in the world’s newest nation, South Sudan.

Prior to becoming a United Nations peacekeeper, Major Araya has served in different military units as part of his country’s army for 20 years.

In his current role, he often spends days and nights in remote areas trying to overcome near-impassable road conditions to reach villages where local communities need protection or humanitarian aid.

Yesterday, Major Araya, along with 642 of his brave colleagues, including 86 women, received the prestigious UN medal honouring their service to the cause of peace in a colourful ceremony attended by senior UNMISS officials and state dignitaries.

For Major Araya, it was a day to remember. “The conditions we serve in as peacekeepers are harsh; we are often in the forefront of armed hostilities, but we try and fulfil our mandate to protect civilians with happiness. This UN medal acknowledges the hardships we go through but, more significantly, it is a reminder that peace and security always necessitate sacrifice,” he states poignantly.

Since their initial deployment to UNMISS, Ethiopian peacekeepers have contributed immeasurably to the mission’s mandate by reducing intercommunal conflict; preventing revenge attacks due to cattle rustling; building community trust and confidence; and ensuring safe, speedy delivery of humanitarian assistance to people who need it the most.

“It hasn’t been an easy deployment for all of you in Jonglei and the Greater Pibor Administrative Area—the terrain is tough, weather conditions arduous and it is a hotspot for conflict, all of which has been exacerbated by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic,” said Main Ullah Chowdhury, Deputy Force Commander, UNMISS, while commending awardees at the medal ceremony.

“However, for the past 18 months you have been the lynchpin for the mission to achieve its mandated tasks here.”

As geographical neighbours with longstanding cordial relations, Ethiopia has also been at the forefront of the ongoing political engagement by international and regional stakeholders for a sustainable peace across South Sudan.

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Ethiopians Deserve a Future They Can Be Proud of – Commentary on Current Affairs

(Getty Images)

THE FINANCIAL TIMES

By Zeinab Badawi

Ethiopians constantly tell me how much they detest being seen as a conflict and famine-ridden country. Parts of the nation, together with Eritrea, once made up the kingdom of Axum, which has been described as one of the four greatest civilisations of the ancient world. Ethiopia has a written language and coinage dating back nearly 2,000 years. Its history is full of glory, heroism and victories against foreign invaders.

It is also the only country in Africa that has never been colonised. In 1963, the capital, Addis Ababa, was chosen as the headquarters of the Organisation of African Unity, today’s African Union. Ethiopia hosts the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa and is an international hub. The palpable pride Ethiopians have in their past transcends different ethnic backgrounds. Indeed, the country’s heritage of independence is a source of great esteem for many Africans, including those in the diaspora. 

My great-grandmother was Ethiopian, though my family are Sudanese. Orphaned during a raid on the Ethiopian Sudanese border, she was adopted by an Egyptian merchant. My mother recalls her concern during the second world war when Ethiopia was occupied by the Italians. Unable to read Arabic, she would ask her grandchildren to scan the newspapers and update her about the Ethiopians’ resistance efforts.

Ethiopia’s descent today into a spiral of conflict and suffering in the northern Tigray state make depressing reading. Five million people need emergency assistance with 400,000 at risk of starvation. Thousands have been killed, nearly two million displaced and accounts of severe human rights abuses are widespread.

The conflict between the government and the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which began last November, was initially described by prime minister Abiy Ahmed as a “law enforcement operation” after an attack on a federal army base. The war has since led to numerous accusations and counteraccusations. Federal forces recently withdrew from Mekelle, the Tigrayan capital, leaving it once again in the hands of the TPLF. Their conditions for a ceasefire suggest they may even be heading towards independence as their ultimate goal.

Last week the UN Security Council held its first open session on the crisis, calling on all sides to commit to an indefinite ceasefire and allow humanitarian access to the region. This was critical and long overdue. But the international community must also focus on the wider challenges in Ethiopia: namely that there are several other opposition forces which could become radicalised.

The Tigrayans account for 6 per cent of Ethiopia’s 112m people. Instrumental in ousting the dictator Mengistu in 1991, they subsequently dominated the coalition government for nearly 30 years. But the Oromo, who make up 35 per cent of the population, also have a century’s long conflict with the central government. If not dealt with promptly, this too could provoke the disintegration of Ethiopia. And among the Amhara, who account for 27 per cent of the population, factions and militias blame the government for intensifying oppression and are growing extremely restless. Abiy has so far failed to put a lid on any of these tensions.

The twice-delayed elections to choose 547 federal parliament members have either been boycotted or postponed in parts of Oromia and Amhara and put off indefinitely in Tigray. Given the lack of a credible opposition, the result of June’s poll in due course will almost certainly deliver victory to the prime minister’s Prosperity Party, securing his position as head of government. Abiy should use this as a platform to stop the fighting and call for round-table discussions with all his opponents. He must pursue a path to genuine power-sharing and inclusive development, so that no group feels marginalised politically or economically. His recent comments that Ethiopia needs peace to develop provide a glimmer of hope. 

As the international community considers how to respond to the tragedy in Tigray, it should also apply pressure to each of Ethiopia’s warring parties in order to get them to come to the table. It must be made clear that there can be no military solution to the country’s challenges.

Sadly, Ethiopia is once again becoming synonymous with war and suffering. Its people need a present and future of which they can be as proud as they are of their past. I wonder what my great-grandmother would think if she could see that the conflict raging in her country today is not between Ethiopians and their would-be European subjugators but between her own compatriots. 

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Ethiopian Airlines Leads Africa in Passenger Traffic During the COVID Crisis

Ethiopian Airlines topped the list with the highest passenger traffic transported through Addis Ababa Bole Airport [in 2020]. A total of 5.5 million passengers have been transported through the airport. Of this traffic, Ethiopian transported 5.2 million passengers. - Travel Daily News. (Photo via @flyethiopian/Twitter)

Travel Daily News

Ethiopian continues to lead Africa in passenger traffic during the COVID crisis

ADDIS ABABA – Ethiopian Airlines Group has become Africa’s top airline in passenger traffic retaining its leadership position in the continent. According to the African Airlines Association’s (AFRAA) report, Ethiopian has been ranked first by passenger and cargo traffic in 2020.

Ethiopian Airlines Group CEO Mr. Tewolde GebreMariam said, “We are honoured to continue our leadership even during the Global Pandemic Crisis which has devastated the aviation industry. This is a manifestation of our resilience and agility. We are excited about the role we played in the fight against the pandemic by continuing our much-needed air connectivity within Africa and with the rest of the world without any flight suspension. We are saving lives through air transport of medical supplies and vaccines.”

Ethiopian Airlines topped the list with the highest passenger traffic transported through Addis Ababa Bole International Airport. A total of 5.5 million passengers have been transported through the airport. Of this traffic, Ethiopian transported 5.2 million passengers and the remaining passengers were transported by other airlines. Ethiopia also topped the list in the most connected countries in Africa due to Ethiopian Airlines’ large number of direct flights within the continent.

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A Mother’s Hope: Ethiopian Woman Returns to San Francisco to Seek her Lost Son

Photos of Maereg Tafesse and his mother Legawork Assefa. (Photo of Tafesse courtesy of Assefa / Photo of Assefa by David Mamaril Horowitz)

Mission Local

The 57-year-old mother from Ethiopia sat across from me on a recent June day. She was in San Francisco, she said, to again search for the son she last heard from in March, 2018.

This is her second visit to the Mission District, one of the last places, she explains, that someone remembered seeing him. One of the last places that gave her some hope.

“I lost all the meanings that I have for life,” said Legawork Assefa, a thin woman who shares her son’s photos. “You can’t imagine what it feels like, looking for your son in the streets of the U.S., where you don’t even know which street takes you where and how to come back to where you have started.”

But she refuses to give up, using savings from her job at an NGO in Ethiopia to cover the costs of three trips to the United States, hire private detectives and slowly piece together the story of her son, Maereg Tafesse. He was 24 when he went missing in early 2018.

An engineering degree and a desire to work with the homeless

Less than two years before disappearing, the 6-foot-2 young man pictured on the flyer in Assefa’s hand graduated from the Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts.

His mother is accustomed to describing him, and the photo confirms her memory: He is skinny with a receding hairline. He has tattoos of flying birds on his left wrist and a tattoo of some sort of box on his right.

His family and friends describe him as intelligent and kind-hearted — precisely the sort of young man who would earn a B.A. in mechanical engineering and then volunteer to serve homeless residents in Los Angeles.

“He’s always been consistent, in the sense that he didn’t just want to get a job and do the whole capitalism thing,” said Zuhair Sras, his close friend from college. “He said he’d want to join the Christian anarchists group in Los Angeles.”

He joined a group of volunteers at the Los Angeles Catholic Worker, which operates hospice care for the dying, a hospitality house for the homeless, publishes a bi-monthly newspaper and generally opposes war-making and systemic injustice.

Members live together in a commune setting, with volunteer work covering room and board and bringing in a stipend of $15 to $25 a week. Tafeesse worked in the soup kitchen.

Jed Poole, an associate director who lived in the room next to Tafesse, said the young volunteer was like others who graduate and aren’t ready to jump into traditional work.

He stayed from September, 2016, to September, 2017, his mother said. Poole said that timeframe sounded about right.

Next, in October, 2017, Tafesse moved to the Seattle area, where he volunteered at Left Bank Books, which “specialize(s) in anti-authoritarian, anarchist, independent, radical and small-press titles,” according to its website. At one point he also volunteered at the Green Tortoise Hostel in return for shelter, Assefa said.

When he last emailed with his mother in March, 2018, Tafesse wrote about leaving the country, but five months later, Assefa confirmed that he had never left.

So, in September 2018, she flew to Seattle to find him. But instead, she only found small clues: that her son had checked out of the the Green Tortoise Hostel in February, 2018, and that he had texted Adrian Lambert, a worker at the bookstore, the day before he went missing to say that he was going to Sacramento and might return to Seattle again in the summer.

Assefa reported her son missing to the police department in Seattle, and detectives there said that they found Tafesse had been in Sacramento in 2018, a fact confirmed by Seattle Police Detective Patrick Michaud. Tafesse’s case as a missing person remains open, Michaud said.

Unable to locate her son, Assefa returned home to Ethiopia, but traveled back to the United States a year later, in October, 2019, to visit Sacramento and to canvas its homeless shelters. At a Salvation Army homeless shelter, she met Lee, who is homeless. He recognized Tafesse’s photo and reported seeing him at the nearby light rail station around a month before Assefa arrived.

The man wore clothes of Ethiopian style, Lee said. Like Tafesse, the man also also had a tattoo on his wrist.

Assefa’s search in 2019 next took her to San Francisco because a private detective told her that Tafesse bought a bus ticket from Sacramento to San Francisco on March 8, 2018. Sras, Tafesse’s college friend, also reported that Tafesse had talked about the possibility of moving to San Francisco.

In San Francisco, Assefa visited homeless shelters — flyers and photos in hand. One of the nonprofits she visited was Dolores Street Community Services.

Three workers there recognized her son, including then-receptionist Barbara Torres. She told Assefa in 2019 that, a week prior, someone who looked “similar” had made a landline call, asked for a shower and was later seen down the street.

Torres, the receptionist, confirmed this month that she and two others at the nonprofit had also remembered seeing Tafesse in the area in 2019. She added, however, that the man she saw looked “rougher” and “more rugged” than the one in the photos Assefa showed them, as if he had been homeless.

In March and April this year, two workers in Sacramento shelters also reported seeing a man who resembled Tafesse, according to Brittany Stevens, an investigator with Sacramento’s Gumshoe Detective Agency.

Why does someone disappear?

Tafesse’s mother, family members and friends are unclear why the young college graduate dropped out of sight. There was no history of mental instability earlier in his life, they said.

Allison McGillivray and her husband Sam Yergler met Tafesse when they were working at Los Angeles Catholic Worker. They said that, a month before he went missing, Tafesse visited them in Eugene, Ore., where they now live.

He took the bus and stayed for several nights to reconnect, McGillivray said. They parted on good terms, and have no idea why he would have gone missing.

Tafesse also regularly spoke to his uncle, Atlabachew Assefa, who lives in Dallas, and is the family member closest to him in the United States. A week or perhaps only days before he disappeared, they talked for 10 minutes and spoke of meeting in April or May of that year.

“I’ll call you next week,” Tafesse promised.

Shortly after, on March 3, 2018, Tafesse stopped communicating with everyone.

“I just don’t have anything. Really. I really don’t,” his uncle said. “I just want to say that anybody who’s seen him, anybody who has any information about this … the family is suffering.”

“We don’t have any clue, even if he’s alive or dead,” Atlabachew Assefa added. “We just need to know what happened to Maerag. That’s all. So, we beg everybody, ask everybody.”

June 2021

When she visits the city her son might have been in, Assefa always finds herself walking.

She tries to get a good view of people’s faces, especially those who are homeless.

Assefa suspects her son could be volunteering again or living on the streets, so she often visits and distributes his information at homeless shelters and community nonprofits wherever he’s lived or been reported in.

“Every time I see someone, I see him in them,” she said.

The San Francisco Police Department found no reports of Tafesse in its system. The Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing declined to confirm the presence of Tafesse in its system due to privacy concerns. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner said it has no reports of Tafesse in its system.

Assefa asks that anyone who may have information relating to the whereabouts of her son contact her at legaworka@gmail.com or on Whatsapp at +251911231194.

The Seattle Police Department said that information on missing people should be reported to (206) 625-5011.

You can alternatively contact the San Francisco Police Department’s Missing Persons Unit at (415) 734-3070 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday or (415) 553-0123 outside of those hours.

You can also contact the reporter, who will forward your message to Assefa, at david@missionlocal.com.

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U.S. Arrests Ethiopian Man for Fraudulently Obtaining Citizenship

According to the indictment, which was unsealed following the arrest, Mezemr Abebe Belayneh, 65, of Snellville, Georgia [east of Atlanta] served as a civilian interrogator at a makeshift prison in Dilla, Ethiopia, during a period in the late 1970s known as the Red Terror, [which he failed to disclose] (DOJ)

Press Release

Department of Justice
Office of Public Affairs

Naturalized U.S. Citizen from Ethiopia Arrested on Charge of Fraudulently Obtaining Citizenship

Indictment Alleges Lies During the Naturalization Process, Including Failure to Disclose Participation in Persecution During the Ethiopian Red Terror

A Georgia man has been arrested on criminal charges related to allegations that he lied to obtain U.S. citizenship.

According to the indictment, which was unsealed following the arrest, Mezemr Abebe Belayneh, 65, of Snellville, served as a civilian interrogator at a makeshift prison in Dilla, Ethiopia, during a period in the late 1970s known as the Red Terror. At the prison, Abebe ordered and participated in the severe physical abuse and interrogation of prisoners held on the basis of their political beliefs. The indictment alleges that Abebe unlawfully procured U.S. citizenship, to which he was not entitled, by concealing his involvement in the Red Terror when he falsely claimed that he had not persecuted anyone because of their political opinions and had never committed a crime for which he had not been arrested.

“Human rights violators have no home in the United States,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Nicholas L. McQuaid of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “No matter how much time has passed, the Department of Justice will find and prosecute individuals who committed atrocities in their home countries and covered them up to gain entry to the United States.”

“The laws of the United States are designed to provide refuge for the victims of human rights violation and to exclude those who commit them,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Kurt R. Erskine for the Northern District of Georgia. “The defendant’s alleged lies through his immigration and naturalization process subverted this system. We commend our law enforcement partners at the Department of Homeland Security and the dedicated team at the Department of Justice who work tirelessly to assure that individuals such as the defendant do not have a safe haven in our communities.”

“Abebe’s lies and horrible past deeds have thankfully come back to haunt him,” said Special Agent in Charge Katrina W. Berger, who oversees Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) operations in Georgia and Alabama. “Now he will be held accountable. Thanks to some great work from the agents and officers involved in this case as well as our law enforcement partners, justice will be served.”

Abebe is charged with two counts of unlawful procurement of naturalization. The maximum sentence for each count is 10 years in prison. If convicted, a federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. A conviction would also result in automatic revocation of Abebe’s U.S. citizenship.

Homeland Security Investigations’ Atlanta Field Office is investigating the case, and coordination was provided by the Human Rights Violators and War Crimes Center (HRVWCC). Established in 2009, the HRVWCC furthers the government’s efforts to identify, locate and prosecute human rights abusers in the United States, including those who are known or suspected to have participated in persecution, war crimes, genocide, torture, extrajudicial killings, female genital mutilation, and the use or recruitment of child soldiers.

Trial Attorneys Jamie Perry and Patrick Jasperse of the Criminal Division’s Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section (HRSP) and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Morris of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia are prosecuting the case, with assistance from HRSP Senior Historian Dr. Christopher Hayden.

Members of the public who have information about former human rights violators in the United States are urged to contact U.S. law enforcement through the HSI tip line at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE (1-866-347-2423) or its online tip form at www.ice.gov/tips.

An indictment is merely an allegation and all defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

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In Louisville, Kentucky Family of Slain Ethiopian Store Owner Devastated His American Dream Came to Tragic End

The shooting happened around noon Monday...when police arrived, they found a man, now identified as Dimtsu Haileselassie, 62, of Louisville, shot to death inside the store. His niece Hilena Haileselassie and nephew Amanuel Abay said they didn't know who would do this to their uncle. (WLKY)

WLKY

Family of slain Louisville liquor store owner devastated his American dream came to tragic end

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The family of a Taylor Berry liquor store owner shot to death inside the store is asking for the public’s help in identifying his killer.

The shooting happened around noon Monday at a store in the 3200 block of Taylor Boulevard, which is just blocks away from Churchill Downs.

When police arrived, they found a man, now identified as Dimtsu Haileselassie, 62, of Louisville, shot to death inside the store.

His niece Hilena Haileselassie and nephew Amanuel Abay said they didn’t know who would do this to their uncle.

“What am I going to say to the person who took our everything?” Haileselassie asked. “Someone chose on a Monday morning to come and take his life and it’s devastating. His wife found him. His nephew [Abay] found him.”

The store was a venture by Haileselassie and his wife to start a new chapter when they moved from Louisville to Atlanta. Haileselassie owned the store for two years before tragedy struck a family already experiencing loss in their home country.

“I feel like I lost a thousand people,” Abay said. “We’re already losing a lot of people in Tigray, Ethiopia. Our family are dying there. Again, here, to happen, this to us. It’s unreal, another death.”

Abay recalled the conversations he had with his uncle about staying safe in a city now plagued by violence.

“He kept saying as long as you’re nice to people, they will never kill you,” Abay said. “He never thought somebody would come and kill him.”

Part of the shock for the family is knowing how much Haileselassie himself survived as a young man. The family said he fled his home country of Ethiopia through Sudan and arrived in America in search of a better life.

“To say Dimtsu Haileselassie was the epitome of the American Dream is not an understatement,” niece Hilena Haileselassie said. “Pulling himself up, pulling his family up with him, pulling the community up with him. Even having gone through all of that, he was the brightest face in the room. That’s his legacy. The kindness, generosity and thoughtfulness. My stomach was sick just to know his blood was spilled here.”

A communal room next door to the store where he was killed is being used to celebrate his life. As the family begins their Ethiopian mourning tradition, they’re calling out to the community Dimtsu Haileselassie had so much faith in to honor him and help bring his killer to justice.

“We need some form of closure,” Hilena Haileselassie said. “It’s not going to bring Dimtsu back. But it can’t end like this so please, please call the anonymous tip line.”

LMPD has not yet made an arrest in his shooting, but released photos Tuesday of a suspect:

Suspect in liquor store homicideWANTED: LMPD releases photos of suspect in fatal shooting of liquor store employee
Anyone with information is asked to call the anonymous tip line at 502-574-LMPD.

Read the full story and watch video at wlky.com »

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Spotlight: Review of Mimi’s Ethiopian BBQ in DC

Mimi’s is named for Siham Mohammed (bottom left), whose mother used to call her “Mimi” as a child. [Siham] is an entrepreneur, just like her parents were back in Gondar. Her restaurant Mimi’s Ethiopian BBQ is located on Pennsylvania Avenue SE in Wahington, DC. (The Washington Post)

The Washington Post

Mimi’s Ethiopian BBQ brings a delicious taste of East African cooking to a new audience

A woman tends to a small portable grill she has placed atop a picnic table at Anacostia Park, just steps from a pirate ship that has, for the moment, separated children from their phones long enough to explore every inch of the three-masted playground. From my own picnic table, I can’t tell what she is cooking, but it has the unmistakable aroma of meat charred and caramelized on a hot grill.

Of course, I have my own platter of grilled meat, which I had bought minutes earlier at Mimi’s Ethiopian BBQ, just up the way on Pennsylvania Avenue SE. Long, ropy lengths of beef are coiled and tangled on a bed of injera, each strip slathered with awaze red-pepper paste and blackened from a brief stay on the grill. Some sections have this sublime crustiness, which forms best, I think, when thickly marinated meats hit a superhot grate. To be honest, I can’t tell who’s enjoying their afternoon more: the children on the pirate ship or me with my zilzil tibs.

Mimi’s is named for Siham Mohammed, whose mother used to call her “Mimi” as a child. Mohammed is an entrepreneur, just like her parents were back in Gondar, in the northern reaches of Ethiopia. Aside from Mimi’s, Mohammed also owns the supermarket a few doors down where, according to the signage, you can get groceries, accessories and your checks cashed. To my mind, the sign doesn’t begin to cover the vast array of foods, services and household goods found in Mohammed’s store.

Mimi’s, by contrast, has only a few offerings. It has even fewer workers. Its principal employee is Hikmah Tasew, older sister to Mohammed. Tasew serves as prep cook, baker, chef, dishwasher, cashier, you name it. She arrives early in the morning and leaves late at night, six days a week. She’s a crew of one, layered in clothes from top to bottom, from her floor-length striped dress to her tawny-colored headscarf. The only visible parts of her body are her hands and her face, which radiates kindness.

“It breaks my heart seeing her working hard, to be honest with you,” says Mohammed. “She makes everything on a daily basis. She doesn’t make anything for the next day. … She makes everything fresh, just like at her house.”

Read more »

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The Concept of “Culture” in Modern Ethiopian Context: By Ayele Bekerie

"Culture provides context with regard to people to people interactions. Cultural understanding is key to peaceful co existence. It is by making space to learn and understand people’s cultures that communication and interaction among people will have positive outcome." -- Ayele Bekerie. (Photo: Dagi pictures)

Tadias Magazine

By Ayele Bekerie, PhD

Published: June 3rd, 2021

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – Human beings are defined by cultures they created, nurtured and embraced. Culture names people, for it is people who make and use culture. It defines and projects their identities within themselves and in relation to others. Culture offers them a sense of belongingness, also a sense to embolden human to human relations. That is, they will have a sense of direction and purpose. It allows them to have and nurture a safe space, a safe space to sing, cry, laugh and even do nothing. Culture provides a certain degree of protection from negative stereotypes or negative judgements of others. One is judged within one’s own cultural community means that the judgement will be fact-based and may serve as a tool for growth and improvement.

It is through culture that people constitute family and community and beyond that may be able to acquire the ability to establish lasting institutions to produce and utilize knowledge or develop characteristics and to be able to passing experiences from one generation to another. Each generation will have the opportunity to leave behind their cultural signatures.

Culture is about what is learned, shared, and symbolized. It is integrated and dynamic. It is subject to evolution and innovation, from time to time, facing critical evaluation. Culture is not about blood or DNA. It is not fixed and is, as a rule, subject to change. Culture provides a framework to human development. Humans acquire attributes of life and living through cultural initiations. The skills of mastering a profession or acquiring knowledge is
rooted in the cultural tradition one is very familiar with.

Culture provides context with regard to people to people interactions. Cultural understanding is key to peaceful co existence. It is by making space to learn and understand people’s cultures that communication and interaction among people will have positive outcome. It is also the acknowledgement of the presence of diverse cultures that will enable people to address misunderstandings and disagreements, in a peaceful and dialogic manner.

Traditional culture is often recognized through arts, music, choreography, story-telling, theatre, and poetry. People often ritualize traditional culture and celebrate them within their own time calendar. Festivities, ceremonies and other time-based activities provide opportunities to maintain and advance the tradition. It also offers an occasion for others to be introduced to the tradition.

It is a phenomenon which is characteristically collective. As the saying goes, I am because we are and we are because I am. Individuals will be able to shine first and foremost in the context of their own cultures. Talents are first tested in one’s safe space. Some talents may attract universal attention thereby transforming the talented individual to global recognition and fame. Culinary traditions of the Chinese or the Mexicans or the Ethiopians have achieved worldwide appreciation. Chinatowns are present in almost all the major cities of the world. Interactions through food pave the way to intercultural understanding. Food diplomacy may be one way to ease political tensions.

In a multiethnic society such as ours, culture is not only collective, but it is normally expressed with nuances and overlapping tendencies. What people share or what they have in common overrides singular features. Multiethnicity appears to have both distinct and cross-cultural features. It is therefore paramount for our society to recognize the impure nature of our cultures.

In other words, given our long history and the tendency of people to move from place to place, cultures flourish in a setting that there are other cultures nearby or in interaction with one another.

Moral and social values, behaviors, beliefs, languages, occupation are often recognized as realms of culture. Even if these expressions are marked with distinctiveness, the practitioners assume multilayered cultural identities. The more features one acquires both from within and without, the more open-minded the person becomes. Tolerance and respect are key words that often guide the day to day activities of a broad-minded person.

It is fair to state that culture is dynamic. That means, it is subject to change, growth and development. Culture is local, but it has the capacity to turn into a universal phenomenon. While culture possesses its own fingerprints to mark people’s identity and way of life, it is also capable of crossing boundaries.

Culture is a source of free space. It is a comfort zone for members of a particular cultural attribute and people’s ability to express themselves fully, free of inhibition, lies in cultural reference point.

Institutions often serve as permanent homes of culture. Educational, political, economic, social and religious institutions are libraries of culture. In these institutions, knowledge is produced and propagated. Categories are useful tools that allow the systematic organization and utilization of cultural attributes.

We may not have universally agreed upon definition of culture, but human beings are capable of recognizing cultural phenomena often expressed in the form of arts, music, aesthetics or festivities. Culinary traditions, for instance, are people-specific. The culinary traditions of the Chinese are distinct and as such recognized by non-Chinese.

Culture is often marked or celebrated in the form of festivals. Rituals are sources of cultural manifestations. Human beings affirm their sense of culture by participating in cultural activities, be it religious or non-religious.

The retention of cultural values will be stronger if a specific cultural event is practiced on a regular basis by people. Cultural activities may be practiced both at home and in public squares.

Cultural development is governed by internal forces, such as natural resources, occupation, beliefs and knowledge production. Culture is also capable of absorbing practices from outside sources. There are no rigid boundaries among cultures. However, it is always important to advance the non-hierarchical nature of culture. That was not the case, however, in the world we live in. Cultural supremacy has been deployed to effectuate colonialism. Languages of the colonizer were imposed among the colonial subjects. In other words, hegemony and supremacy are hostile to distinct local cultures. They stunt their normal development. External intervention to impose alien culture often threatens the healthy development and advancement of a particular culture.

For instance, among the Oromo people’s cultural attributes are mogassa and gudificha. Mogassa refers to fostering children from within and without the community, while gudificha refers to adoption of children from non-Oromo communities. These cultural attributes represent the learned nature of culture. It also affirms that culture is not about blood or biology nor it is about purity.

The notion of blood tie or the push for purity are mere ideological and political posturing often used to cover up the active mission of land grabbing and to engage in displacing people who are labeled impure. Millions of people have been displaced and pushed out of their birthplaces under the cover of purity and lack of blood relations. Since blood or biology is a false base for a person’s identity, its use is an excuse to fascistically remove people from the land of their birth.

In most instances, blood is used as a false tool to claim identity and also to bypass the fact that
the non-Oromos might be speaking the language of their new homeland.

To conclude, culture is a trademark of human beings. Human beings flourish if they have access to cultures they relate and are in a position to actively participate in them. Intercultural interactions lead to peaceful co-existence of different cultures, provided that there are no hierarchies among cultures. By adopting tolerance, respect and understanding to cultures, human beings will be in a position to create and embrace a peaceful world.

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Ethni & Serene Amsale: 17 Year-old Ethiopian American Twin Sisters Reflect on Their Culture

In the following essay twin sisters Ethni & Serene Amsale reflect on their Ethiopian culture. Born and raised in the U.S. the college bound sisters -- who live in Middletown, Delaware -- are set to graduate from high school this month. (Courtesy photo)

Tadias Magazine

By Ethni Amsale

Updated: June 7th, 2021

Middletown, Delaware — My name is Ethni Amsale. I am 17 and a first generation, Ethiopian American. My twin sister, Serene and I were raised by our beautiful single mother. Our lives have been nothing short of full and bright. Throughout my lifetime, I have been blessed to have been exposed to my Ethiopian culture and background. I believe all should be judged by their character and how they treat others rather than their ethnic or economic background. This is most important.


Ethni and Serene Amsale at their home in Middletown, Delaware. (Courtesy photo)

However, I often remember feeling proud of my ethnic background when I went on car rides with my family listening to Ethiopian music. My mother would explain the lyrics to my sister and I, unveiling the message behind each tune. One song stands out to me Tikur Sew or “Black Man” by Teddy Afro was its title. The song is a tribute to Emperor Melenik II’s victory of a united Ethiopia against an Italian invasion specifically in the Battle of Adwa. It highlighted the role women played in the Ethiopian military, celebrating our success in resisting European colonialism. My mom tells us to listen for the lyrics ourselves and that this is one of the many reasons we feel honored to be Ethiopian. As I get older, I become increasingly exposed to a variety of literature, music, art, food, and dance representative of Ethiopia and I fall more in love with it. As a student in the American school system, I learn about history and become increasingly aware of the racial divide that exists. Although I do not fully understand it, I make an effort to research and analyze the reasons behind the socioeconomic disparity between African Americans and Whites that we witness today. The majority of African Americans who arrived in America hundreds of years ago through the transatlantic slave trade have been systematically disconnected from their roots. Many generations were born without the cognizance of their ethnic language, customs, social institutions, and achievements. They were forced to carry the name and surname given to them by their slave masters with nothing else to hold on to but the color of their skin and folktales. Unfortunately, this disconnect has caused an understandable frustration and a version of identity crisis in the Black community.


Ethni and Serene Amsale with their mother, Meseret Tamirie, at their home in Middletown, Delaware. Ethni is also pictured on the right. (Courtesy photo)


Ethni & Serene Amsale attending church in New York City with their mother and grandmother. (Courtesy photo)

I am grateful for the connection I have to my ancestors birthplace and its rich history. I accredit this to my upbringing and my eagerness to continue to learn in a system that would otherwise see me fail. Currently, I am a high school senior planning on studying Animal Science and Biology on a Pre-Veterinary Track. I have been accepted to several accredited colleges and am in the process of making a decision. I am also an aspiring model and hope to one day have the platform to advocate for environmental policies that would positively impact the ecosystem and animal rights. I am appreciative of the opportunities I have and look forward to serving Ethiopia and the global community. Ethiopia enate tinur le zelalem.

‘Ethiopian music as the soundtrack to my life’ By Serene Amsale


Serene Amsale. (Courtesy photo)

By Serene Amsale

I can imagine myself opening and closing my eyes, the light of the sun, or the highway flooding my pupils and then disappearing as my eyelids met each other. I was on a car ride, when my mother, Meseret or “Mimi” and my twin sister, Ethni would go on family trips. My Ethiopian, specifically, gurage mother would put on music, with a wide variety of Ethiopian artists. From Mohamood Ahmed to Gigi, to Teddy Afro. Ever since our first days on Earth, even if I couldn’t recall, I can hear Ethiopian music in the background of old home movies with us as babies.

Staring out of the window, looking at landscapes, cities, and eventually crossing states, with Ethiopian music as the soundtrack to these road trips, and essentially my life. I was able to pick up on words and use my mother as a human dictionary. “Ehe mindinew?”, I would say, pointing to a lamb or cow on a local farm. It is important to note that I am passionate about animals. Ever since I was little, I aspired to be a veterinarian or wildlife biologist.

At the age of 6, my sister and I decided in unison to become vegetarian, which my lovely, single mother fully supported. I would love learning what animals would translate to in the Amharic language. Soon after, I noticed myself understanding the language more, and the conversations my mom would have with relatives on the phone. I was able to articulate myself, which was very apparent to me on our most recent trip to Ethiopia in the summer of 2018. While I enjoyed reconnecting with family and friends, I also got a glimpse into the experience of animals in Ethiopia, particularly cattle and domesticated animals.


Serene and Ethni Amsale with their mother, Meseret Tamirie, pictured before their Prom night at their home in Middletown, Delaware. (Courtesy photo)


(Courtesy photo)

I noticed some were used in the prime of their lives and then deemed no longer valuable. They were left emaciated and lifeless on the streets of Addis Ababa and Hawassa, and everywhere in between, where we traveled. I am pursuing a higher education in biology and environmental policy. I will be majoring in those fields in the beginning of this fall semester. I will focus on veterinary medicine. I am confident I can rely on my knowledge thus far, and solid upbringing in my 17 years of life that being a human being is extraordinary but being Ethiopian is a true privilege.

I take great pride in being able to call Ethiopia my country of origin. It is a strong and determined lion, “anbessa” in a pride of lost ones, remaining independent through two Italian invasions, thus becoming the only uncolonized African country in history. Accordingly, the only African country with its own indigenous alphabet, “fidel” and diverse subcultures, breaking into over 80 dialects. The land is home to impressive geographic locations, from the Danakil Depression, the hottest point on planet Earth to the Great Rift Valley and Simien Mountains- by the way I loved doing a report on them in 5th grade- The mountains helped coin the phrase “The roof of Africa” for the nation. Retrospectively, notice our flag colors, green, yellow, and red, and countries across the continent, subsequently adopt them throughout history. The first, Ghana, in 1957, then, Mali, Cameroon, Benin, and Senegal, consecutively after that. These are not simply colors, but a symbol of indepence, peace, and a real possibility of freedom, not just hope. I aspire to emulate my mother’s principles, her open-heartedness, and ability to lead with the heart, and to be present, and accessible, non-judgement towards others, belief in herself, and strong-willed, graceful, and magnetic nature. Similarly, these are all elements of the wonderful nation where our roots lie, and leading with any one of those traits will surely lead one to a bright future. I am excited to embark on my life’s adventure, and eager to affect change in a meaningful way.

If you would like to share a similar story please send your submssion to info@tadias.com.

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ART TALK: In A Thrilling Retrospective, Ethiopian-American Artist Julie Mehretu Maps A Radical New Path For Geopolitics

"The extraordinary vitality of these works is achieved by Mehretu’s artistic talent for abstraction, through which she channels her interests in political forces including globalism and migration. (The latter is tinged with personal experience. Her family fled political instability in Ethiopia, moving from Addis Ababa to East Lansing, Michigan, when the artist was a child.)- Forbes. (© Julie Mehretu)

Forbes

In A Thrilling Whitney Retrospective, Ethiopian-American Artist Julie Mehretu Maps A Radical New Path For Geopolitics

Before the world was home to Africans, Asians, Europeans, Australians, and North and South Americans, all lands were massed in a single supercontinent called Pangaea. And before Pangaea, the landmasses were conjoined to make the supercontinent of Gondwana. At the time, some five hundred million years ago, there were no humans, and the dinosaurs that were alive to watch the tectonic shifts leading to Gondwana’s breakup – a multi-million-year process – left no record of what they witnessed. Geologists have only recently mapped Gondwana by simulating plate tectonics in reverse. The artist Julie Mehretu has also charted Gondwana. Her version takes the form of a mural-scale painting currently on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art, a highlight of her impressive mid-career retrospective.

Mehretu is best known for paintings that have the superficial appearance of cartography yet are deeply disorienting. Since the 1990s, she has combined rigorous systems of geometry with symbols of her own imagination, often highly gestural, which articulate specific spatial relationships between unknown reference points. Titles such as Black City and Back to Gondwanaland sometimes hint at a subject being mapped or explored, but any modicum of certainty is undermined by other titles applied to similar canvases, such as Mumbo Jumbo.


Julie Mehretu, Retopistics: A Renegade Excavation, 2001. Ink and acrylic on canvas, 101 ½ × 208 ½ inches (257.81 × 529.59 cm). Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas 2013.28. © Julie Mehretu

The extraordinary vitality of these works is achieved by Mehretu’s artistic talent for abstraction, through which she channels her interests in political forces including globalism and migration. (The latter is tinged with personal experience. Her family fled political instability in Ethiopia, moving from Addis Ababa to East Lansing, Michigan, when the artist was a child.) Mehretu has creatively embraced the tension between abstract tradition and political engagement by evoking the ambiguous ways in which geopolitics maps onto the intercontinental landscape.

One of the most extreme instances of this technique can be seen in a mural she created for Goldman Sachs in 2009. Mehretu intended Mural to represent “a spatial history of global capitalism”, an ambition she set out to achieve by layering abstractions of global trade routes, historical stock exchange architecture, and corporate logos. The result is unintelligible in the sense of being irreducible, and thereby evocative of the irreducible complexity of the marketplace. Capitalism is depicted as a self-perpetuating system that repels reform through its inconceivable internal logic.

Taking a commission from Goldman Sachs to create this painting may be viewed as cynical opportunism – a shrewd way to make a buck on the wages of sin – or more charitably can be seen as a gesture of optimism: Situating the mural in the lobby of one of the world’s most powerful investment banking firms, where financiers would see it daily, might provide just the kind of unmooring required to awaken the need to reorient global wealth distribution.

Read more »

Related:

ART TALK: Julie Mehretu – A Decade of Printmaking at Gemini G.E.L. in NYC

Watch: Checkerboard Film Foundation presents “Julie Mehretu: Mid-Career Survey”

ART TALK: Julie Mehretu Makes Art Big Enough to Get Lost In

Julie Mehretu’s Mid-Career Survey at LA County Museum of Art

Julie Mehretu’s Mid-Career Survey To Open at LACMA

Julie Mehretu at Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), November 3, 2019 – March 22, 2020 (Level 1) and May 17, 2020 (Level 3)

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OBITUARY: Influential Ethiopian Producer Amha Eshèté Dies at 74

Amha Eshete, the Founder of Amha Records -the pioneering record company whose work from the "golden era" of Ethiopian music is now enshrined in the world-famous éthiopiques CD series - has died at the age of 74. “The Amha Records catalog includes more than 100 vinyl references, released between 1969 and 1975. (Courtesy photo)

World Music Central

Amha Eshèté, a highly influential Ethiopian music producer and founder of Amha Records, died on April 30, 2021. The Amha Records label released iconic recordings of Ethiojazz and Ethiopop rooted in traditional music. These releases captured the golden era of Ethiopian music. The Amha recordings were licensed to French world music label Buda Musique and received worldwide distribution and critical acclaim as part of the successful Ethiopiques series.

Gilles Fruchaux (Buda Musique) and Francis Falceto (collections éthiopiques & ethioSonic) issued a press release: “The departure of our friend Amha Eshèté (Amha Records) from Ethiopia’s great modern music scene follows five weeks after the death of Ali Tango (Kaifa Records).

“A music lover through and through, a lone pioneer of record production in his country, a daring young entrepreneur, an alternative activist before his time (and something of a combative dude), a gentleman outlaw, Amha managed to circumvent Emperor Haile-Selassie’s state monopoly which did not publish any modern music and banned the importation and production of records. Amha Eshèté said «I had a gut feeling that it was the thing to do. I thought, nobody’s going to kill me for that. At most I might land in jail for a while. »

“The Amha Records catalog includes more than 100 vinyl references, released between 1969 and 1975. The very essence of Ethiopian pop golden oldies. Nearly all of them have been reissued in the Éthiopiques series. Ethiopian pop is now firmly established, everywhere.

“Without Amha Records and Kaifa Records, there would have been no Ethiopiques.

“Thank you Amha. Thank you Ali. Rest in peace.”

Related:

TADIAS Interview: Amha Eshete & Contribution of Amha Records to Modern Ethiopian Music

How Ethiopian Music Went Global: Interview with Francis Falceto

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Spotlight: In Colorado, Governor Visits Konjo Ethiopian in Edgewater

Yoseph Assefa and Fetien Gebre-Michael of Konjo Ethiopian [the first Ethiopian food truck in Colorado serving the Denver metro area] meet with Colorado Governor Jared Polis at the Edgewater Public Market on Friday, April 30, 2021. (Photo: Oh Hey Creative)

Edgewater Echo

This past Friday (April 30, 2021) Colorado Governor Jared Polis visited Edgewater and had lunch with the owners and operators of Konjo Ethiopian, Yoseph Assefa and Fetien Gebre-Michael, at the Edgewater Public Market. Governor Polis spent the day touring small businesses throughout the Denver area.

Here’s our interview with Fetien Gebre-Michael of Konjo Ethiopian about the visit.

How did you hear the Governor would be stopping by Konjo?

We received a call from the Governor’s office wanting to confirm a time in the next 2 days for him to stop by Konjo. Ummm, let’s rewind a bit here. Yes, we would love to have the Governor stop by, but why Konjo? So, Konjo is a part of the SBDC and back in 2018 we particpated in Trout Tank, a pitch accelerator. We ended up winning for our pitch of a fast-casual Ethiopian restaurant. One of the judges at the time, China, who is now the director of the SBDC, threw Konjo’s name in the hat. How cool is that?? Full circle.

What was the message you wanted to the Governor to hear?

We wanted the Governor to know that even though we barely made it through the pandemic, our struggles as a small business are not over yet. Yes, people are getting vaccinated and starting to come out more and more, but no one in our industry has enough staff. We are all struggling to keep up with the overnight demand and lack of staff has been a big issue. Our co-founder Yoseph suggested some sort of incentive to try to get more folks back into the service industry by way of a signing bonus funded by the state or a way that small businesses can draw potential employees back with help from the state level.

What makes you hopeful for the future?

Business is already starting to pick up exponentially. This will be a busy summer across the board. People are antsy to get out and they have money saved up from staying home for so long. They want to be around other people and start socializing again. Failure wasn’t an option for Konjo. We’ve worked too hard to get to where we are. We diversified and did what we could to stay afloat. If we can make it through Covid, we can make it through anything.

Related:

Video: The Ethiopian Food Truck In Denver

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UPDATE: Ethiopian Airlines Launches COVID-19 Digital Health Passport

Ethiopian Airlines is now the first African carrier to use the International Air Transport Association's COVID-19 test mobile app. The IATA Travel Pass, which will help verify the authenticity of test information presented by travelers, will be used by the airline on two flights out of Addis Ababa: Washington D.C. and Toronto. (Photo: Airbus)

Simple Flying

Ethiopian Airlines Launches IATA Travel Pass Trials

Yet another airline is announcing that it will be trialing IATA’s Travel Pass – a digital health passport that will make the verification of COVID-19 tests and vaccinations easier for the carrier. Ethiopian Airlines is now the first African carrier to run through a test of the mobile app, joining other airlines such as Emirates, SWISS, Singapore Airlines, and more.

“Ethiopian has gone digital in all of its operations to avoid physical contact and combat the spread of the pandemic and now, embarks on this initiative which will allow passengers to relish unparalleled flight experience.”

-Ethiopian Airlines official statement

Where is the trial taking place?

The IATA Travel Pass, which will help verify the authenticity of test information presented by travelers, will be used by Ethiopian Airlines on two flights out of Addis Ababa Bole International Airport (ADD):

Washington D.C. – Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD)
Toronto – Lester B. Pearson International Airport (YYZ)

For flights to Addis Ababa, two airports will participate in this trial:

London Heathrow (LHR)
Toronto – Lester B. Pearson International Airport (YYZ)

The airline notes that this was effective as of April 25th, 2021, meaning that the trial is already underway.


A visualization of the airports participating in this trial. Ethiopian flights to Toronto and Washington include technical stops, but this has not been included in the map to reduce confusion. (Photo: GCMap.com)

Solving problems through digital technology

Mr. Tewolde GebreMariam, Group CEO of Ethiopian Airlines, says that digital technology is vital to solving many of the problems that arise from the pandemic. Saying:

“We are glad that we are offering new digital opportunities to our passengers so as to fully and safely restart air travel. Our customers will enjoy efficient, contactless and safer travel experience with their travel pass digital passport. As a safety first airline, we have become the first African airline to trail IATA’s travel pass initiative to facilitate travel.”

For those still unfamiliar with IATA’s Travel Pass, the mobile app is designed to be a digital health passport of sorts, which will receive test and vaccination certificates and verify that they are sufficient for the traveler’s specific route.


Ethiopian has 27 Boeing 787 Dreamliners in its fleet. These are a mix of the -9 and shorter -8 variants. (Photo: byeangel via Wikimedia Commons)

The app will share testing or vaccination certificates with airlines and authorities to facilitate travel. “The digital travel app will also avoid fraudulent documentation and make air travel more convenient,” the airline’s official messaging adds.

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In Virginia No Bail for Accused Ethiopian Man in 70-pound Marijuana Plot

Samson Desalegne Alemu, 31, of Springfield, was one of four people arrested April 14 as Christiansburg police ended weeks of surveillance and swooped in on an operation that investigators said connected a Northern Virginia supply chain to drug sales in two town neighborhoods. The trigger was Alemu’s arrival in a red 2019 Ford Escape that officers secretly equipped with a tracer. (Photo: Christiansburg Police Dept.)

The Roanoke Times

No bail for accused driver in 70-pound marijuana plot in Montgomery County

HRISTIANSBURG — An Ethiopian man accused of delivering 70 pounds of marijuana to a suspected dealer in Christiansburg will not be allowed free on bond, a Montgomery County judge said Thursday.

Samson Desalegne Alemu, 31, of Springfield, was one of four people arrested April 14 as Christiansburg police ended weeks of surveillance and swooped in on an operation that investigators said connected a Northern Virginia supply chain to drug sales in two town neighborhoods. The trigger was Alemu’s arrival in a red 2019 Ford Escape that officers secretly equipped with a tracer – Alemu was tracked electronically as he drove south, with officers falling in behind him as he passed Roanoke, Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Jennifer Wolz said at Thursday’s bond hearing.

Police seized 66 pounds of suspected marijuana from the vehicle Alemu drove and another four pounds from the townhouse in the 300 block of Oak Tree Boulevard where his trip ended, Commonwealth’s Attorney Mary Pettitt said.

Another pound of suspected marijuana was found at an apartment in the Christiansburg Bluff complex in the 500 block of Republic Road that allegedly also was used by accused drug seller Tomas [Alemayehu] Keno, 29, of Radford, a search warrant said.

Alemu and Keno each were charged with conspiring to distribute or to possess with the intent to distribute more than five pounds of marijuana, and with distributing or possessing with the intent to distribute more than five pounds of marijuana.

Also arrested was Kayla Lynn Raines, 28, of Christiansburg, on the same two charges, and Natnael Kifle Yilma, 20, of Herndon, who was charged with the same conspiracy count and with having a firearm while involved in selling a pound of marijuana.

Keno and Yilma had already been denied bail at earlier hearings, and Raines released on a $25,000 secured bond, when Alemu appeared by a video link from the county jail Thursday in Montgomery County General District Court.

Attorney Chris Anderson of Roanoke, who represented Alemu, said his client, an Ethiopian citizen, was needed at home in Springfield, where the youngest of his two children was undergoing cancer treatment and his fianceé was recovering from her own cancer care.

“There is a substantial need for Mr. Alemu’s presence there,” Anderson said.

Alemu also has a more local community tie, with a sister living in Christiansburg, Anderson added.

Wolz countered that the scale and alleged ongoing nature of the marijuana operation argued against setting a bond, as did a 2014 conviction that Alemu had for failing to appear for a Radford court hearing.

Judge Gerald Mabe agreed with Wolz’ argument, saying that Alemu’s earlier failure to appear concerned him and the nature of the case left him unsure if Alemu would not commit other offenses if set free. Mabe said Alemu would have to remain in jail at least until his preliminary hearing, now set for Sept. 13, or he could appeal to Circuit Court and try to convince a judge there to set bail.

According to Wolz, investigators had been looking at Keno as a regional marijuana seller since March and thought that Alemu was his source. Raines is Keno’s girlfriend, and she told investigators that she stayed at the Oak Tree Boulevard townhouse and Keno helped her with expenses, Wolz said.

When officers raided the townhouse, they found more than $30,000 in cash. Much of the money was in a nightstand and Raines said it had not been there that morning, Wolz said. Among the money was $200 in marked bills that had been used in an earlier police undercover drug buy from Keno, Wolz said.

A tipster had told police that several times per week, someone was bringing 10 to 20 pounds of marijuana from Keno’s address, Wolz said.

Alemu told officers that the contraband found in the Ford Escape and in the townhouse was all his, Wolz said.

When Alemu drove to Christiansburg, he was followed by a white 2014 Ford Fusion driven by Yilma, Wolz said. Among the items in the Fusion were five bags of spice, or synthetic marijuana, Wolz said.

In an email after the hearing, Pettitt drew a sharp distinction between the alleged marijuana operation in Christiansburg and the legalization that Virginia is about to enact.

“Beginning July 1st, adults 21 years of age or older may possess up to 1 ounce of marijuana for personal use and may grow up to four plants per household,” Pettitt wrote. “However, it will be illegal to use marijuana in public or while driving. In addition distribution or sharing of marijuana in any amount over 1 ounce will continue to be illegal and a felony. We will continue to pursue distribution of marijuana cases when the amounts involved exceeds the 1 ounce authorized by the Legislature.

“In this case, the quantity involved is over 1,100 ounces and the street value is approaching $200,000.”

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Spotlight: “A Fire Within” A New Historical Ethiopian American Documentary Premiers at Atlanta Film Festival

A new documentary film, A Fire Within, will premiere at the 45th Atlanta Film Festival with a special event outdoor “Drive-In” screening on April 30th at 8:00pm at the Plaza Theatre Atlanta. (Courtesy photos)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: April 28th, 2021

New York (TADIAS) — This week A Fire Within, which is executive produced by Liya Kebede and directed by acclaimed filmmaker Christopher Chambers, is set to make it’s world premiere at the 45th Atlanta Film Festival with a special event outdoor “Drive-In” screening on April 30th at 8:00pm at the Plaza Theatre Atlanta. In addition, the film will also be available for viewing online.

The new documentary A Fire Within brings to life the dramatic and widely reported story of three Ethiopian women in the U.S. that played out in an Altanta courtroom in the 1990′s when one of the women Hirute Abebe-Jira sued a former Ethiopian police official named Kelbessa Negewo as the person who tortured her in prison during the ″Red Terror″ era in Ethiopia.

At the time the Associated Press reported that “the suit was filed under the Alien Tort Claims Act, which allows aliens to seek relief in federal court for human rights violations in other countries. According to the suit, Negewo commanded police forces in part of Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa” during that period.

As the press release notes:

“A FIRE WITHIN recounts the remarkable coincidence when Edjegayehu “Edge” Taye, Elizabeth Demissie, and Hirut Abebe-Jiri, three Ethiopian women who immigrate to the United States after surviving torture in their home country, discover the man responsible for their torture is living in America and working at the same restaurant as Edge in midtown Atlanta’s Colony Square Hotel. In Ethiopia, Kelbessa Negewo was a government official who tortured and executed scores of civilians during “The Red Terror”. At the Colony Square Hotel, he was the dish washer.

After confirming Negewo’s identity, the women vowed to find a way to bring him to justice. Atlanta-based lawyers Miles Alexander, Laurel Lucey and Michael Tyler at Kilpatrick Townsend law firm, along with ACLU Director Paul Hoffman, took the women’s case pro bono. Their legal strategy would hinge on the Alien Tort Statute of 1789, a section from America’s first Judiciary Act. Since 1979 (Filártiga v. Peña-Irala), American human rights lawyers have used the Alien Tort Statute to bring cases against human rights violators. The film documents the women’s harrowing journey to justice, bringing them face to face with their own torturer in what became a historic trial in modern American human rights law.

“Making this film has been a powerful, humbling experience,” said Chistopher Chambers, director. “The resilience of these three women, refusing to be intimidated into silence by their abuser, relentlessly pursuing justice, while struggling to start new lives as immigrants and refugees, is nothing less than heroic. These women represent the best of what “American values” can and should be.”

A FIRE WITHIN is executive produced by Ethiopian supermodel Liya Kebede. Kebede is also an award-winning actress, former World Health Organization (WHO) Ambassador, women’s rights activist, and founder and creative director of lemlem fashion brand.

I was so touched and moved by this story,” said Kebede. “We don’t often get to hear about such stories — the “other” stories. The stories that do not get told. It is very rewarding to be a part of this film and to bring the story of these courageous women to light.”

A FIRE WITHIN was filmed using interviews, archival footage and narrative recreations in 10 cities across the globe, including Atlanta, Georgia; Ottawa, Canada; and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. In Ethiopia, narrative recreations were filmed with a locally-hired, all-Ethiopian cast and crew.

You can learn more about the film and screening at www.facebook.com/AFireWithinDoc

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Conversation With Ethiopian-born, New York-based Actor Antu Yacob at JCTC

Ethiopian-born, New York-based actor, producer, and playwright Antu Yacob will be featured for the final edition of Black Space by the Jersey City Theater Center on Sunday April 25. Antu was born in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia and raised in California and Minnesota. Her work is focused on women of the African Diaspora. (NJ.com)

NJ.com

Last month, the Jersey City Theater Center (JCTC) began its new talk series, “Black Space,” an ongoing series of intimate and candid conversations exploring the experiences of black artists in the world today led by Ashley Nicole Baptiste, JCTC’s associate artistic director.

On Sunday April 25, Baptiste will initiate an in-depth conversation with actor, producer, and playwright Antu Yacob. Yacob is an Ethiopian-born, New York-based actor and has also worked extensively in the Bay Area and the Twin Cities. The talk takes place at 2 p.m. EST on Facebook Live and as a Zoom webinar.

“As our city gentrifies while retaining its diversity, and indeed as the world is changing in fundamental ways, being right in the middle of these conversations is essential,” says JCTC’s artistic director, Olga Levina. “For us as a theatre company dedicated to sparking conversations that lead to deeper respect and understanding, we know we need to create a safe place to listen and learn and collaborate.”

Yacob’s work focuses on women of the African diaspora. On the acting faculty of Rutgers University’s Mason Gross School of the Arts, her short film “Love in Submission” tells the story of two Muslim women from different backgrounds who meet for the first time when their worlds collide through a mutual third party. You can follow Yacob on Instagram @antuyacob and Twitter @AntuAbdi for updates.

Past talks for Black Space included Jersey City visual artist K. Brown, who talked about her love for art and Jersey City; and a discussion with nine black artists in different fields and different cities including Portland, Jersey City, New York, and London.

“I want to create an intentional safe space where black artists from around the world can come together and have a human-to-human exchange about art, race and life,” says Baptiste, an actor and a veteran youth theatre educator with the JCTC Youth Theatre and the Stories of Greenville initiative. “This series is about expansion, and pushing past pre-conceived notions of blackness.”

Related:

In Pictures: Antu Yacob Performs “In the Gray” at United Solo Theatre Festival

In the Gray: A One Person Ethio-American Show by Playwright Antu Yacob

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In Harlem Ethiopian Church Faces Eviction In City’s Affordable Housing Deal

Board members Atsede Elegba (left) and Almaz Kebede outside the Beaata Le Mariam Ethiopian Orthodox Church on March 28, 2021. The church is set to be evicted from its home on Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. due to a city deal with a local nonprofit. (Photo: Patch)

Patch

A celebrated deal to create permanently affordable housing in Harlem will leave the neighborhood’s last Ethiopian Orthodox church homeless.

HARLEM, NY — When leaders of the Beaata Le Mariam Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church received an eviction notice in 2019, displacing them from their longtime home, they assumed their landlord had reached a deal with some private developer to construct a new set of condominiums or a luxury tower.

“We thought it was some huge corporate structure who was just wanting to buy the building to make money,” said Atsede Elegba, a church board member.

It was not until March of this year that the church learned the more complicated truth: their landlord, the city’s Housing Preservation Department, had reached a much-heralded deal to give their building to a neighborhood nonprofit, which will convert it into permanently affordable housing.

Now, members of the church — the last remaining Ethiopian Orthodox institution in Harlem — are packing up icons and incense at their home on Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard and West 121st Street ahead of their May 28 eviction date.


In this pre-pandemic photo, crowds gathered inside Beaata Le Mariam for a bishop’s visit in 2019. (Courtesy of Atsede Elegba)

They are also contending with internal disagreements over how to find a new home, and conflicted feelings about the group that is displacing them.

“I’m very sad,” said Mezgebu Zikarge, the church’s head priest and administrator. “I cry to God.”

“People from all over”

Behind Beaata Le Mariam’s modest corner storefront, about two dozen people were gathered on a recent Sunday after finishing that day’s services. Families sipped coffee and tea and tore off chunks of dabo bread; women wearing traditional netela scarves spoke in English and Amharic as children ran between rooms.

In the inner sanctuary, Zikarge pointed at portraits of Saint Michael, Saint Gabriel and Jesus’s crucifixion as the smell of incense wafted in. The church, which welcomed up to 100 congregants on past Sundays, has continued holding smaller, socially-distanced services during the pandemic.


Mezgebu Zikarge, priest head and administrator of Beaata Le Mariam Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, inside the church sanctuary on March 28, 2021. (Nick Garber/Patch)

The Ethiopian Orthodox church first made inroads in Harlem in the 1950s, arriving at the request of Black Americans who were drawn to it as one of the few Christian churches in Africa that predated colonialism.

Today, Beaata Le Mariam is “a rare combination of Western-born and Ethiopian-born parishioners,” said Elegba, whose family were early converts to the faith in the 1960s. Starting in the 1970s, Black American and Caribbean congregants were joined by native Ethiopians and Eritreans immigrating to Harlem during those countries’ civil war.

Over the years, fellow churches around Harlem have shut their doors as parishioners moved to other boroughs and the suburbs. Beaata Le Mariam opened in 2003 in Lower Manhattan, sharing space with an Armenian orthodox church before moving into its Harlem home in 2006.

“We have a lot of people from all over,” said board chair Almaz Kebede, citing congregants who travel from the Bronx, New Jersey and Connecticut to attend weekly services.

A historic housing deal

For more than a decade, Beaata Le Mariam paid just $1,267 per month to occupy the ground floor of the five-story brick building at 2020 Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard.

Despite repeatedly asking for a permanent lease, the church was kept on a month-to-month basis by HPD, which the agency says is standard practice as it works to convert its properties into affordable housing.

Then, in April 2019, came the eviction notice.

Since December 2019, the church has been allowed to pay no rent, and was granted an extension on its eviction through June 2020 after negotiating with the city. Due to the pandemic, the deadline was extended into 2021, before the firm May 28 deadline was handed down earlier this year.


Congregants celebrated Easter inside Beaata Le Mariam in 2013. (Courtesy of Atsede Elegba)

It was only through media reports this spring that church leaders learned what had happened: their building had been transferred to the nonprofit East Harlem El Barrio Community Land Trust (EHEBCLT), in a historic agreement announced last fall and hailed by housing advocates.

In the deal, the EHEBCLT purchased four HPD-owned buildings for $1 each, promising to renovate them and turn them into housing that would be kept affordable in perpetuity.

“In anticipation of this property’s substantial renovation as part of the East Harlem El Barrio Community Land Trust (EHEBCLT) project, the former commercial tenant was issued a standard 30 day vacate notice,” HPD spokesperson Jeremy House said.

“We don’t have the money”

As the deadline nears, congregants are split roughly in half between those who want to find a way to stay, and others who see the eviction as a chance to start fresh elsewhere, Elegba said.

But as church leaders hunt for a new home in Harlem, they are facing a stark reality: few spaces are available with rents as low as what they are used to paying.

“We don’t have the money to rent a market-rate facility,” Elegba said. “It just seemed as though we were disregarded.”


Congregants served food at Beaata Le Mariam for a 2013 celebration. (Courtesy of Atsede Elegba)

Now, elders are moving the church’s possessions into a storage locker in the Bronx, after outreach to the mayor’s faith-based pandemic advisory council and City Councilmember Bill Perkins’s office failed to yield any relief.

Reached for comment, Athena Bernkopf, a project coordinator for the EHEBCLT, said the group could not comment on legal proceedings, but has “always been open to being in conversation with community members regarding community land.”

Members of Beaata Le Mariam were hesitant to draw attention to their eviction, Elegba said, in part because they support the land trust’s mission of creating affordable housing.

But the desire to find a new home for the church outweighed their reluctance, Elegba said.

“A part of me hopes that if someone writes about it, maybe someone else will have the heart to say, ‘Maybe you can move here.”


The storefront home of Beaata Le Mariam Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, on Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard and West 121st Street, March 28, 2021. (Nick Garber/Patch)

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Ethiopian Airlines Celebrates 75 Years Of Flights

As Ethiopian Airlines announced [this week] April 8th, 2021 marked the 75th anniversary of the carrier’s first-ever commercial flight. This inaugural service flew from the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa to its Egyptian counterpart, Cairo. (Photo: Ethiopian was the first African airline to order the Boeing 787 ‘Dreamliner.’/Getty Images)

Simple Flying

Yesterday marked a significant anniversary in the airline industry, as Ethiopian Airlines marked 75 years since its inaugural commercial flight. In the three-quarters of a century since then, the carrier has become the largest in Africa. Let’s take a look at the airline’s history, and how it has celebrated this special anniversary this week.

How did it all start?

As Ethiopian Airlines announced yesterday, April 8th, 2021 marked the 75th anniversary of the carrier’s first-ever commercial flight. This inaugural service flew from the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa to its Egyptian counterpart, Cairo.

The flight was operated by a Douglas C-47 Skytrain, and flew via the Eritrean capital of Asmara. Ethiopian’s initial fleet consisted of five C-47s acquired from the US government. These previously served as military transport aircraft, and were a development of Douglas’s popular DC-3. Ethiopian’s C-47s had a mixed configuration, carrying passengers and cargo.

In the 75 years that have followed, Ethiopian has experienced impressive and consistent growth. According to Planespotters.net, its fleet today consists of 127 aircraft. These include some of the most modern and efficient twinjets in the skies, namely the Boeing 787 and Airbus A350. With this fleet, Ethiopian serves the fourth-largest number of countries of any airline.


Ethiopian eventually operated the popular Douglas DC-3 as well as its military counterpart, the C-47. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

Anniversary celebrations

The ongoing coronavirus is continuing to significantly impact the world of commercial aviation. As such, Ethiopian’s 75th birthday probably did not play out how the airline might previously have imagined. Nonetheless, the carrier was able to mark the occasion with a special event on a flight to Cairo. As established, this was Ethiopian’s first commercial route.

Read more »

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Spotlight: Ethiopian American Ainae Nielsen, Howard University Student Competing on ‘The Voice’

Ainae Nielsen, a Washington, D.C., native and Silver Spring, Maryland, resident, made it onto Team Kelly in the final blind audition last week. She grew up in an Ethiopian American family that loves music. She said she's always known she wanted to be a singer. It wasn’t until the pandemic hit that she began to make her dream a reality. (Photo: Ainae Nielsen on stage during season 20 of “The Voice”/NBC)

NBC Washington

‘You Got This’: Howard University Student Competing on ‘The Voice’

A 21-year-old Howard University student is competing on “The Voice” and may advance Monday night.

Ainae Nielsen, a Washington, D.C., native and Silver Spring, Maryland, resident, sang her own arrangement of “Best Part” by H.E.R. and Daniel Caesar and made it onto judge Kelly Clarkson’s team last week in the final blind audition.

Nielsen told News4 she could hardly believe her eyes as she saw Clarkson’s chair begin to turn to see her.

“The whole time, I was saying to myself, ‘You got this, you got this,’” she said. “I was nervous, but I was confident that all that practice that I did would come through in that moment.”

Nielsen majors in business marketing at Howard and is set to graduate this spring. She grew up in an Ethiopian American family that loves music. She said she’s always known she wanted to be a singer. It wasn’t until the pandemic hit that she began to make her dream a reality.

Nielsen said a casting director from “The Voice” asked her to audition. She took it as a “sign,” as she had been dreaming of moving to California to pursue a music career.

Nielsen’s advice to others who may want to audition for a singing competition was to “know yourself” and “be confident.”
“Now that I’m here, I know this is the road I’m supposed to be going on,” she said.

After the blind audition, Clarkson said Nielsen is “a competitor” and “different from anyone else in the show.” Clarkson said she believes Nielsen is ready to take on the challenge.

Nielsen said she has had a great experience on the show so far.

“The amount of growth that I’ve had within a week is insane,” she said.

Nielsen’s advice to others who may want to audition for a singing competition was to “know yourself” and “be confident.”

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Three Ethiopian Films Featured at New African Film Festival in U.S.

According to organizers the annual film festival, which is usually held at AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland, will be held online this year (April 1–18) highlighting 33 films from 26 Countries including Ethiopian movies "Running Against The Wind, Finding Sally and Min Alesh [ምን አለሽ. (Courtesy photos)

Tadias Magazine

By Tadias Staff

Updated: March 30th, 2021

New York (TADIAS) — This year’s U.S.-based New African Film Festival features three award-winning Ethiopian films including the 2020 Oscar Selection Running Against The Wind; filmmaker Tamara Dawit’s timely documentary Finding Sally and the inspiring new film Min Alesh [ምን አለሽ], a story set in Merkato about a young woman who overcomes adversity through athletics.

According to organizers the annual film festival, which is usually held at AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland, will be held online this year (April 1–18) highlighting 33 films from 26 Countries.

The 2021 New African Film Festival “showcases the vibrancy of African filmmaking from all corners of the
continent and across the diaspora,” the announcement stated. “This year, for its 17th edition, the festival goes virtual, presenting a lineup of outstanding contemporary African cinema online for audiences in the Washington, DC, area and beyond.”

Below are descriptions and trailers of the Ethiopian films courtesy of AFI Silver Theatre.

Special Presentation

2020 Oscar® Selection, Ethiopia

RUNNING AGAINST THE WIND

Available starting Friday, April 2

Ethiopia’s 2020 Oscar® submission traces the lives of two brothers pursuing big dreams along very different paths. As children, Abdi (Ashenafi Nigusu) wants to become a long-distance runner, while Solomon (Mikias Wolde) desires nothing more than to become a professional photographer. Early in their childhood, the brothers part ways. Solomon escapes his remote hometown to seek his fortune as a photographer in Addis Ababa, eventually ending up on the streets in the city’s vast slums. Abdi remains in his village, training to become an Olympian in the hopes of following in the footsteps of Ethiopian legend and gold medalist Haile Gebrselassie (who has a cameo in the film). When fate reunites the brothers as adults in Addis Ababa, can the distance that has grown between them be bridged? DIR/SCR/PROD Jan Philipp Weyl; SCR Michael Wogh; PROD Samerawit Seid Kekebo, Chris Naumann, Andreas Seck. Ethiopia/Germany, 2019, color, 116 min. In Amharic with English subtitles. NOT RATED

Special Presentation

FINDING SALLY

Available starting Thursday, April 8

Followed by a recorded Q&A with filmmaker Tamara Mariam Dawit

FINDING SALLY tells the incredible story of a 23-year-old woman from an upper-class family who became a communist rebel with the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Party in the 1970s. Idealistic and in love, Sally got caught up in her country’s revolutionary fervor and landed on the military government’s most wanted list. She went underground and her family never saw her again. Four decades after Sally’s disappearance, filmmaker Tamara Mariam Dawit pieces together the mysterious life of her aunt Sally. She revisits the Ethiopian Revolution and the terrible massacre that followed, which resulted in nearly every Ethiopian family losing a loved one. Her quest leads her to question notions of belonging, personal convictions and political ideals at a time when Ethiopia is going through important political changes once again. (Note adapted from Catbird Productions.) Official Selection, 2020 Göteborg Film Festival, African Diaspora International Film Festival and Film Africa; 2021 Pan African Film Festival. DIR/SCR Tamara Mariam Dawit; PROD Isabelle Couture. Canada, 2020, color, 78 min. In English and Amharic with English subtitles. NOT RATED

MIN ALESH? [ምን አለሽ]

Available starting Thursday, April 8

Set in Merkato, a sprawling, open-air market in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, MIN ALESH? tells the inspiring story of 21-year-old Selam (Amleset Muchie, who also wrote and directed), whose perseverance transforms her life for the better. Having grown up amid poverty and hardships, Selam is determined to change her own and her family’s circumstances through her passion for running. An international race offers her a chance to achieve her dream. (Note adapted from New York African Film Festival.) DIR/SCR Amleset Muchie; PROD Selamawit Mare. Ethiopia, 2019, color, 84 min. In Amharic with English subtitles. NOT RATED

Learn more at AFI.com and get festival access at https://naff.eventive.org/.

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Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund Announces Board Vacancy and Request for Proposal

The Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund is a U.S.-based non-profit organization established to mobilize the Ethiopian Diaspora to raise funds and support Ethiopian projects at home. (Courtesy image)

Press Release

Board Vacancy at the Friends of EDTF (FEDTF)

We are excited to invite you to apply or nominate to be a member of the Board of the Friends of Ethiopia Diaspora Trust Fund (FEDTF). FEDTF is a US incorporated non-profit entity with the primary mission of mobilizing resources from the Diaspora and channel them to projects that promote inclusive development of Ethiopia and impact livelihoods. It is governed by the Board of Directors in conformity to best governance practices under US laws.

More info at ethiopiatrustfund.org »

Request for Proposal

Operations and Management at Friends of EDTF, INC.

Issued by: Friends of EDTF, INC.
Submissions to be sent to: Lulite Ejigu (Email: Board@EthiopiaTrustFund.org)

Introduction & Background

Friends of EDTF, INC. a non-profit organization organized to mobilize the Ethiopian Diaspora to raise funds and support Ethiopian projects at home. As part of the FEDTF’s renewed organizational initiative to be more visible, responsive and transparent and to increase its operational capability, it is looking to hire a management and operations support team. To this end it is issuing a Request for Proposal (“RFP”).

We invite and encourage qualified persons or firms who can provide high quality support in fundraising, administration, and other general day-to-day management of the organization to apply.

This management and operations support would help implement FEDTF’s enhanced vision and strategy to raise more funds to have meaningful impact in the lives of our brothers’ and sisters’ back in Ethiopia. In response to this RFP, qualified applicants must be capable to provide the following:

1. Develop a fundraising strategy engaging the diverse Ethiopian Diaspora Communities, including milestones and a timeline for targeted growth for FEDTF;
2. Develop a grant strategy to raise funds from national and global grant giving organizations
3. Develop a strategy to raise funds from corporations as part of their CSR programs
4. Develop a timely and transparent communication plan to reach out to its donors and all stakeholders and manage donor relationships effectively
5. Increase its fundraising dollars as well as develop a global core of strategic partners and donors
6. Propose, organize, and implement fundraising events including assisting EDTF chapters across the globe;
7. Manage and Oversee the execution of new large scale multi-million dollar development projects on the ground in Ethiopia.

The objective of this RFP is to identify and select a candidate that will provide the best overall value – both financial and programmatic, to the Foundation. While cost is a significant factor, other criteria will also be considered as the basis of the award decision, as fully described in the Evaluation Factors section below.

Submission Guidelines & Requirements

The following submission guidelines & requirements apply to this RFP:

1. Only qualified individuals or firms with prior experience in the required activities listed above.
2. Potential bidders must notify the Foundation with a letter of intent no later than March 26, 2021.
3. Bidders should have experience working on the African continent and/or have experience running projects with stakeholders across the globe.
4. Bidders should be able to highlight how they have mobilized both volunteers and fundraised resources for projects of similar scale.
5. Bidders must list projects that are substantially similar to this project as part of their response. Examples of work and references will be requested if chosen.
6. A technical proposal must be provided that doesn’t exceed four pages. This technical
proposal must provide an overview of the proposed solution including, milestones and
time tables as applicable.
7. A cost breakdown must be provided on a separate sheet, not more than one page. This should indicate the overall fixed cost for the project as well as any potential variable costs.
8. Proposals must be signed by the applicant or, if for a company, by a representative that is authorized to commit company.
9. If you have a standard set of terms and conditions, please submit them with your proposal.
10. Proposals must be received on or before March 31, 2021 to be considered.
11. Proposals and financial quotations must remain valid for a period of 60 days.
12. Friends of EDTF, INC. would select the winner of the awards after completing its in depth discussions and negotiations with bidders.

Project Description

The purpose of this project is as follows:

The purpose of this project is to improve our management and operations efficiency and productivity so that we can expand our capabilities to implement our mission to connect the large Ethiopian diaspora community from across the globe fulfill its desire to support socio-economic development projects in Ethiopia.

The description of the project is as follows:

To manage the day-to-day operations overseeing grant management, administration activities, and improve fundraising efforts; including identifying and soliciting new strategic partners and expanding the donor base.

The criteria set forth below should be met to achieve successful completion of the RFP:

1. Strategic Plan for (2021-2025)
2. Expansion of donor base including significant strategic partners
3. Refinement of grant & fundraising management as well as reporting processes, including enhancing reporting with key data elements to highlight performance
4. Enhanced operations procedures based on strategic plan assessment

Acceptance of the work is contingent on the following acceptance criteria:

1. Effective action plan that is adopted by the Board of Directors
2. Updated and adopted operations procedures by the Board of Directors

RFP & Project Timelines

The Contract period shall commence as soon as practicable following the date of award. The minimum length of the contract is until December 31, 2021. The Board of Directors, at its sole discretion, may elect to extend for an additional four (4) one (1) year option periods.

Evaluation Factors

Friends of EDTF, Inc. will rate proposals based on the following factors, with cost being the most important factor:

1. Responsiveness to the requirements set forth in this RFP
2. Relevant past performance/experience
3. Cost, including an assessment of total cost of ownership
4. Technical expertise/experience of bidder and bidder’s staff

Friends of EDTF, Inc. reserves the right to award to the bidder that presents the best value to Friends of EDTF, INC. as determined solely by Friends of EDTF, INC. in its absolute discretion.

The FEDTF Board of Directors also reserves the right to cancel this RFP, in whole or in part, at its own discretion

Learn more at ethiopiatrustfund.org »

Related:

EDTF Launches Emergency COVID19 Fund

Update: EDTF procures $1.173 Million medical supplies for campaign against COVID-19 in Ethiopia

Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund: Q&A with Dr. Bisrat Aklilu

EDTF Ethiopia Board Announced

Ways to Boost Donor Participation for the Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund

Few Takeaways From EDTF Press Conference at Ethiopian Embassy in DC

Interview: Dr. Lemma Senbet on the Diaspora Trust Fund & Chapter Formation

Interview with Dr. Bisrat Aklilu About the Ethiopian Diaspora Trust Fund

A Diaspora Trust Fund for Ethiopia (Tadias Editorial/July 10th, 2018)

You can learn more at https://www.ethiopiatrustfund.org/

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Meet Hana Getachew: The Textile Designer Bringing Ethiopian Craft to New Audience

NYC-based Textile designer and owner of Bolé Road Textiles Hana Getachew collaborates with artisans living and working in Ethiopia. (Courtesy of Bolé Road Textiles)

Business of Home

The textile designer bringing Ethiopian craft to a new audience

It might not seem ideal to split a small business across two continents—but for textile designer Hana Getachew it’s essential. To produce her collections of ethically sourced handwoven pillows, throws and linens, the Kingston, New York–based owner of Bolé Road Textiles collaborates with artisans living and working in Ethiopia. For Getachew, the thread has always been there.

Her family left their home in Ethiopia when she was 3, relocating first to Canada for a few years before settling in New York. It wasn’t until Getachew was in college that she returned to her home country to visit family and experienced a deeper cultural immersion. “It ended up being this pretty powerful homecoming that I didn’t anticipate,” she tells Business of Home. “It was seeing all that in its original form, in its undiluted and un-Americanized form, that was really powerful—to go to the source.”

After graduating from Cornell University with a degree in interior design, Getachew spent 11 years at an architecture firm designing commercial interiors and office spaces. Still, she couldn’t shake the impression her trip to Ethiopia had made on her. In 2014, she quit her job and took the plunge—traveling down Bolé Road in her birthplace of Addis Ababa, she hit the pavement to find the partners with whom she would launch her textile business.

“Here I am, I don’t have any credentials, I don’t have a business, and I don’t have a lot of funds. … In retrospect, it’s kind of comical,” she says. “I stuck with the people who were curious and interested and didn’t brush me away.”

Those same artisans and vendors Getachew encountered on that trip are still working with Bolé Road Textiles today. The decision to partner with artisans based in Ethiopia was partly a matter of quality—the weaving looms there differ from those commonly used in the West, requiring a high skill level to create the intricate geometric patterns featured on many of the brand’s pillows. Plus, there’s no formal training for this method—the weavers and artisans, who are predominantly male, are taught by their fathers and grandfathers. Women more frequently serve as the business owners of textile workshops, many of which are formed as collectives that divide labor and share profits equally—including Bolé Road’s partner company.

In most cases, Getachew’s design process begins with a place. Take, for example, the Harar collection, inspired by a city in eastern Ethiopia. The vibrancy of the town’s bustling markets and colorful dress is juxtaposed with the centuries-old walls surrounding it. “How would I create a collection that tells the story of Harar?” says Getachew. “It became these geometric forms from the rigid architecture, to a lot of bold, bright colors from the streetscape.” The result is a striking collection of textiles in vibrant, deeply saturated hues—think fuchsia, cobalt and maroon—marked with lively patterns of intersecting lines.

Since Bolé Road made its debut at the Brooklyn Designs show in 2015, the company’s growth has varied from year to year. However, according to Getachew, that changed this summer—largely due to the push to support Black-owned businesses in the wake of George Floyd’s death and the racial reckoning that followed. She experienced such an outpouring of press inquiries, orders, and requests for partnerships beginning in June 2020 that she began to have frank conversations with those reaching out to her about issues of equity and representation.

“My response has evolved,” she says. “At first, I was just overwhelmed. I came to the conclusion that it will start to feel manageable and digestible if the cards were out on the table—if we were more transparent [in] talking about the bigger context about why this person was across the screen from me.”


Textile designer Hana Getachew in her studio. (Courtesy of Bolé Road Textiles)

Getachew also began to reflect on her own experiences—including the lack of representation during her early years in corporate architecture. She called some of her old colleagues and clients and began a series of conversations that would form the basis of the International Interior Design Association of New York’s newly founded Equity Council, whose mission is “to achieve equity and accountability toward increased diversity and inclusion in the design industry.” Though still in its early stages, the group recently brought on consultants from Racial Equity Partners. It also plans to distribute a pledge later this year, which Getachew says will borrow inspiration from the 15 Percent Pledge (a commitment by retailers to buy 15 percent of their merchandise from Black-owned businesses), while also including steps companies can take to create a more equitable workplace.

Read more »

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Spotlight: Ethiopian-Canadian R&B/Neo-Soul Artist Liza

Born and raised in Toronto, Liza grew up in a traditional Ethiopian household immersed with the Ethiopian musical culture. (Photo: Liza © Zachary Zewudia)

Atwood Magazine

TODAY’S SONG: LIZA’S “DONE IS DONE” BRINGS SOULFUL NEW MEANING TO DESOLATION

R&B and Neo-Soul artist Liza tells the story of love fading away and how much of it is worth saving in her hauntingly cathartic single, “DONE IS DONE.”

For artists who leave trails of their talent behind in bright, lively, feel-good music, a venture into the world of melancholy songs can sometimes be surprising. However, when the song comes from Ethiopian-Canadian R&B/Neo-Soul artist Liza, it is far from shocking. Liza is a voice for the R&B sound today, blending rhythm with soul, no matter what stage of living her soul might be in. From her first few singles off February 29 (2017) to her latest 2021 release, “ROLLA,” it’s always been evident that the writing, the sound, and the music that go into Liza’s tracks are authentic, and for the first time, so is her new haunting, desolate single, “DONE IS DONE.”


DONE IS DONE – Liza

Her switch from upbeat R&B songs to a track like “DONE IS DONE” isn’t surprising because of the artist’s truthfulness in her art. With enchanting vocals, melodic trills, and captivating, soul-soothing melodies, the song is a pathway to Liza’s up-and-coming eclectic sound. “Just like the words said / They can’t be unsaid / Tears can’t be unshed,” Liza sings. As a listener, it is easy to follow her story, whether she’s singing of a newfound romance or a love that’s dying out. “DONE IS DONE,” is the sequel to the artist’s previous single, “ROLLA.” Where “ROLLA” narrates the excitement of falling in love, her newest single tells of the yearning for closure after a broken heart is left behind.

Produced by Akeel Henry (Jeremih, dvsn, and Ty Dolla $ign) and Kofo (Wizkid and Kaash Paige), Liza’s soulful vocals paired with harmonies from vocalist Nevon Sinclair bring the sound of heartache drowned in R&B to light on the track. Initially writing “DONE IS DONE” as a poem, Liza has since been able to eloquently articulate her feelings in retrospect. Drawing from her upbringing in Toronto, Canada where a mix of different cultures inspired her sound, artists like Brandy, Sade, Aster Aweke, and traditional Ethiopian sounds can often be found in a lot of the artist’s music. On “DONE IS DONE,” you’ll hear a perfect blend of all of the above where Liza’s open lyricism and questions of where love went wrong are synced to the song’s wandering, heartfelt sound.


Liza © Zachary Zewudia

“I find that sometimes I have a hard time learning to let go of things, and people. I tend to let good memories overshadow the present reality of a given situation and, as a result, I don’t immediately recognize when something is no longer working. When I wrote this song, I initially wrote it as a poem and I was going through many life transitions at the time – dealing with the end of some really important relationships. It was months later where Nevon read my poem and told me that it should be a song. We worked together to bring it to what it is now and it was a really deep and beautiful experience. Through the making of this song, I realized and accepted that even though relationships may come to an end, that doesn’t mean that it didn’t serve its purpose.”

“Dead roses don’t come back to life,” she sings. The magic of hearing an artist embrace something like the sadness you’re left wondering “When did we go down?” especially after a discography of light, carefree songs is in the fact that they’re embracing every emotional part of the human experience. “DONE IS DONE” showcases Liza’s darker, more sorrowful side, and it’s something that listeners will be able to relate to, just as much as they relate to her songs about giving up everything for the one you love. Her artistry is versatile and entering a new phase, one that shows how soul – as a genre and as a human experience – has a place in every kind of music.

Liza has been most recently featured on Daniel Caesar‘s latest project, CASE STUDY 01 as well as Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground Official Spotify Playlist. Her original music serves as the soundtracks for hit TV shows like “Twenties” on BET and “Grown-ish” on ABC. Her plans to release more new music are forthcoming in the Spring of 2021. In the meantime, stream “DONE IS DONE,” and keep up to date with all things Liza by following her socials below!

Stream: “DONE IS DONE” – Liza

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Business: Ethiopian Economy Regaining Momentum in 2021

Based on data from the African Development Bank and IMF "comparatively speaking Ethiopia is doing better than most African countries [and regaining its momentum]," Chairman of the U.S.-based Fairfax Africa Fund Zemedeneh Negatu tells CNBC. (Image via CNBC Africa)

CNBC Africa

Fairfax Africa Fund Chair, Negatu sees Ethiopian economy regaining momentum in 2021

Ethiopia’s economy saw a slowdown in the fourth quarter of 2020 despite the country having some of the laxest COVID-19 measures in the region.

“Overall considering what’s going on around the world and in Africa and based on data from the African Development Bank and IMF comparatively speaking Ethiopia is doing better than most African countries [and regaining its momentum],” says Chairman of the U.S.-based Fairfax Africa Fund Zemedeneh Negatu.

Read more and watch the video at cnbcafrica.com »

Related:

African Development Bank: African Economic Outlook 2021

Recent macroeconomic and financial developments in Ethiopia

Ethiopia’s economy grew by 6.1% in 2020, down from 8.4% in 2019, largely because of the COVID–19 pandemic. Growth was led by the services and industry sectors, whereas the hospitability, transport, and communications sectors were adversely affected by the pandemic and the associated containment measures to prevent the spread of the virus. The fiscal deficit, including grants, increased slightly during 2020, financed mainly by treasury bills. Tax revenue increased by 16%, but the tax-to-GDP ratio declined to 9.2% in 2020 from 10% in 2019 due to delayed implementation of tax reforms. Total public spending remained stable, in line with the country’s fiscal consolidation strategy.

In 2020 inflation reached 20.6%, well above the 8% target, due to pandemic-induced supply chain disruptions and expansionary monetary policy. In November 2020, the official exchange rate was devalued by about 8% to 35.0 birr per US dollar. Export revenues increased by 12% in 2020, as exports of gold, flowers, coffee, and chat increased while imports declined by 8.1%. This helped narrow the current account deficit to 4.4% in 2020 from 5.3% in 2019. Service sector exports declined by about 6%, mostly because of lower revenue from Ethiopian Airlines. Foreign direct investment (FDI) fell 20% to 2.2% of GDP, and personal remittances declined by 10% to 5.3% of GDP. Poverty was projected to decline from 23.5% in 2016 to 19% by end of 2020. But pandemic-driven job losses, estimated at as many as 2.5 million, will impede poverty reduction.

Outlook and risks

The medium-term economic outlook is contingent on the resolution of the COVID–19 crisis, the pace of the economic recovery, and such other shocks as civil strife and climate change. Real GDP growth in 2021 is projected to fall to 2%, then recover to about 8% in 2022, led by a rebound in industry and services. Monetary policy is expected to remain flexible in response to the government’s financing requirements. Increased use of open-market operations is expected to reduce inflation gradually. The fiscal deficit is projected to increase as tax policy reforms are delayed due to COVID–19. The current account is likely to deteriorate in 2021 before improving in 2022 as service exports gradually pick up. The key downside risks to the economic outlook include low investor confidence, in part due to sporadic domestic conflicts, weakness in global growth, and climate change.

Financing issues and options

Ethiopia’s financing requirements are significant given its large physical and social infrastructure needs and low tax-to-GDP ratio, which averaged 10% from 2017 to 2020. The primary deficit plus debt service was estimated at nearly 4% of GDP. As of June 2020, total public debt was about 57% of GDP, slightly more than half of which was external. Since 2017, Ethiopia has been classified at high risk of public debt distress due to weak export performance coupled with increased import-intensive public infrastructure investments. The International Monetary Fund’s 2019 debt sustainability analysis estimated the net present value of debt-to-exports at 247.6% and debt service-to-exports at 24.6%; the highest sustainable levels are 180% and 15%, respectively. Ethiopia benefited from the G20 Debt Service Suspension Initiative, and the government is taking measures to contain the debt burden as part of the so-called Home-Grown Economic Reform agenda, which includes fiscal consolidation, expanding public financing sources, a moratorium on nonconcessional borrowing, harnessing grants and concessional loans, and debt restructuring. Gross reserves amounted to $3.1 billion in 2020, or 2.5 months of imports and are unlikely to provide an alternative source of development financing in the short term. Expansion of public debt in the context of large public expenditure requirements could constrict the fiscal space and lead to repayment risks, especially since $1 billion in eurobonds come due in December 2024. Further reforms in public finance and investment management are needed to improve the efficiency of public expenditures.

Read the full report »

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Senior U.S. Commerce Official Discusses Trade and Entrepreneurship With American & Ethiopian Businesswomen

The U.S. Department of Commerce office building in Washington, D.C. (Getty Images)

Press Release

U.S. Embassy in Ethiopia

Senior U.S. Commerce Official Discusses Trade and Entrepreneurship with U.S. and Ethiopian Businesswomen, and Encourages Prosperity through Mutually Beneficial Commercial Engagement

Addis Ababa – U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary (DAS) of Commerce for Middle East and Africa Global Markets Camille Richardson participated in a Women’s Empowerment Through Trade Initiative Coffee Chat Series (“The Series”) on March 9. The event occurred during Women’s History Month. The virtual meeting featured speakers and panelists from the private sector and government from Ethiopia and the United States.

The panel featured two Ethiopian female entrepreneurs, Felekeche Biratu and Sara Yirga, and Business Development Specialist at the Export-Import Bank of the United States (EX-IM) LaTaunya Darden. Felekeche Biratu is the co-founder of the Yenae Collection and a member of the Association of Women in Boldness/Business. Sara Yirga is the founder of Ya Coffee Roasters and Ethiopian Women in Coffee. Both shared valuable perspectives on opportunities in Ethiopia, female entrepreneurship, and potential for business relations between women-led businesses in the United States and Ethiopia. LaTaunya Darden outlined the important role that EX-IM can play in supporting U.S. exporters.

The Ethiopia Coffee Chat was the second of ten such engagements planned throughout the year by the Office of Middle East and Africa at the U.S. Department of Commerce. “The Series” is one component of the Women’s Empowerment Through Trade Initiative, which will include another webinar on March 31, 2021 organized in conjunction with the President’s Advisory Council on Doing Business in Africa, and which will focus on women’s entrepreneurship throughout the African continent. “The Series” will culminate in a multi-region event in Dubai in conjunction with Trade Winds Dubai, in March 2022, that will coincide with International Women’s Day 2022.

This Ethiopia Coffee Chat reflects the high priority that the U.S. Department of Commerce places on the commercial relationship between the United States and Ethiopia. The U.S. International Trade Administration also maintains a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Ethiopian Ministry of Finance and Economic Development. This MOU was signed in 2018 and is intended to facilitate information-sharing and collaboration on commercial opportunities in priority sectors.

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UPDATE: Ethiopian 737 MAX Crash Families Set to Obtain Key Documents

At a memorial service for the crew of Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET302 at the Ethiopian Pilots Association in Addis Ababa. The Boeing 737 Max crashed near Ethiopia's capital on 10 March 2019 killing all 157 on board. (Photo by Mulugeta Ayene/AP)

Reuters

Updated: March 12th, 2021

Ethiopian 737 MAX crash families set to obtain key Boeing documents

Families of victims of the deadly 2019 Ethiopian Airlines jet crash may obtain as soon as Thursday Boeing’s reports to U.S. regulators that helped keep its 737 MAX flying after a prior disaster with the same jet in Indonesia five months earlier.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), an independent U.S. government investigative agency, told Boeing Co in a letter on Monday it should turn over nearly 2,000 documents to lawyers representing families who want to determine what the company knew about its flight systems after the Indonesian crash on Lion Air.

The agency said international rules mandate the release of the documents after two years from the crash date, even though Ethiopia has yet to produce a final crash report which the agency cited in blocking the documents until now, according to the letter reviewed by Reuters.

Boeing said it plans to produce the investigation-related information to the plaintiffs beginning today following the NTSB guidance that, at the second anniversary of the Ethiopian accident, the restrictions would be lifted.

The plaintiffs lawyers said they expect the papers to show what Boeing executives knew of defects in the flight system of the newly designed aircraft following the Indonesian crash. An automated flight-control system called MCAS has been implicated in both crashes, which together killed 346 people.

The plane continued to fly until the Ethiopian crash prompted a global grounding.

“What we want to see are the documents upon which Boeing resisted the grounding of the airplane and based its assertion to its customers that the airplane was safe,” plaintiffs’ attorney Justin Green told Reuters.

Related:

UPDATE: Ethiopia to Release Final Boeing Max Report in ‘Near Future’

Bloomberg

By Samuel Gebre

Updated: March 10th, 2021

(Bloomberg) — The Ethiopian Accident Investigation Bureau said Wednesday it plans to release a final report on the fatal crash of the Boeing Co. jet in the “near future” after lockdowns to contain the Covid-19 pandemic hampered the investigation.

The work is in the final stages, the Transport Ministry said in a statement on its Facebook page Wednesday, without giving a publication date. The update coincided with the two-year anniversary of the Ethiopian Airlines jet disaster outside Addis Ababa, which killed all 157 people on board.

The incident followed another fatal Max crash in Indonesia the previous year and led to regulators grounding the model worldwide, plunging Boeing into crisis. The U.S. planemaker has since made revisions to the model and addressed safety concerns, and the jet was cleared to return to the skies in its home market late last year.

While regulators in the European Union, U.K., U.A.E. and others have since followed suit, others are more circumspect. China, a major market for Boeing, still has safety concerns and said this month it’s awaiting conclusions from the Ethiopia probe.

Ethiopia’s final report will build on interim findings released a year ago. Investigators had then planned to say Boeing’s design and inadequate pilot training led to the crash, but those conclusions were dropped after push back from the U.S. and France, Bloomberg reported at the time.

The interim conclusions did highlight the role of a malfunctioning safety feature known as the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, to which Boeing has since made several changes.

Meanwhile, families of the crash victims are planning a series of events to commemorate the second anniversary. Representatives are planning to meet with Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg in Washington, protest outside a Boeing office in nearby Virginia and hold an hour-long vigil outside the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration offices.

Related:

UPDATE: In Court Filing Ethiopia 737 MAX Crash Lawyers ask Boeing CEO to Testify


Families have called for testimony from Boeing Chief Executive Dave Calhoun, his predecessor [Dennis Muilenburg, pictured above] and other current and former employees as part of their legal case in Chicago, court documents show. (Reuters)

Reuters

Updated: February 27th, 2021

Relatives of victims of a Boeing Co 737 MAX crash in Ethiopia that occurred five months after an Indonesian Lion Air disaster are stepping up pressure on the American planemaker and the federal government, according to a court filing and a letter to U.S. lawmakers.

Families have called for testimony from Boeing Chief Executive Dave Calhoun, his predecessor and other current and former employees as part of their legal case in Chicago, court documents show.

Separately, the families urged lawmakers in letter to demand that the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration turn over internal emails and documents spanning the Lion Air crash and one month after the Ethiopian crash. Together, 346 people died.

The letter was sent to members of the House and Senate transportation committees on Friday, including committee head Representative Peter DeFazio and aviation subcommittee chair Representative Rick Larsen.

A Congressional official said: “I can confirm that this week Chairs DeFazio and Larsen re-upped their request to DOT (Department of Transportation) for FAA records that have gone unfulfilled to date.”

A Senate report in December detailed lapses in aviation safety oversight and failed leadership in the FAA. It found that FAA leaders obstructed that report as well as a DOT watchdog review of the regulator’s oversight, the results of which were released on Wednesday.

“There is serious unfinished business,” the families said in the letter, reviewed by Reuters.

Boeing has mostly settled civil litigation stemming from the Lion Air crash, but still faces over 100 lawsuits in Chicago federal court related to the second crash.

The plaintiffs’ lawyers are focusing on what Boeing knew about the causes of the first crash and why the plane continued to fly. They want to schedule depositions of Calhoun and Muilenburg between May 3 and June 18.

Those victims’ families also want to know what FAA management, which in November lifted a 20-month safety ban of the MAX, understood about the first crash.

Boeing’s board faces a separate investor lawsuit in Delaware Chancery Court, where a complaint unsealed this month alleged breach of fiduciary duties and gross negligence by failing “to monitor the safety of Boeing’s 737 MAX airplanes.”

Last month, Boeing reached a $2.5 billion settlement with the Justice Department over the 737 MAX crashes, including a $243.6 million fine.

Related:

Boeing Reaches $2.5 Billion Settlement in 737 MAX Crashes in Ethiopia & Indonesia


Ethiopian officials deliver the Black Box for Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 to the headquarters of France’s BEA air accident investigation agency in Le Bourget, France on March 14, 2019. As NPR reports the families of the passengers who died in the crash will be compensated from a fund of $500 million. (Reuters photo)

NPR

Updated: January 7th, 2021

Boeing To Pay $2.5 Billion Over 737 Max Fraud, Faces No Other Charges

Boeing will pay more than $2.5 billion to settle criminal charges that it repeatedly concealed and lied about the 737 Max’s engineering problems that led to two catastrophic crashes claiming hundreds of lives.

The company admitted to one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States as part of the deferred prosecution agreement announced on Thursday and will face no further charges from the U.S. Department of Justice.

“Boeing’s employees chose the path of profit over candor by concealing material information from the FAA concerning the operation of its 737 Max airplane and engaging in an effort to cover up their deception,” Acting Assistant Attorney General David Burns of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, wrote in a statement.

Boeing, which is the country’s second-biggest defense contractor behind Lockheed Martin, will pay the DOJ a criminal penalty of $243.6 million.

The families and legal beneficiaries of the 346 passenger victims who died in the Lion Air Flight 610 in Indonesia in October 2018 and the Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 in Ethiopia five months later will be paid from a fund of $500 million. If split equally among them, that amounts to a little over $1.4 million for each family.

The vast majority of the settlement is allocated for airline companies that had purchased the faulty 737 Max aircraft and were subsequently forced to ground the planes following the crashes. Together they will receive $1.77 billion in compensation for their financial losses, according to the DOJ.

“The tragic crashes of Lion Air Flight 610 and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 exposed fraudulent and deceptive conduct by employees of one of the world’s leading commercial airplane manufacturers,” Burns added in the statement.

In both cases, the crashes were caused by changes to the jet’s Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System that forced the nose of the 737 Max toward the ground and left pilots unable to control the planes.

In a note to employees, Boeing President and Chief Executive Officer David Calhoun said, “I firmly believe that entering into this resolution is the right thing for us to do—a step that appropriately acknowledges how we fell short of our values and expectations.”

He added: “This resolution is a serious reminder to all of us of how critical our obligation of transparency to regulators is, and the consequences that our company can face if any one of us falls short of those expectations.”

Internal Boeing documents revealed during a U.S.House panel’s inquiry showed that engineers notified the company of the MCAS “egregious” problems as early as 2016.

Related:

Ethiopian Report Blames Boeing for 737 MAX Plane Crash

Boeing to Stop 737 Max Production (AP)

Internal FAA review saw high risk of 737 MAX crashes

Boeing Was Aware of 737 Max Problem Long Before Ethiopia Crash – Report

Boeing CEO Apologizes to Victims of Ethiopia, Indonesia Crashes

Ethiopian Airlines Slams Bloomberg’s Ex-Pilot Story as ‘Baseless & False Allegation’

Read Excerpt From Ethiopia Crash Report

Ethiopian Airlines Expresses Disappointment – Calls Out Media Outlets Eager to Blame Pilot

Watch: Ethiopian CEO on The Future of Boeing 737 Max Planes — NBC Exclusive

Watch: Ethiopia Releases 737 Max Preliminary Crash Report

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COVID-19: Ethiopian Airlines Delivers First Batches Of Vaccine In Ethiopia

Ethiopian Airlines conducted a major service this week amid progress with the vaccination program in Ethiopia. The airline delivered over two million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine to the country. (Getty Images)

Simple Flying

[This week] marked a milestone moment for Ethiopia and its flag carrier. The country received 2.184 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine through the COVAX global vaccine-sharing initiative. These doses were brought in by Ethiopian Airlines.

Getting the ball rolling

In December, Ethiopian Airlines struck a deal with Cainiao Network, which is the logistics branch of the Alibaba Group. This agreement formed an international cold chain from China for the supply of pharmaceuticals, including vaccines. Subsequently, temperature-controlled pharmaceuticals are being delivered twice a week from Shenzhen, China, to Africa and beyond, via hubs in Dubai, UAE, and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Following this progress, millions of doses of the vaccine landed in Ethiopia today. Ethiopian Airlines shared the following about the delivery on its Twitter.

“We have transported and delivered the first batch of COVID-19 Vaccines to Ethiopia. The shipment has arrived today and delivered to the Ethiopian MoH in a ceremony held in our cargo terminal. We will keep on providing this mission-critical service to save lives”

A vital service

WHO Ethiopia also tweeted how the delivery was a landmark event. The group confirmed the product that arrived is the University of Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine. It added that this move is a big step towards ensuring equitable distribution of vaccines amid the pandemic.

Today, Ethiopian Airlines’ leadership said that the company is prepared to take a lead role in transporting vaccines across the globe. The airline’s cargo division expects demand for these operations to last for up to three years.

Fitsum Abadi, the managing director of Ethiopian Cargo, told Reuters the following:

“We have aircrafts converted from passengers by removing their seats, 16 of them, which are very wide aircrafts converted to transport vaccines.”


The airline has been supporting its cargo department by utilizing otherwise dormant passenger aircraft amid the pandemic. (Getty Images)

Rising to the task

Altogether, Ethiopian’s cargo division has been scaling up services amid the global health crisis. Shipping has been a lifeline for carriers amid the severe downturn in passenger activity, and Ethiopian recognizes the potential.

The airline swirly adapting its operations amid the rise of new opportunities. Early on in the pandemic, the operator took seats out of 25 of its passenger planes to increase capacity for cargo. As the world becomes more reliant on the delivery of products, the carrier is prepared to take on the challenge.

Simple Flying reached out to Ethiopian Airlines for further comment on this landmark delivery this weekend. We will update the article with any further updates from the carrier.

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Video: The Ethiopian Food Truck In Denver

Established in 2015, The Ethiopian Food Truck is the first Ethiopian Food Truck in Colorado serving the Denver-Metro area. (Photo: konjoethiopianfood.com)

KWGN-TV

Yoseph Assefa and Fetien Gebre-Michale created the Ethiopian Food Truck back in 2015 and it was the first Ethiopian food truck in Colorado serving traditional recipes fresh and quick all over the Denver metro area.

The colorful menu features some of the mos popular Ethiopian vegetarian dishes alongside chicken and beef options.

You can find out where the Ethiopian Food Truck is by following them on their website at konjoethiopianfood.com/food-truck.

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Fire Kills Ethiopian Migrants at Yemen Detention Center

The majority of those held in the immigration holding facility “were Ethiopian so we can assume that the dead are mostly of that nationality,” said an official with the International Organization for Migration. (Photo: Ethiopian migrants in the Yemeni capital, Sana last year/Getty Images)

Bloomberg

By Samuel Gebre

Fire in Yemen Migrant Detention Center Kills 8 and Injures 170

At least eight people, mainly of Ethiopian origin, died in a fire in detention center for migrants in Yemen’s capital, Sana’a, on Sunday.

There were more than 350 migrants in a hanger near the main building of the center at the time the blaze broke out and at least 170 of them were injured, with many still in critical condition, the International Organization for Migration said in an emailed statement.

“While the cause of the fire is still unconfirmed, its impact is clearly horrific,” said Carmela Godeau, IOM’s Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa, said in a statement.

The majority of those held in the immigration holding facility “were Ethiopian so we can assume that the dead are mostly of that nationality,” another IOM official said, adding that the death toll could climb much higher.

Most of the migrants were arrested in Yemen, while trying to cross to Saudi Arabia. More than 170,000 migrants have crossed from the Horn of Africa to Yemen since 2019, according to IOM data.

Last week, at least 20 people drowned after smugglers threw them into the sea while on a journey from Djibouti to Yemen. Similar incidents claimed 50 lives in October last year. More migrants are waiting to cross, and thousands of migrants are stranded in Yemen, according to IOM.

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Q&A: Amen Temesgen, Founder of BeNu Foods, on His Ethiopian Startup Business

Ethiopian company BeNu Foods, founded in 2018, produces nutritious biscuits from local raw materials. Founder Amen Temesgen (27) answers our questions. (How We Made It in Africa)

How We Made It in Africa

High-protein biscuits: Ethiopian food startup founder gives snapshot of his business

1. Give us your elevator pitch.

BeNu Foods is a startup that aims to tackle malnutrition in Ethiopia by manufacturingnutritious, high-protein BeNu biscuits for kids.

Ethiopia severely lacks affordable protein-rich products. Two out of five children in Ethiopia are undernourished and the country loses a staggering 17% of its GDP due to malnutrition. BeNu aims to tackle this problem with an integrated approach that brings together different stakeholders in the food sector.

2. How did you finance your startup?

My co-founder and I initially put in a small amount of money. Although access to finance has remained a great challenge, we raised funds from different organisations and individuals like Reach for Change Ethiopia.

3. If you were given $1 million to invest in your company now, where would it go?

Part of it would go towards R&D facilities where we could develop, design and manufacture on a small scale to test our products. Part of it would go to establishing a distribution chain and a small portion would help strengthen the digital platform we are developing to revitalise and enable different stakeholders in the food sector to work in partnership.

4. What risks does your business face?

Our sector is a low-risk one. But what has been a challenge is the unpredictable inflation of raw materials. It makes it harder to determine prices and to have a stable operation.


BeNu Foods’ biscuits

5. So far, what has proven to be the most successful form of marketing?

Word of mouth. Our pilot project was on a Melka Oba School feeding programme with an American donor and we recorded tremendous results like illness reduction, improvement in academic performance and class attendance. The fact that we had a proven pilot project enabled us to receive interest from places we didn’t even expect like Nicaragua.

6. Describe your most exciting entrepreneurial moment.

Just days ago, we received a confirmation of the caloric content of our product. Before this, our claims were from our own analysis. According to recent results from a top laboratory, we learnt our product is 548Kcal/100g with 25% protein content. To put things into perspective, a child would get their protein requirement for an entire day. This is crucial information for me and those we need to reach out to in the future.

7. Tell us about your biggest mistake and what you’ve learnt from it?

Eighteen months ago, we received an urgent order and didn’t have the manufacturing capacity. We approached an accomplished manufacturer who informed us that with his baking machine, he could meet our production needs. We went ahead and scheduled production without checking his machine or organising the delivery logistics beforehand.

Our delivery was supposed to be on a Tuesday and the manufacturer seemed confident he would meet the delivery timelines but by the Sunday, it was clear it was not going to happen. We had to find another manufacturing facility in our neighbourhood and do the production overnight.

We learnt to ensure any business is formalised and we always do our due diligence before we go ahead with orders.

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UPDATE: Ethiopian Employees of International Media Held in Tigray Released

“All journalists and translators have been released without charges,” Abebe Gebrehiwot Yihdego, deputy head of Tigray’s interim administration, told Reuters. (Getty Images)

Reuters

By Reuters Staff

Ethiopia frees workers with foreign media detained in Tigray, official says

NAIROBI (Reuters) – Four Ethiopians working with foreign journalists in the northern Tigray region have been released without charges, an official and media outlets said on Wednesday.

A reporter for the BBC’s Tigrinya language service, Girmay Gebru, two translators with Agence France-Presse and the Financial Times, and a journalist working with the New York Times were detained in recent days, their outlets said.

“All journalists and translators have been released without charges,” Abebe Gebrehiwot Yihdego, deputy head of Tigray’s interim administration, told Reuters.

The BBC confirmed Girmay’s release in a tweet, while AFP and the New York Times also confirmed in emails to Reuters that those working with them had been freed.

“We are pleased that the local journalist we had worked with was released and that no charges were filed,” said the New York Times’ communications vice-president Danielle Rhoades Ha.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has overseen sweeping reforms since taking office in 2018, including the unbanning of more than 250 media outlets and release of dozens of journalists.

However, rights groups say press freedom has suffered during outbreaks of violence including in Tigray, where thousands have died in fighting since last year between federal troops and the former local ruling party.

Watchdogs reported the arrests of at least 13 journalists in Ethiopia last year, including Reuters cameraman Kumerra Gemechu who was held without charge for 12 days.

Abiy’s government declared victory over the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) after its forces withdrew from major cities and towns at the end of November.

However, low-level fighting has continued in parts.

UPDATE: U.S. Deploys Diaster Response Team to Tigray, Urges End of Hostilities


The USAID team will lead the U.S. Government’s humanitarian response. The press release said: “The team includes disaster experts who are assessing the situation, identifying priority needs to scale up assistance, and working with partners to provide urgently needed assistance to communities affected by the conflict.” The U.S. is the largest humanitarian donor in Ethiopia, having given more than $652 million last year alone. (Photo: USAID Headquarters in D.C./Shutterstock.com)

Press Release

Office of Press Relations: press@usaid.gov

USAID DEPLOYS DISASTER ASSISTANCE RESPONSE TEAM TO RESPOND TO HUMANITARIAN NEEDS IN TIGRAY, ETHIOPIA

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is deploying a Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) to respond to growing humanitarian needs stemming from conflict in Ethiopia’s Tigray region. After nearly four months of fighting between armed groups, hundreds of thousands have been forced to flee their homes and more than four million people are in need of food assistance.

USAID’s DART will lead the U.S. Government’s humanitarian response. The team includes disaster experts who are assessing the situation, identifying priority needs to scale up assistance, and working with partners to provide urgently needed assistance to communities affected by the conflict.

Since the outbreak of conflict, USAID’s partners have been pivoting existing programs to provide life-saving assistance in the few areas of Tigray that can be reached. While USAID has been working with partners to overcome many access challenges, an estimated 80 percent of Tigray remains cut off from assistance.

The United States remains committed to supporting the people of Ethiopia and is the largest humanitarian donor in Ethiopia. In FY 2020, the U.S. provided more than $652 million in humanitarian assistance to respond to acute food needs, conflict-driven displacement, flooding, a desert locust infestation, and the COVID-19 pandemic.

U.S. Urges Ethiopia to End Hostilities in Tigray

By Reuters

Published March 2, 2021

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken on Tuesday pressed the leader od Ethiopia to end hostilities in the northern Tigray region, citing a “growing number of credible reports of atrocities and human rights violations and abuses.”

In a phone call with Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, Mr. Blinken pushed for Ethiopia to withdraw outside forces from Tigray, and for an immediate end to the violence, according to a State Department spokesman, Ned Price.

The Biden administration is seeking an end to what it describes as a deepening humanitarian crisis. It was the second time in less than a week that Mr. Blinken cited reports of atrocities in the region.

“The secretary urged the Ethiopian government to take immediate, concrete steps to protect civilians, including refugees, and to prevent further violence,” Mr. Price said in a statement Tuesday.

Speaking to reporters, he said, “We strongly condemn the killings, the forced removals and displacement, the sexual assaults, and other human rights violations and abuses by several parties that multiple organizations have now reported.”

Mr. Blinken also asked that Mr. Abiy allow independent international investigations.

A spokeswoman for Mr. Abiy, Billene Seyoum, pointed to a statement made late last month in which Ethiopia’s Foreign Affairs Ministry called American attempts to intervene in its internal affairs “regrettable.”

The statement said that Ethiopia’s government took its responsibility for the safety, security, and well-being of all citizens “very seriously” and that it was “fully committed to undertake thorough investigations” into reports of abused.

But it added the government had a duty to hold the nation together in the face of “treasonous and divisive forces.”

The Ethiopians military ousted the former local ruling party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, from the regional capital in November, after what it described as a surprise assault on its forces in Tigray.

Thousands of people have died, hundreds of thousands have been forced from homes and there are shortages of food, water and medicine around the region of more than five million people.

Related:

UPDATE: Ethiopia Responds to U.S. Criticism Over Tigray


People receive services from a mobile health and nutrition clinic in Freweyni town, north of Mekele, Monday, Feb. 22, 2021. (Zerihun Sewunet/UNICEF via AP)

The Associated Press

Ethiopia rebuffs US call to pull outside forces from Tigray

Ethiopia’s government is rebuffing calls by the United States to withdraw troops from the embattled Tigray region.

In response to U.S Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s call for Ethiopia to immediately withdraw troops from Tigray, Ethiopia’s foreign ministry said that it is an issue to be decided by the Addis Ababa government, not a foreign power.

“It should be clear that such matters are the sole responsibility of the Ethiopian government,” Ethiopia’s foreign ministry said in a statement issued Sunday. “The Ethiopian government, like any government of a sovereign nation, has in place various organizing principles in its federal and regional structures which are solely accountable only to the Ethiopian people.”

No foreign country should try to “dictate a sovereign nation’s internal affairs,” said the Ethiopian statement.

Alarm is growing over the fate of Tigray’s 6 million people as fierce fighting reportedly continues between Ethiopian and allied forces and those supporting the now-fugitive Tigray leaders who once dominated Ethiopia’s government.

The United Nations in its latest humanitarian report on the situation in Tigray says the “humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate” as fighting intensifies across the northern region.

“Aid workers on the ground have reported hearing gunshots from the main cities, including in Mekelle and Shire,” the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reported on Sunday. “Residents and aid workers on the ground continue reporting incidents of house searches and indiscriminate looting, including of household items, farming equipment, ambulances and office vehicles, allegedly by various armed actors.”

No one knows how many thousands of civilians have been killed. Humanitarian officials have warned that a growing number of people might be starving to death in Tigray.

Accounts of atrocities by Ethiopian and allied forces against residents of Tigray were detailed in reports by The Associated Press and by Amnesty International. Ethiopia’s federal government and regional officials in Tigray both believe that each other’s governments are illegitimate after the pandemic disrupted elections.

Related:

Ethiopia slams US for urging pullout of Amhara forces


The Ethiopian Foreign Ministry said in a statement: “The Ethiopian government, like any government of a sovereign nation, has in place various organizing principles in its Federal and Regional structures which are solely accountable only to the Ethiopian people.” (Anadolu Agency)

AA

Addis Getachew Tadesse

Forces from Amhara region were on frontlines of law enforcement operations against Tigray rebels last November

ADDIS ABABA – The Ethiopian government on Monday lashed out at the US for demanding the withdrawal of forces from the region of Amhara in the country’s northernmost Tigray region.

Force from the Amhara region were on the frontlines of law enforcement operations launched against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) last November after the group’s deadly attack on the Northern Command of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces.

On Saturday, US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken issued a statement saying that Amhara and the neighboring country of Eritrea need to pull their troops out of the Tigray region.

The US remarks followed a report by Amnesty International that hundreds of civilians were shot dead in the town of Axum in Tigray — a report that alleged the involvement of Eritrean forces in the killings, which, if proved, could amount to crimes against humanity.

“[The] attempt by the US to make pronouncements on Ethiopia’s internal affairs and specifically the reference to the Amhara regional forces’ redeployment is regrettable,” the Ethiopian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

“It should be clear that such matters are the sole responsibility of the Ethiopian government, which, as a sovereign nation, is responsible to deploy the necessary security structures and means available in ensuring the rule of law within all corners of its borders,” it said.

It added: “The Ethiopian government, like any government of a sovereign nation, has in place various organizing principles in its Federal and Regional structures which are solely accountable only to the Ethiopian people.”

The Horn of Africa country said it would investigate the alleged killings and other human rights abuses in Tigray.

Ethiopia’s War Leads to Ethnic Cleansing in Tigray Region, U.S. Report Says


Children playing in front a house in the Tigray region that was damaged in fighting in December. (Getty Images)

The New York Times

Updated: Feb. 27, 2021

An internal U.S. government report found that people in Tigray are being driven from their homes in a war begun by Ethiopia, an American ally — posing President Biden’s first major test in Africa.

Ethiopian officials and allied militia fighters are leading a systematic campaign of ethnic cleansing in Tigray, the war-torn region in northern Ethiopia, according to an internal United States government report obtained by The New York Times.

The report, written earlier this month, documents in stark terms a land of looted houses and deserted villages where tens of thousands of people are unaccounted for…

On Friday afternoon, in response to the Amnesty International report, Mr. Abiy’s office said it was ready to collaborate in an international investigation into atrocities in Tigray. The government “reiterates its commitment to enabling a stable and peaceful region,” it said in a statement.

Read the full article at nytimes.com »

Related:

UPDATE: In Ethiopia Premier Launches Campaign to Support Tigray


“In an online meeting held this afternoon [Thursday, February 18th 2021], Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, the regional presidents, and city administrators launched a solidarity initiative for the Tigray Regional Provisional Administration and the people of the region,” said a statement by the office of the prime minister. (AA)

AA

By Addis Getachew

Updated: February 18th 2021

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — The Ethiopian prime minister and regional authorities have launched a campaign to support the rehabilitation and reconstruction of the restive Tigray region.

“In an online meeting held this [Thursday] afternoon, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, the regional presidents, and city administrators launched a solidarity initiative for the Tigray Regional Provisional Administration and the people of the region,” said a statement by the office of the prime minister.

“The solidarity initiative aims at mobilizing the contribution of regions and federal institutions as well as other stakeholders in supporting humanitarian efforts underway, in addition to food and non-food items to be directed to the people of Tigray,” it said.

It added that “the regional presidents also pledged direct support to strengthen the provisional administration to carry out public service delivery duties.”

Vehicles, various equipment, input seeds for farmers, ambulances, medicines, and monetary support were pledged by each region and would be handed over to the provisional administration within the coming days.

“Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed further called upon all sections of society to make whatever contributions they can towards the #RebuildTigray solidarity initiative,” the statement noted.

On Nov. 3, 2020, the now-outlawed Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and its special forces attacked the Northern Command of the Ethiopian National Defense Forces, killing soldiers and looting military hardware.

The following day, the federal government launched what has been dubbed as a large-scale law enforcement operation in Tigray in which the TPLF was largely defeated and some of its top leaders and fighters were either neutralized or captured.

Although the prime minister declared the military operations were over on Nov. 28, there have been sporadic clashes between the government forces and fighters loyal to TPLF.

More than 60,000 Ethiopians fled the fighting to neighboring Sudan while international organizations have been calling for scaled-up humanitarian assistance in the region for civilians affected by the conflict.

Hundreds of thousands of civilians have also been reported to have become internally displaced and in dire need of emergency assistance.

The international media have been kept out of the scene, making it difficult to give total pictures of the humanitarian tribulations and suffering in an objective and impartial manner.

An Addis Ababa resident with relatives living in Tigray told Anadolu Agency, asking to remain anonymous, that humanitarian assistance in support of suffering civilians has not been sufficient.

Last week, the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission revealed that 108 rape cases were reported in two months across the region.

Related:

UPDATE: UN Ethiopia Tweeted ‘Progress’ on Humanitarian Front in Tigray

UN, Ethiopia Strike a Deal Over Aid Workers’ Access to Tigray

ANALYSIS: In Ethiopia’s Digital Battle Over the Tigray Region, Facts Are Casualties

UPDATE: PM Abiy Ahmed’s Message to the World on the Situation in Ethiopia

Doctors Without Borders on the Humanitarian Crisis

Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

Virginia Furniture with Ethiopian Roots: Garden & Gun Magazine on Jomo Tariku

Raised in Ethiopia, Jomo Tariku came to the United States in 1987. After studying industrial design at the University of Kansas, he eventually moved to the suburbs of D.C., where he works as a data scientist. He based his earliest furniture designs on the three-legged Jimma stools of Ethiopia that he remembered from childhood. (Garden & Gun Magazine)

Garden & Gun Magazine

Two and a half hours south of Washington, D.C., outside of Columbia, Virginia, in a former three-car garage on the north side of the James River, the designer Jomo Tariku and the woodworker David Bohnhoff are redefining contemporary African furniture. In the studio, African mahogany shavings cover a section of the floor as they collaborate on museum-worthy chairs and stools, and the smell the wood casts off as the day heats up permeates the space.

Born in Kenya and raised in Ethiopia, Tariku came to the United States in 1987. After studying industrial design at the University of Kansas, he eventually moved to the suburbs of D.C., where he works as a data scientist. He based his earliest furniture designs on the three-legged Jimma stools of Ethiopia that he remembered from childhood. All of his pieces tie back to the African diaspora in some way, and many center on his East African upbringing. “When people define African art,” he says, “they think of masks and handcrafts, and old things. There is no space for people like me.”

Tariku bucks against the modern definition of African furniture, usually relegated to pieces with a Eurocentric aesthetic with a twist, such as colorful batik upholstery. Instead, the large spiral horns of the male mountain antelope found in Ethiopia’s Bale region, for instance, inspired his Nyala chair. Highly sculptural in nature, the curving wooden back of the chair seems to defy gravity, serving as a functional marvel. And his MeQuamya chair riffs on the T-shaped prayer staffs used in Ethiopian Orthodox ceremonies, found in rock-hewn churches in the region that date back to the sixteenth century. “I love history,” Tariku explains. “Ethiopia is the only African country that was never colonized. So, my perspective is a little different. Our religious art is still there. So are our old manuscripts in our language, in our handwriting. All of that informs my ideas.”

Tariku had all of these designs in his mind but could not find someone with the skills to build them—he had trouble bringing them to fruition with his own hands. For several years, he sent out emails, hundreds of them, to woodworkers up and down the East Coast, searching for someone to collaborate with who had the talent to build the graceful, elegant minimalist designs that have become his signature. In 2017, Bohnhoff, a regionally renowned furniture maker and woodworker based in Columbia, received Tariku’s email, and the pair decided to meet at a furniture show in Richmond.

When Bohnhoff saw Tariku’s sketch of the Nyala chair, he knew he had to try to build it. Quickly, Tariku saw that Bohnhoff understood the intentions behind his designs, and could take them from two-dimensional renderings to pieces that fine furniture lovers would be proud to have in their living rooms. “I saw the challenge in it,” Bohnhoff says. “I saw the beauty in it. I’m always pulling from nautical culture in my work, and every region has its own seafaring aesthetic. I appreciate learning the details of Jomo’s culture and how it helps him generate ideas.”

Bohnhoff’s own creative journey began at a potter’s wheel in middle school. Struggling with academics, he found solace in using his hands to create beautiful and unusual shapes. When he finished high school, he took to boatbuilding, eventually earning a BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University, and started a career as a boatbuilder, working in shipyards along the way from Maine to North Carolina, studying the art of the curve. Eventually he returned to Virginia, intent on transferring his skills to furniture, freeing complicated pieces from cherry, mahogany, and ash. In his workshop, maple burl logs become masterpieces. The draketail hull of a boat inspired a chair. The interior framework of a canoe transformed into a steam-bent throne.

Designers like Tariku need highly skilled craftsmen like Bohnhoff. The designer works with a few others on certain furniture pieces, but boatbuilding gave Bohnhoff an intimate knowledge of a variety of wood species, and how to bend them to his will without breaking. That technical skill serves him well as his artisanship dovetails with Tariku’s more intricate, curving chair designs, and as they go back and forth on prototypes to refine until form and function perfectly align. While COVID-19 has halted Tariku’s access to furniture shows and showrooms, the duo is currently making each chair to order for interested clients and interior designers—who can inquire at jomofurniture.com—and Tariku is preparing new designs for 2021.

A change in the tide—what they see as the younger generation’s lack of access to apprenticeships and opportunities—has both men worried that relationships like theirs, forged out of mutual admiration for art and a respect for technical skills, are fading. For now, they find solace in creating heirlooms that tell a global story—of Ethiopia, of the Atlantic, and of Virginia. —

Related:

Spotlight: New York Times Features Jomo Tariku

Opening the Doors of Design (The New York Times)

Contemporary Design Africa Book Features Jomo Tariku’s Ethiopia Furniture

Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

Spotlight: Ethiopian Startup Gebeya Launches New Mobile App To Connect Freelancers To Employers

Ethiopia's tech startup Gebeya Inc., an online marketplace for jobs, has announced the launch of its latest mobile App called Gebeya Talent, a new platform through which it is expanding access to its network across Africa and around the globe. (Photo: Gebeya Inc)

Digital Times Africa

Gebeya, an Ethiopian startup has launched its new app, Gebeya Talent, a portal through which it is expanding access to its network across the continent and around the globe.

Gebeya is an online talent marketplace focused on cultivating the potentials of African youth, training them with technical skills, and helping them find jobs.

The app bridges the gap between African talents and employers through its easy application process, automatic matching, and a no-bidding process where they get paid.

“We strive to be the most-referenced freelance African talent company. Having fast, reliable, seamless digital tools at the heart of our marketplace is a must,” said Amadou Daffe, chief executive officer (CEO) and co-founder of Gebeya.

“Currently, the process for talents wanting to join our marketplace takes anywhere from one to two weeks. Our objective is that, with the Gebeya Talent app, we will be able to onboard a talent within 24 hours after they submit their application.”

Founded in 2016, the startup formerly leveraged on manual processes but has now scaled to automation and improved processes. Gebeya says it would be adding new features to the platform and further optimize the process throughout the year.

Ethiopia’s Gebeya launches app to help freelancers access work opportunities


(Image courtesy of Gebeya Talent)

Disrupt Africa

Ethiopian startup Gebeya, a pan-African online talent marketplace, has launched Gebeya Talent, a new app through which it is expanding access to its network across the continent and around the globe.

Gebeya focuses on cultivating the untapped tech potential of African youth to prepare them for the demands of the global market, training young people with technical skills and helping them find jobs.

Its new app, Gebeya Talent, provides African talent seeking their next freelance work opportunity with access to a quick and easy application process, automatic matching, and a no-bidding process where they get paid at rates that represent their capabilities and experience.

Prior to the release of the Gebeya Talent app, the process to apply to join Gebeya’s talent network was largely manual, requiring intensive human involvement. Now, leveraging improved processes and automation, the process has greatly improved, and Gebeya said it will be adding additional features to streamline and further optimise the process throughout the year.

“We strive to be the most-referenced freelance African talent company. Having fast, reliable, seamless digital tools at the heart of our marketplace is a must,” said Amadou Daffe, chief executive officer (CEO) and co-founder of Gebeya.

“Currently, the process for talents wanting to join our marketplace takes anywhere from one to two weeks. Our objective is that, with the Gebeya Talent app, we will be able to onboard a talent within 24 hours after they submit their application.”

Below is the full press release from Gebeya Inc. shared on linkedin by Becky Tsadik, Director of Marketing at Gebeya Inc: “I’m so excited to share that Gebeya Inc. has just launched a mobile app that will transform the landscape for freelance talent in Africa. Our development team has been hard at work building a sleek, sophisticated app to connect talent with opportunities on the continent and beyond.”

Gebeya Inc. Launches Gebeya Talent App to Transform African Talent Acquisition

Gebeya Inc. announced today the launch of its new app: Gebeya Talent. With this, the Pan-African online talent marketplace will expand access to its network across the continent and around the globe.

African talent seeking their next freelance work opportunity will now have access to these features:

  • A quick and easy application process
  • Save time with automatic matching with exciting projects inline with their skill sets
  • No bidding; get paid at rates that represent their capabilities and experience level; get paid in multiple currencies
  • Being part of an engaging, growing community with exclusive professional networking, events, free upskilling, and mentorship
  • Showcase their best work via custom portfolio and profile


    Gebeya team members. (Photo: Gebeya Inc.)

    Prior to the release of the Gebeya Talent app, the process to apply to join our talent network was largely manual, requiring intensive human involvement.

    Now, leveraging improved processes and automation, the process has greatly improved. Throughout the year, additional features will be added to streamline and further optimize the process, and leverage the full power of artificial intelligence and automation. From application, to testing, from interview to onboarding, potential candidates can expect to enjoy a seamless experience.

    “We strive to be THE most-referenced freelance African Talent company. Having fast, reliable, seamless digital tools at the heart of our marketplace is a MUST,” said Amadou Daffe, CEO and Co-founder of Gebeya. “Currently, the process for talents wanting to join our marketplace takes anywhere from 1 to 2 weeks. “Our objective is that, with the Gebeya Talent app, we will be able to onboard a talent within 24 hours after they submit their application.”

    The year 2020 was abuzz with phrases like “future of work,” “gig economy,” and “remote work.” The release of the Gebeya Talent app proves that this bold, new future predicted has arrived. Access to opportunities for talent has expanded, as they are no longer restricted to their immediate geographic location; we follow a remote-first work model. And: anyone can download the app.

    “This is only the beginning,” said Thierno Niang, Chief Platform Officer at Gebeya. “We launched a mobile app before a web application, because all of our talent have access to a phone. As we add features to the product, we will also expand to include a web app.”

    The most in-demand talent for startups and corporations include: software development, graphics & design, project management, digital marketing, product management, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence. But, as market needs evolve, so will the Gebeya Talent pool.

    The Gebeya Talent app grants access for talented professionals in Africa and its diaspora to join a community built with them in mind. Rather than bid against millions of freelancers in an anonymous pool of talent, they can be assured that every opportunity caters to their skill set and agreed-upon rate. No more underbidding, missed payments, or ghosted clients. Because Gebeya manages the entire process of matching, plus administrative and finance processes, talents are ensured timely and fair delivery of payment in exchange for their work.

    Within the next three-to-five years, we anticipate identifying and vetting the top 100,000 talent. From that, we expect to onboard the top 20,000 best. If you’re a talent from Africa or of African descent, seeking to join a community that will care about you, download the Gebeya Talent app and apply today.

    A web-based application to connect clients of all sizes, including individual entrepreneurs, startups, and large enterprises with talent, will launch later this month. This will be for clients that are seeking to: diversify their workforce, augment their existing team, or expand into new markets without the hassle of opening a physical office. Our goal is that clients will be matched with talent within seconds, and within 24-to-48 hours of contract-signing, begin the work.

  • Related:

    Spotlight: Ethiopia’s Debo Engineering, A Jimma Based Agritech Startup


    Boaz Berhanu and Jermia Bayisa are founders of Debo Engineering, part of a burgeoning technology startup scene in Ethiopia that’s blazing a trail in various fields. Debo Engineering has announced that it has developed an app that automatically detects and classifies plant disease through image detection. (Courtesy photo)

    Tech in Africa

    Ethiopia Agritech startup develops an App that detects plant disease

    Debo Engineering, a startup based in Jimma has developed an app that automatically detects then classifies plant diseases through image detection once it runs the image through an algorithm.

    Debo engineering designs and develops smart engineering solutions for the agricultural sector. The startup banks on applied engineering centering on newly evolved technologies such as ML, artificial intelligence, IoT, image processing, mobile computing, and big data.

    Debo has a desktop application connecting commercial farms and research institutes in making farm analysis and drone rental services in the case of large rental farms. Most of the startup’s customers are urban farmers operating in Jimma city. Debo served over 300 customers in the last year.

    Boaz Berhanu and Jermia Bayisa are founders of Debo Engineering. They both have engineering backgrounds and have received several recognitions to date. The team clinched the Green Innovation and Agritech Slam 2019 Business Competition and MEST Africa’s Ethiopia Competition. This has helped them raise initial funding to begin the implementation of their business ideas.

    Meet This Jimma Based Agritech Startup That Developed An App That Detects Plant Disease

    Shega

    Debo Engineering, A Jimma based agritech startup, developed an algorithm that automatically detects and classifies plant disease through image detection.

    Debo engineering is a startup that design and develop smart business applications solution in the agriculture sector. The startup uses applied engineering discipline centered on newly evolving technologies such as artificial intelligence, ML, IOT, image processing, big data, and mobile computing.

    Debo developed an algorithm that automatically detects and classifies plant disease through image detection. The solution is available via a monthly subscription on the web and mobile application. It provides a recommendation to be taken for the user after detect plant disease.

    Debo also provides a desktop application that helps commercials farms and research institutes to make farm analysis as well as drone renting services for large commercial farms.

    Even though most of their customers are urban farmers that operate in Jimma city and nearby, Debo has been able to serve more than 300 customers last year.

    Boaz Berhanu and Jermia Bayisa are founders of Debo Engineering. They both have engineering backgrounds. The startup has received many recognitions so far. The team was the winner of the Green Innovation and Agritech Slam 2019 business competition and MEST Africa’s Ethiopia Competition.

    These recognitions have helped them in raising the initial fund to start implementing their business idea.

    Debo plans to add more features and use wireless sensor networks and the Internet of Things (IoT) that can be easily deployed in farm fields and continuously send data.

    Related:

    Spotlight: Ethiopia’s Qene Tech, Creators of Kukulu & Gebeta Video Games


    Dawit Abraham, Qene Technologies Co-founder and CEO. (Photo: Qene Tech)

    Ventures Africa

    DAWIT ABRAHAM AND HIRUY AMANUEL DISCUSS THE FUTURE OF AWARD-WINNING MOBILE GAMING STUDIO, QENE GAMES

    As one of the top gaming studios in Africa, Qene Games already has a 2018 Apps Africa Award for Best Media and Entertainment App under its belt, along with a bright future ahead.

    A part of this Ethiopian company’s vision is to incorporate African roots into the games created. Qene Games launched its first mobile 3D game in 2018 called Kukulu. The firm then spent almost a year problem-solving to establish a global friendly African game brand for the international market. The original African game set expectations high after winning the 2018 Apps Africa Award for Best Media and Entertainment App and Qene Games is set to launch the iOS version in 2021 behind their latest release of Gebeta.

    Kukulu is a 3D runner game similar to the global hit Subway Surfers but has a plot twist of African culture integrated into the game as it takes place in a fairy-tale land type of setting. Kukulu is the name of the main character in the game, a brave chicken that finds freedom from her farmer. Gamers are taken through the African terrain as they help Kukulu journey and run for her life through levels and challenging obstacles.

    Recently, Qene Games proudly entered into a global, multi-year partnership with Carry1st. These two companies worked together to publish Gebeta, a free-to-play mobile board game that is a modern take on the traditional African and South Asian game of mancala. The game’s features include new mechanics, boosters, and tricks as it is intended to make the game more engaging with modern players as they grow in mastery.

    Qene Games also has plans to launch another addition to its ever-growing portfolio with the launch of Feta slated for 2021. Feta is a puzzle slider game with fun and challenging characteristics. Ethiopian culture is highlighted in the game, along with the country’s tradition and food. The game is a way for all audiences who play to see the beauty that Ethiopian culture brings to the world.

    Qene Games will launch the App Store version of the Kukulu game, as it is currently only available on Google Play. The company also plans to launch “Feta” and eventually become its own game publisher after closing a quiet pre-seed round of $250,000 in 2021 said the company CEO and co-founder, Dawit Abraham.

    “The software development firm, Qene Games, is excited for what the next few years and beyond holds after being the leader in raising the bar and popularity of African gaming in the technology industry. Experts at the company are generating more global content to add to future game releases,” said Hiruy Amanuel.

    About Hiruy Amanuel

    Hiruy Amanuel is a dedicated philanthropist who has invested in several educational and technological initiatives in East Africa. By increasing access to quality education and technological resources, he hopes to drive the rapid development of groundbreaking technologies throughout the Horn of Africa.

    About Dawit Abraham

    Dawit is a Senior game developer and co-founder of Qene Games which is a gaming company creating premium African mobile games for the international market. Dawit believes that Africa has a strong capacity to compete with international software industries and his goal is to make Qene Technologies one of the leading gaming companies in Africa, and eventually, the world.

    Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

    In Aurora, Colorado An Ethiopian Church Becomes A Trusted COVID Vaccination Site

    A woman receives a dose of COVID-19 vaccine during an equity clinic held at Saint Mary’s Ethiopian Orthodox Church in Aurora, Colorado on Feb. 13, 2021. (Photo: KUNC)

    KUNC

    For months, the halls of Saint Mary’s Ethiopian Orthodox Church have stood mostly empty.

    COVID-19 restrictions prevent the congregation from sharing meals. Services are mainly held online. Holidays come and go without the usual mass celebrations.

    But on a recent, chilly morning, the church’s cafeteria was once again buzzing with activity. On the menu: 300 COVID-19 vaccines specifically reserved for congregants and other immigrant and refugee residents from the community.

    “I’m very happy,” said Mergersa Edeye, a longtime member of the congregation, after getting his vaccine. “Many of us wouldn’t have this opportunity otherwise.”

    The church partnered with Democratic state Rep. Naquetta Ricks and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to become an equity clinic — one of dozens taking place across the state. The pop-up vaccine distribution sites are designed to help quash racial disparities emerging in the rollout.


    Congregants walk through the parking lot of Saint Mary’s Ethiopian Orthodox Church in Aurora. (KUNC)


    A man exits the front door of Saint Mary’s Ethiopian Orthodox Church in Aurora. (KUNC)

    For church leaders, the decision to host the clinic was easy.

    Girma Tilahun, vice chair of the church’s board, said many congregants have encountered language or transportation barriers when trying to make appointments elsewhere. Having the clinic on site eliminates excuses not to get vaccinated.

    “We educate everyone that the vaccine is important for them, just like masks,” Tilahun said. “They all know that (they need to get vaccinated) if they want to come back to the church. If they don’t take the vaccine, they’ll have to stay home.”

    Still, hesitancy has been an issue. A husband and wife recently came to Tilahun and said they were suspicious of the 15-minute wait period required for all patients.

    Tilahun, along with a nurse in the congregation, were able to explain it was just a safety precaution. Feeling assured, the couple went ahead with getting their doses, Tilahun said.

    “It’s a small percentage (of those who don’t want it),” he said. “Most of our members do.”

    Yohannes Feye, one of Saint Mary’s priests, thought getting the vaccine would be a bigger deal. But when he rolled up his sleeve during the church’s equity clinic, he was shocked.

    “It’s like a regular flu vaccination,” Feye said. “I didn’t feel anything.”

    Feye said the pandemic has hit his congregation hard. A lot of people have gotten sick with COVID-19. A few have died.

    He wanted to get vaccinated to encourage others to do the same.

    “It’s good for the community. It’s good for the country. It’s good for a lot of people’s health so we stop transmitting the virus to each other,” Feye said. ‘So I will advocate as much as I can.”

    Read the full article at kunc.org »

    Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

    In New York, Ethiopian Community Hosts Online Yekatit 12 Program February 21

    Guest speakers include Jeff Pearce, Toronto-based Canadian journalist and author, whose famous book 'Prevail' features profiles of Ethiopian heroes from the second Italian-Ethiopian war including Jagama Kello, Ambassador Imru Zelleke, Lekelash Bayan, Lorenzo Taezaz and African-American pilot John Robinson. (Photo: ECMAA)

    Tadias Magazine

    By Tadias Staff

    Updated: February 18th, 2021

    New York (TADIAS) — The Ethiopian Community Mutual Assistance Association, in collaboration with the Global Alliance for Justice, will host an online event this weekend in remembrance of Yekatit 12 and the Ethiopian lives lost at the Addis Ababa massacre on February 19, 1937.

    Guest speakers include Jeff Pearce, Toronto-based Canadian journalist and author, whose famous book Prevail features profiles of Ethiopian heroes from the second Italian-Ethiopian war including Jagama Kello, Ambassador Imru Zelleke, Lekelash Bayan, Lorenzo Taezaz and African-American pilot John Robinson.

    The announcement adds that Mr. Nicola A. DeMarco, an Italian-American human rights activist who served in the Axum Obelisk Return Committee, will also be featured as a guest speaker.

    Per wiki:

    Yekatit 12 (Amharic: የካቲት ፲፪) is a date in the Ethiopian calendar which refers to the massacre and imprisonment of Ethiopians by the Italian occupation forces following an attempted assassination of Marshal Rodolfo Graziani, Marquis of Negele, Viceroy of Italian East Africa, on February 19, 1937. Graziani had led the Italian forces to victory over the Ethiopians in the Second Italian invasion of Ethiopia and was supreme governor of Italian East Africa. This has been described as the worst massacre in Ethiopian history.

    Estimates vary on the number of people killed in the three days that followed the attempt on Graziani’s life. Ethiopian sources estimated that 30,000 people were killed by the Italians, while Italian sources claimed that only a few hundred were killed. A 2017 history of the massacre estimated that 19,200 people were killed, 20 percent of the population of Addis Ababa. Over the following week, numerous Ethiopians suspected of opposing Italian rule were rounded up and executed, including members of the Black Lions and other members of the aristocracy. Emperor Haile Selassie had sent 125 men abroad to receive college education, but most of them were killed. Many more were imprisoned, even collaborators such as Ras Gebre Haywot, the son of Ras Mikael of Wollo, Brehane Markos, and Ayale Gebre, who had helped the Italians identify the two men who made the attempt on Graziani’s life.

    ——
    If You Attend:
    Yekatit 12: An Online Commemoration
    Sunday, February 21, 2021 at 3PM ET
    Click here to register
    More info at ecmaany.org.

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    Spotlight: Ethiopian-American Artist Awol Erizku’s Photo of Poet Amanda Gorman on TIME Magazine‘s New Cover

    TIME Magazine‘s new cover features American poet Amanda Gorman, photographed by Ethiopian-American artist Awol Erizku. (Photo of ​Awol Erizku by Jeff Vespa)

    Fad Magazine

    AMANDA GORMAN, PHOTOGRAPHED BY ARTIST AWOL ERIZKU FOR TIME COVER.

    TIME Magazine‘s new cover features American poet Amanda Gorman, photographed by Ethiopian-American artist Awol Erizku. Erizku is quickly becoming one of the most iconic photographers of our time.

    Erizku is a multidisciplinary artist working in photography, film, sculpture and installation, creating a new vernacular that bridges the gap between African and African American visual culture, referencing art history, hip hop and spirituality, amongst other subjects, in his work.

    “I was interested in allowing her to own the space that she’s in right now,” Erizku says. “We were going for timelessness, something that felt classical” and tied in to the “resurgence of a Black renaissance.”

    It was a special moment for him, too. “Like many who witnessed the recent presidential Inauguration, I was captivated by her poem and her exquisite delivery,” says Erizku, who is based in Los Angeles and has exhibited at institutions including New York City’s Museum of Modern Art and the Studio Museum in Harlem. “For TIME, I wanted to extricate her from the political dimension and immerse it in a more cosmic atmosphere to add to the weight of her words.”

    In a separate image featured inside the magazine, Gorman holds a white birdcage in a nod to the birdcage ring she wore on inauguration day. (That ring was a gift from Oprah, referring to previous inauguration poet Maya Angelou’s poem, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.”)

    “It needed a layer of depth that only poetry can explain,” Erizku says of the image.

    A team of Black creative professionals prepared Gorman for the portraits: Jason Bolden styled her, Autumn Moultrie did her makeup, Khiry provided jewellery and the dress was from Greta Constantine.

    The issue features Michelle Obama in conversation with American poet Amanda Gorman, whose poem ‘The Hill We Climb’ read at Joe Biden’s inauguration ceremony touched hearts and minds all over the world. The article, which covers issues such as the role of art in activism and the pressures Black women face in the spotlight, is also accompanied by a video shot and directed by Erizku.

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    Spotlight: UK’s Medics Academy & Ethiopian Medical Women’s Association Aim for More Women Leaders in Medicine

    As part of the collaboration Medics Academy will be investing £250,000 GBP (over 12 million Ethiopian Birr) in building a new learning community to provide digital access to training and support a target of 70% of female physicians in Ethiopia over the next 5 years – identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as one of the 57 countries in the world with a chronic shortage of health workers. (Life Science Newswire)

    Life Science Newswire

    Medics Academy and Ethiopian Medical Women’s Association to address health worker shortfall and strengthen women physician leaders across Ethiopia

    London/Addis Ababa Life Science Newswire – Medics.Academy – a revolutionary UK company delivering global access to world-leading medical education and the Ethiopian Medical Women’s Association (EMeWA) have signed a partnership agreement to help women physicians in Ethiopia.

    The project will help EMeWA – an organisation established by female physicians in Ethiopia – to fulfil its vision to establish an excellence center for women physicians through one of its main thematic areas of professional development.

    As part of the collaboration Medics Academy will be investing £250,000 GBP (over 12 million Ethiopian Birr) in building a new learning community to provide digital access to training and support a target of 70% of female physicians in Ethiopia over the next 5 years – identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as one of the 57 countries in the world with a chronic shortage of health workers.

    The unique collaboration has been endorsed by the Ministry of Health of Ethiopia and, by championing access to online education, aims to drive digital transformation to help address the country’s health workforce needs, promote professional development and achieve greater representation and leadership of women in medicine.

    Globally, the COVID-19 crisis has led to a significant shift to digital adoption that will likely persist post-pandemic. While there has been high growth in the adoption of education technology in recent years, this move has been deeply accelerated by COVID-19. Remote learning has become a vital part of education delivery and all across the world has been enrolled into the ‘new normal’.

    Dr Alastair McPhail CMG OBE, UK Ambassador to Ethiopia, said: “We are very proud of the partnerships between the UK and Ethiopia on health. The coronavirus pandemic has stretched health systems and healthcare workers to their limits.”

    “I hope that this new partnership will inspire and upskill female doctors across Ethiopia, directly contributing to high quality, equitable health services and ending the avoidable deaths of mothers and children.”

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    Video: Another Ethiopian Victory at World Indoor Tour As Getnet Wale Wins 3000m

    Ethiopia's Getnet Wale wins the 3000m race at the 2021 World Indoor Tour in Lievin, France on Tuesday. Although he missed the world record by .08. seconds, Getnet's time was the fastest in the world, indoors or out, in over 21 years. (Photo: FloTrack YouTube)

    Lets Run

    Getnet Wale of Ethiopia, best known before today as the 2019 Diamond League steeplechase champion, ripped a 7:24.98 in the 3000m, and missed the world record by .08. In the process, he led four men under 7:30 for the first time ever indoors. Wale’s time was the fastest in the world, indoors or out, in over 21 years. Only Daniel Komen (7:20.67) and Hicham El Guerrouj (7:23.09) have ever gone faster under any conditions.

    Video: Getnet Wale of Ethiopia wins 3000m | 2021 World Indoor Tour Lievin, France


    Getnet Wale ran a 7:24​.98 in the 3000m, and missed the world record by only .08 seconds and four men broke 7:30​ for the first time ever indoors at the 2021 World Athletics Indoor Tour Lievin meeting. (FloTrack)

    WATCH: Ethiopia’s Gudaf Tsegay Smashes 1500m World Record


    Gudaf Tsegay (left) celebrates winning the women’s 1500m in Liévin, France and setting an indoor world record time of 3min 53.09sec. The 24-year-old’s time not only broke the previous best set by Genzebe Dibaba in 2014 but – understandably – the resolve of Britain’s Laura Muir. (Reuters photo)

    The Guardian

    Ethiopian records 3min 53.09sec to shatter record

    Gudaf Tsegay of Ethiopia demolished the women’s 1500m indoor world record by more than two seconds on an astonishing night that will fuel yet more talk about how new track spike technology has become a gamechanger for the sport.

    The 24-year-old’s time of 3min 53.09sec at the World Indoor Tour meeting in Liévin, France not only broke the previous best set by Genzebe Dibaba in 2014 but – understandably – the resolve of Britain’s Laura Muir.

    Muir is one of the world’s finest middle-distance runners, but she was unable to keep up with Tsegay as the pacemaker led the field through the first 400m in a lightning quick 58.97.

    The gap only grew and Muir could do little as she finished more than six seconds back in 3:59.58. Her time was still good enough to break the British record.

    “My training did that,” said Tsegay, the 2019 world bronze medallist, who was running in new Adidas spikes. “The pace is my friend. I have been training really hard and I am so happy.”

    Two world records that have stood for a generation almost fell during an incredible two hours. The 20-year-old Ethiopian Getnet Wale – who is better known as a steeplechaser – produced an astonishing final kilometre to come within 0.31sec of the indoor 3,000m record that has been held by Daniel Komen since 1998.

    Read more »

    Watch: Guduf Tsegay Sets WORLD RECORD 1500m 3:53.09

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    Ethiopian-Born D.C. Businessman, Yimaj “Steve” Kalifa, Helps Howard University Fight The Pandemic

    Ethiopian-American businessman Yimaj “Steve” Kalifa has built a personal wealth estimated at $100 million. As the Jacksonville Free Press notes: "Now at a time when COVID-19 has struck nearly 38,000 residents of [Washington,D.C.] and killed more than 900, Kalifa is paying back to the community that helped him build his fortune." (The Jacksonville Free Press)

    Jacksonville Free Press

    As an immigrant from Ethiopia, Washington, D.C., businessman Yimaj “Steve” Kalifa is living the American Dream, having built a personal wealth estimated at $100 million. Now at a time when COVID-19 has struck nearly 38,000 residents of the District and killed more than 900, Kalifa is paying back to the community that helped him build his fortune.

    At the urging of a friend with connections to Mayor Muriel Bowser’s office, one of Kalifa’s companies, Capital Medical Supply Inc., donated 30,000 pieces of personal protection equipment to a Howard University virus testing center.

    The friend was Armstrong Williams, political commentator and chief executive officer of Howard Stirk Holdings.

    “It’s really sad what’s going on, so I really wanted to do something for the community that’s given so much to me,” said Kalifa, 53. “So, Armstrong called me and said, ‘Let’s buy these masks.’ He reached out to the city, which reached out to Howard’s Unity Clinic, and that’s how it happened.”

    With a $1 million grant awarded in 2020, Howard University launched a testing site in the impoverished neighborhood of Benning Road Northeast, whose residents are disproportionately affected by pre-existing health conditions that make them susceptible to the novel coronavirus.

    The site, which offers free testing four days a week to walk-ins, was impacted by a citywide shortage of personal protective equipment.

    “The donation was very helpful at a time when the use of masks was critical to helping to curb the spread of the virus, especially in the minority community,” said Hugh E. Mighty, M.D., dean of the Howard University College of Medicine and vice president for clinical affairs. “We are grateful to Mr. Kalifa and Mr. Williams for their generous donations and support of the community.”

    The site is now providing COVID-19 vaccinations, and will extend the program as more vaccine doses become available, Mighty said. Citywide, 83,125 doses have been delivered, with 62,219 administered as of the end of January, according to a monthly COVID-19 situational report released by Bowser’s office.

    An additional 10,975 doses are expected to be delivered this week.

    Although he incurred a personal cost of about $100,000, Kalifa said it was Williams’ connection to the mayor that made the personal protective equipment donation possible.

    “I don’t have her cellphone number; he does,” Kalifa said. “So, he definitely gets credit for that.”

    Building his empire

    A self-described serial entrepreneur, Kalifa entered the business world in 2006, traveling to more than 20 states opening branches of a home health care company owned by three doctors and based in his adopted hometown of Los Angeles.

    “On one trip, I went to Allentown, Pennsylvania, when the property owner offered to sell me the whole building for $30,000,” Kalifa said. “Coming from LA, that was a great price. That was the first property I purchased. But, from that point, in every state that I purchased a property, I leased it back to the three doctors. It was a lot of work starting out on my own, but that was the start of Capital View General Construction Inc.”

    CVGC (doing business as Mitchell Heating and Cooling) is now a multimillion-dollar company specializing in commercial construction, road construction, residential construction and renovation projects in Denver and Colorado Springs, Colorado, and Washington, D.C.

    CVGC and Mechanical Solutions Inc., a Denver-based heating, ventilation and air conditioning company, make up the bulk of Kalifa’s business portfolio. He also operates Capitol Medical Supply Inc., a durable medical equipment company in the District, and Source Cuisine, which, in 2019, outbid the former owner of Taylor Gourmet in a bankruptcy auction to reopen four locations of the popular D.C. sandwich shop.

    Medical staff at Howard University give a Covid-19 vaccination dose. (Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)
    Opposites attract

    Williams, 59, a black conservative commentator and owner of several television stations through his company, is known for a brand of rhetoric that often runs counter to voices on the American left. He met Kalifa about 10 years ago at the Congressional Black Caucus dinner. He acknowledges that he and Kalifa agree on little besides a mutual interest in building their respective business holdings.

    “We have opposing views, but we have a civil discourse,” said Williams. “We agree on business, and we learn from each other. But, if everybody agreed with everybody, somebody’s not necessary.

    “My first impression on meeting Steve was that he is very free, he’s truly free. We can agree on legal, moral and ethical things; I respect that. He’s built the $100 million health care and real estate portfolio around the world that he always wanted to. Steve’s a great guy; he’s my brother.”

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    Spotlight: Webinar on COVID19 Vaccine Hosted by Ethiopian Diaspora

    The online conference, which takes place via Zoom on Saturday, February 6, will focus on "plans, preparation and strategies for COVID-19 vaccine introduction in Ethiopia." (Courtesy photos)

    Tadias Magazine

    By Tadias Staff

    Updated: February 3rd, 2021

    New York (TADIAS) – This weekend People to People & Ethiopian Diaspora Advisory Council on COVID-19 are hosting a timely webinar titled “Addressing Fear and Hope – COVID-19 Vaccines.”

    According to the announcement the online conference, which takes place via Zoom on Saturday, February 6, will focus on “plans, preparation and strategies for COVID-19 vaccine introduction in Ethiopia.”

    Featured guests include Ethiopia’s Minister of Health Dr. Lia Tadesse and Ethiopia’s Ambassador to the U.S. Fitsum Arega who are scheduled to deliver opening remarks as well as Dr. Ebba Abate, Director General of the Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI).

    The keynote speaker is Prof. Tilahun Yilma, Distinguished Professor of Virology at the University of California, Davis, whose presentation covers “the safety and efficacy of available vaccines for COVID-19.”

    Other speakers are Dr. Gebeyehu Teferi, Chief of Infectious Disease at Unity Health Care in Washington DC; Dr. Muluken Yohannes, Special Advisor to Anglophone Africa at GAVI board; Prof. Yonas Geda, Psychiatrist and Behavioral Neurologist; and Dr. Zelalem Mekuria of Ohio State’s Global One Health initiative (GOHI).

    The program notes that Webinar topics include “COVID19 vaccine diplomacy” (Ambassador Fitsum Arega), “COVID19 epidemiology and public health measures in Ethiopia” (Dr. Ebba Abate), “COVID-19 vaccine introduction, planning and strategies” (Dr. Muluken Yohannes), SARS COV2 variants of concern (Dr. Zelalem Mekuria), “Discipline: the missing link between public health measures and ‘being caught by Corona’” (Prof. Yonas Geda).

    The event will be moderated by Prof. Demissie Alemayehu of Columbia University’s Department of Statistics. Welcoming remarks will be delivered by Dr. Enawgaw Mehari, President of P2P & Chair of EDAC-C, while closing remarks will be made by Dr. Kebede Begna, Hematologist/Oncologist at Mayo Clinic.

    If You Attend:

    Click here to resgister.

    Related:

    The Latest: Ethiopia Coronavirus Update

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    Review: How the Pandemic Has Changed Ethiopian Dining in DC Area, For Now

    From left, Admassu Mekonnen, Wubeshet Mehari, Milka Tesfaye and Deriba Reba share lunch at Nazret Ethiopian Restaurant in Falls Church, Virginia. (The Washington Post)

    The Washington Post

    Ethiopian dining is as much about community as food. The pandemic has changed that, for now.

    A businessman from Addis Ababa has dined on occasion during the pandemic at Nazret Ethiopia Restaurant (3821 S George Mason Dr. D, Falls Church, 703-347-9911; nazretethiopiarestaurant.com). The man — who is quite wealthy, says chef-owner Endalkachew Mekonnen — usually requests a spot in the corner of the dining room and politely asks the proprietor to keep the tables around him clear of other customers. He tries to eat early in the evening, or later at night, to avoid what passes for a crowd during the coronavirus pandemic.

    “He tells me I can charge him any amount but usually we don’t charge him” for the special accommodation, Mekonnen says. Instead, the businessman tips well, frequently handing the owner a C-note for his troubles.

    Say what you want about the entitlement of the rich and their ability to bend the world to their will with the flash of a little cash. But when it comes to the warmth, culture and exchange of the Ethiopian table, this businessman is as bereft as the rest of us. The pandemic has cast its shadow over our lives for almost a year now, and it has been particularly cruel to the restaurant industry. I’d argue, though, that few cuisines have suffered as much as the one from East Africa — the one that’s so prominent on the streets of Washington and in many of its suburbs.


    Chef-owner Endalkachew Mekonnen at Nazret. (The Washington Post)

    Read more »

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    France Suspends Ethiopian Airlines Flights For Four Days Due to COVID-19 Violation

    "Several shortcomings were noted on the arrival in France of flights of the Ethiopian Airlines company," the French transport ministry said in a statement. "It is up to the company to check that each passenger on board has a document showing a negative PCR (Covid-19) test," it added. (Photo via Twitter @flyethiopian)

    AFP

    The French government is suspending Ethiopian Airlines for four days over a failure to ensure passengers have had negative coronavirus tests, the transport ministry announced Wednesday.

    “Several shortcomings were noted on the arrival in France of flights of the Ethiopian Airlines company,” the ministry said in a statement.

    “It is up to the company to check that each passenger on board has a document showing a negative PCR (Covid-19) test,” it added.

    France warned the Ethiopian flag carrier on Tuesday but, after fresh shortcomings on Wednesday, it “decided to suspend flights by the company from Thursday January 28 to Sunday January 31 inclusive,” the statement said.

    French government spokesman Gabriel Attal had earlier Wednesday said Paris wants to consider a Europe-wide “strengthening of border rules” and “sanctions against airlines” outside the European Union which do not ensure the necessary virus checks on passengers.

    Such sanctions could lead to “a temporary or definitive ban” on landing or taking off at French airports, he added.

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    Spotlight: How Ethiopian Soccer Referee Lidya Tafesse Made African History

    Ethiopian Soccer Referee Lidya Tafesse Abebe. (Getty Images)

    Tadias Magazine

    By Tadias Staff

    Updated: January 29th, 2021

    New York (TADIAS) — Last week Ethiopian Soccer Referee Lidya Tafesse Abebe made African history when she led the first ever all-female officiating team refereeing the men’s African Nations Championship quarter-finals game in Cameroon between Namibia and Tanzania.

    Lidya, who is a former professional basketball player, “gave a flawless performance as Tanzania edged Namibia 1-0 in Cameroon city Limbe,” AFP reported, noting that Lidya was joined by her assistants, Malawian Bernadettar Kwimbira and Nigerian Mimisen Iyorhe, during the landmark match that was fully controlled by women referees.


    Lidya Tafesse was also the first ever woman FIFA centre referee from Ethiopia. (Photo via cafonline)

    According to AFP:

    Tafesse exuded confidence in every decision she made, was extremely fit and tolerated no foul play as she yellow-carded three Tanzanians within 10 minutes during the second half.

    African male footballers often dispute decisions against them, but most accepted without hesitation the rulings of Tafesse at the Stade Omnisport in the southwestern coastal resort.

    CAF referees manager Eddy Maillet from the Seychelles was overjoyed as the trio created history eight days into the sixth edition of the Nations Championship.

    Below is a profile of Lidya Tafesse courtesy of CAFOnline.com, the official website of the governing body of African Soccer, Confederation of African Football:

    From basketball to top level refereeing


    “It was very difficult when I started because sometimes, some people would ask why I decided to go into refereeing as a woman when there were no any other women doing the same” — Lidya Tafesse (cafonline)

    Starting off as a professional basketball player, not many thought Lidya Tafesse Abebe would trade the rims and bounces for the whistle, and not in basketball, but football. The 40-year old has been on a 20 -year journey of refereeing, becoming the first ever woman to officiate a men’s top flight game in Ethiopia.

    She was also the first ever woman FIFA centre referee in the East African nation.

    “I started off in Jimma while still playing basketball. I played football in school but basketball was my first sport. I was interested when I met one of the instructors doing some courses and some of us from the basketball team were invited. I liked how he was teaching and I got interested more,” Tafesse says.

    The seed planted in her soul by the FIFA/CAF instructor Shiferaw Eshetu continued to germinate and grow as the days went on.

    When she moved to the capital Addis Ababa to continue her basketball career and pursue a course in Pharmacy, the interest continued and soon, she started building on with more courses and when it became apparent that she had found some new love, dumped the old one; basketball.

    “I was part of the female referees project and I started off by doing the Under-15, 17 games, the local tournaments as well as some Federation tournaments. I got more certification and I started doing the Men’s Premier League as an assistant referee and in 2005, I became a centre referee,” narrates Tafesse.

    The journey, though satisfying hasn’t been easy for the mother of one. When she started, there were no women referees and when she officiated men’s games, there was even more difficulty.

    But her resilience and desire to make a mark in Ethiopian football drover her passion.

    “It was very difficult when I started because sometimes, some people would ask why I decided to go into refereeing as a woman when there were no any other women doing the same. But my family supported me and I am grateful for them,”

    “Also, I came from a sports background and the fact that while playing basketball we trained and played against some men teams gave me confidence and it wasn’t so difficult for me at times, even when I did men’s games,” explains Tafesse.


    Lidya Tafesse (cafonline)

    She also remains grateful to the Ethiopian Football Federation who gave her and her colleagues confidence to continue and even handed them Premier League matches to boost their confidence. She vividly remembers the influence former vice president Tihaye Egziaber had on her.

    “He would talk to us as women referees and really encouraged us. He gave us so much support,” she states.

    Her impressive performances earned her a first ever international assignment in 2006 when she officiated an Under-20 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier between Nigeria and Liberia in Abuja and that opened the floodgates for her to grow.

    “I will not forget that match because it was so different. The stadium was bigger than what we are used to here in Ethiopia, the crowd was amazing and the level was definitely good,” Tafesse remembers.


    (cafonline)

    She has gone on to progress, doing the All Africa Games in 2007 and 2011, before going on to do the Total Africa Women’s Cup of Nations (AWCON) four times in a row in 2012, 2014, 2016 and 2018.

    On top of that, she has officiated at the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 2015 and 2019, did the FIFA Under-17 World Cup in 2016 as well as the Under-20 in 2018.

    But in between all those wonderful assignments, she faced a challenge that nearly slowed down her sailing career. In 2013, she conceived her first born child who will be turning seven years old in October. But, the aftermath of her return seven months later was full of challenges.

    “Physiologically as women, we have so many body changes after pregnancy and I was not different. I gained so much weight and I had to work very hard to get back in shape. I worked a lot and eventually I was better and in 2014, I got a chance to go for the Cup of Nations,”

    “But while training there, I got injured and in my mind, it was all over for me. I tried to do some tests and see whether I could go on but I had decided I would go home. However, the director came and told me ‘Lydia you are not going. Just try and see whether you can recover’. I started treating the sprain on my ankle everyday and ultimately, I got better,”

    “I did a match in the semi-final, Cameroon vs Côte d’Ivoire which went up to extra time. Surprisingly, I was stronger and fitter than both teams when the game went to 120 minutes. I was so pleased,” Tafesse remembers.

    This is one of her most memorable matches. The other one was in 2012 when she officiated another semi-final pitting Nigeria and South Africa, a match that the Banyana Banyana won 1-0.

    “It was such a great game to officiate because both of them are brilliant teams. Also, it was very hot and I remembered hoping it would not go to extra time,” jokes Tafesse.


    (cafonline)

    Despite the stoppages caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Tafesse has continued to train on her own and has also use the time off competitions to give back to the community.

    She is using her background as a pharmacist and knowledge in medicine to raise awareness on the virus and help the community keep themselves safe from contracting and spreading the virus.

    “I have been doing education on social media and in radio and TV stations just trying to tell people on the dangers of the virus. I also go to the communities and teach them how to wash hands and keep hygiene. Also, I have been giving back to the community by helping the vulnerable who have not had a chance to get food and basic commodities,” she states.

    On her training, Tafesse admits that it has been tough but notes she has not had a reason to put the feet off the gas. “I train outside three times a week and also indoors where I have tried to put up my own small gym. We have a system where we have to make reports daily as well as GPS trackers to ensure we are training.”


    Lidya Tafesse (cafonline)

    As a woman, Tafesse says it has been great balancing between her family and refereeing, a career she has given her full attention to. The support from her husband and the motivation of her seven-year old keeps her going, Tafesse says.

    And now, she hopes she can influence the next generation of women referees in Ethiopia and the continent at large to take up the career. She hopes that after her active years, apart from continuing with her profession as a pharmacist, she will switch to become an instructor as she looks to get more and more following her path.

    Her hopes to continue getting high profile games and getting the chance to officiate at a CAF men’s tournament for the first time finally became true in the Total African Nations Championship (CHAN), Cameroon 2020.

    Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

    Watch: In New York Activists Rally to Save Ethiopian Coffee Shop in Bronx

    The owners of Buunni Coffee say they will have to close by the end of January because they can't meet their landlord's rent demands. Activists are calling on state and city lawmakers to pass already proposed legislation to help businesses like Buunni survive. (Courtesy photo)

    ABC 7 News

    Activists Rally to Save Ethiopian Coffee Shop in Bronx

    RIVERDALE, Bronx (WABC) — An Ethiopian coffee shop in the Bronx has become the center of a cry for help to save small businesses in danger of closing amid the pandemic.

    The owners of Buunni Coffee say they will have to close by the end of January because they can’t meet their landlord’s rent demands.

    Activists are calling on state and city lawmakers to pass already proposed legislation to help businesses like Buunni survive.

    “Small businesses faced serious problems before COVID, and now the pandemic has brought us to a breaking point,” Sarina Prabasi, co-founder of Buunni Coffee, said. “This is not about any one business. It’s beyond time to create bold, comprehensive support for the smallest of businesses and our workers. We have an opportunity to address long-standing inequities, to level the playing field and to invest in our neighborhoods for the long term. But this will take courage and political will from our elected representatives.”

    Those at the rally said Buunni has been a vital part of the neighborhood, a center for local activism, art, and music for the past three years.

    “Immigrant-owned small businesses, such as Buunni Coffee, have become one of the biggest casualties of the COVID-19 pandemic with them closing at an alarming rate all across the City, including The Bronx,” Sen. Gustavo Rivera said. “The federal government’s inaction has left hard working businesses owners such as Ms. Prabasi at risk of losing their livelihoods and our borough in danger of a deeper economic crisis. I join local leaders and Riverdale residents in calling on our local government to fill the void left by Washington and enact legislation that will help businesses like Buunni Coffee to remain open and successfully recover from this unprecedented crisis.”

    Related:

    From the Birthplace of Coffee Cafe Buunni Serves Ethiopian Organic Specialty Coffee

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    Lawyers Advise Ethiopian Airlines Against ‘Financially Disastrous’ Settlement Offer by Boeing Over 737 MAX Crash

    In an urgently worded letter sent Sunday, the Chicago-based attorneys warned Ethiopian CEO Tewolde GebreMariam that the offer falls “grossly short” of what the airline could win before a U.S. jury — particularly since Boeing recently accepted responsibility for criminal fraud during the plane’s certification by regulators. (AP photo by Mulugeta Ayene)

    Seattle Times

    American attorneys for Ethiopian Airlines, which lost 157 passengers and crew in the second fatal crash of a Boeing 737 MAX in early 2019, have advised the carrier not to accept a settlement Boeing has offered but instead to sue the manufacturer for punitive damages in the U.S.

    In an urgently worded letter sent Sunday, the Chicago-based attorneys warned Ethiopian CEO Tewolde GebreMariam that the offer falls “grossly short” of what the airline could win before a U.S. jury — particularly since Boeing recently accepted responsibility for criminal fraud during the plane’s certification by regulators.

    The settlement Boeing has offered is “a mere fraction” of the actual damage, the lawyers told Tewolde, and accepting it “will inevitably leave substantial money on the table and would be a tremendous political and financial mistake for Ethiopian Airlines.”

    Yet like many airlines, Ethiopian is now desperate for cash.

    Before the 2019 crash of Flight ET302, state-owned Ethiopian was the largest and most successful airline in Africa. It lost business after the tragedy and the subsequent grounding of the MAX fleet. Then last year its revenue plummeted further when the COVID-19 pandemic paralyzed air travel.

    The letter conveys the attorneys’ concern that direct settlement negotiations between Boeing and the airline’s management are close to done and that a “financially disastrous” deal may be imminent.

    A person familiar with developments in the private negotiations shared details from the letter with The Seattle Times.

    It offers a rare look inside what are normally secret negotiations. And with the MAX back in the air and the second anniversary of the second crash approaching, it highlights a Boeing push to conclude customer compensation discussions and put the MAX crisis behind it.

    The letter from law firm DiCello Levitt Gutzler, which Ethiopian hired to provide advice on its claims against Boeing, is signed by co-founding partner Adam Levitt.

    Boeing declined to comment on discussions with its customer. Ethiopian Airlines did not respond to an emailed request for comment. Levitt did not return a call seeking an interview.

    Levitt’s letter argues that Boeing’s Deferred Prosecution Agreement with the Department of Justice (DOJ) earlier this month provides Ethiopian new legal leverage because of “Boeing’s admission of its criminal conduct.”

    The DOJ settlement staves off a criminal fraud charge against Boeing with a relatively light $244 million penalty.

    It also explicitly exonerates senior management while pinning the fraud on two Boeing technical pilots who misrepresented to airlines the details of new flight control software on the MAX — the maneuvering characteristics augmentation system (MCAS) — that was a key contributing factor in both crashes.

    However, Boeing admitted in the deferred prosecution agreement that the accusations of fraud involving the two pilots were “true and accurate” and acknowledged that the company is responsible for criminal acts by its employees.

    Read more »

    Boeing Reaches $2.5 Billion Settlement in 737 MAX Crashes in Ethiopia & Indonesia


    Ethiopian officials deliver the Black Box for Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 to the headquarters of France’s BEA air accident investigation agency in Le Bourget, France on March 14, 2019. As NPR reports the families of the passengers who died in the crash will be compensated from a fund of $500 million. (Reuters photo)

    NPR

    Updated: January 7th, 2021

    Boeing To Pay $2.5 Billion Over 737 Max Fraud, Faces No Other Charges

    Boeing will pay more than $2.5 billion to settle criminal charges that it repeatedly concealed and lied about the 737 Max’s engineering problems that led to two catastrophic crashes claiming hundreds of lives.

    The company admitted to one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States as part of the deferred prosecution agreement announced on Thursday and will face no further charges from the U.S. Department of Justice.

    “Boeing’s employees chose the path of profit over candor by concealing material information from the FAA concerning the operation of its 737 Max airplane and engaging in an effort to cover up their deception,” Acting Assistant Attorney General David Burns of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, wrote in a statement.

    Boeing, which is the country’s second-biggest defense contractor behind Lockheed Martin, will pay the DOJ a criminal penalty of $243.6 million.

    The families and legal beneficiaries of the 346 passenger victims who died in the Lion Air Flight 610 in Indonesia in October 2018 and the Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 in Ethiopia five months later will be paid from a fund of $500 million. If split equally among them, that amounts to a little over $1.4 million for each family.

    The vast majority of the settlement is allocated for airline companies that had purchased the faulty 737 Max aircraft and were subsequently forced to ground the planes following the crashes. Together they will receive $1.77 billion in compensation for their financial losses, according to the DOJ.

    “The tragic crashes of Lion Air Flight 610 and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 exposed fraudulent and deceptive conduct by employees of one of the world’s leading commercial airplane manufacturers,” Burns added in the statement.

    In both cases, the crashes were caused by changes to the jet’s Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System that forced the nose of the 737 Max toward the ground and left pilots unable to control the planes.

    In a note to employees, Boeing President and Chief Executive Officer David Calhoun said, “I firmly believe that entering into this resolution is the right thing for us to do—a step that appropriately acknowledges how we fell short of our values and expectations.”

    He added: “This resolution is a serious reminder to all of us of how critical our obligation of transparency to regulators is, and the consequences that our company can face if any one of us falls short of those expectations.”

    Internal Boeing documents revealed during a U.S.House panel’s inquiry showed that engineers notified the company of the MCAS “egregious” problems as early as 2016.

    Related:

    Ethiopian Report Blames Boeing for 737 MAX Plane Crash

    Boeing to Stop 737 Max Production (AP)

    Internal FAA review saw high risk of 737 MAX crashes

    Boeing Was Aware of 737 Max Problem Long Before Ethiopia Crash – Report

    Boeing CEO Apologizes to Victims of Ethiopia, Indonesia Crashes

    Ethiopian Airlines Slams Bloomberg’s Ex-Pilot Story as ‘Baseless & False Allegation’

    Read Excerpt From Ethiopia Crash Report

    Ethiopian Airlines Expresses Disappointment – Calls Out Media Outlets Eager to Blame Pilot

    Watch: Ethiopian CEO on The Future of Boeing 737 Max Planes — NBC Exclusive

    Watch: Ethiopia Releases 737 Max Preliminary Crash Report

    Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

    Yene Damtew: Meet the Ethiopian Woman Behind Michelle Obama’s Famous Hairstyles

    Yene Damtew has been Michelle Obama's hairstylist since 2008. Regarding the former first lady's recent look at Joe Biden's inauguration this week that has attracted international attention, Yene says: “I personally loved her look and was very happy to see how it came together, but did not expect it to resonate with viewers the way it has." (Photos: Courtesy of Yene Damtew and Getty Images)

    The Washington Post

    The woman behind Michelle Obama’s instantly iconic hair

    It was a moment watch parties and group chats are made for: former first lady Michelle Obama, hand in hand with former President Barack Obama, emerging from the U.S. Capitol in a regal, floor-length plum coat and statement belt, her voluminous curls bouncing with each step.

    The monochromatic pantsuit designed by Sergio Hudson was striking, but the star of the show was Obama’s hair: a silk press so perfect, it launched thousands of social media shares. In the middle of the inauguration ceremony, “laid” — a reference to the flawlessness of Obama’s hair — began trending.

    Obama’s coif came courtesy of her longtime hairstylist, Yene Damtew, who has been part of the former first lady’s glam squad since 2008. For her, Wednesday began as a “typical day at work.” It wasn’t until a client tagged her in a tweet about Obama’s hair that she got a sense of how much the style had resonated with people, particularly Black women.

    “I personally loved her look and was very happy to see how it came together, but did not expect it to resonate with viewers the way it has,” Damtew wrote in an email.

    She has helped craft memorable looks for Obama before.

    Damtew picked up her passion for hair from watching her mother get ready for church, enamored with her hot rollers and the full, bouncy hair they produced. As a teenager, she became the go-to person in her Orange County, Calif., neighborhood when someone wanted their hair done.

    “I did everyone’s hair from football players to the kids, and then my high school classmates,” she told Allure.

    At 21, she began working alongside Obama’s hairstylist Johnny Wright, whom she met while completing an assignment for cosmetology school. Damtew started doing Malia and Sasha Obama’s hair, as well as styling Obama’s mother, Marian Robinson. At the 2016 Democratic National Convention, when Obama delivered her famous “When they go low, we go high” line, Damtew was behind Obama’s striking, chestnut brown color that she custom-created and hand-painted onto Obama’s hair, according to Elle. In 2017, when Damtew opened her own business, Aesthetics salon in Arlington, Va., Obama attended the opening.

    To create Obama’s inauguration look, Damtew consulted with Obama’s wardrobe stylist Meredith Koop and makeup artist Carl Ray. Since Obama was going for a monochromatic look, Damtew says she knew “the hair would stand out a lot on its own.”

    “As I thought about the hairstyle that would complement her outfit and suit the weather, these bouncy curls came to life,” she said.

    But Damtew couldn’t predict just how much life they would give to viewers of the inauguration, many of whom wanted to know who was behind the look. Within hours of Damtew revealing herself as Obama’s hairstylist on Twitter, thousands of compliments and requests for tips starting pouring in.

    “The support of Black Women Twitter has been amazing,” said Damtew, who is Ethiopian American. “As a salon owner who caters to women with textured hair, I know the importance that hair holds, particularly to Black women and the crowns that they wear. Black women hold their hair in high regard.”

    She noted that it was important to continue showing versatility with Obama’s looks because “representation matters.” To celebrate her 57th birthday this week, Obama posted a selfie rocking her natural hair.

    But Obama’s hair was about more than just serving a look. It was celebratory, “showing out” hair — a stark contrast not just to the modest bun Obama wore at Donald Trump’s inauguration ceremony four years ago, but to the scenes at the Capitol earlier this month. During an inauguration ceremony that needed to acknowledge the deep divisions that remain in this country, as well as the hundreds of thousands of lives lost to the coronavirus in the United States, being able to gush over a coat or a blowout felt like a brief respite.

    This is not lost on Damtew.

    “The truth is we are still very much in a hard time in this nation,” she said. “But if, for a few minutes, people found joy in seeing a former first lady supporting her friends and wearing a beautiful coat and bouncy curls — I’m OK with that. We all need something to give us hope and make us smile.”

    Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

    Q&A: Ethiopian-American Novelist Dinaw Mengestu

    Dinaw Mengestu is an Ethiopian-American novelist, freelance journalist and professor of creative writing. This week Dinaw was the keynote speaker at MLK commemorative event held via Zoom at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. The following is a Q&A with Dinaw by the University's main student newspaper The Vanderbilt Hustler. (Getty Images)

    The Vanderbilt Hustler

    Ethiopian-American novelist Dinaw Mengestu speaks to The Hustler about his experiences as a writer and immigrant

    Vanderbilt Hustler: Your novels tell very unique immigrant narratives, how do you intend for your novels to speak to your readers?

    Dinaw Mengestu: I do not know who my readers are, and I never want to underestimate them. Your readers are always a slightly-amorphous body of people. The audience that I am most concerned with, strangely enough, are my fictional characters. I feel the most obligation to my characters. That obligation can be thought of as a respect for them and their desire for the complexity and depth of experience that I think people deserve.

    I am never thinking about the characters under any category or label, but I am definitely thinking about them as people who have lost a lot. As immigrants, they are people who have lost their homes, their families and in many cases, are struggling to rebuild their lives in America.

    That movement away from the things they had to leave behind to the construction of a new identity, a new home, trying to make sure that experience isn’t defamiliarized and contains as many layers of meaning as I have seen in my own families and witnessed in my own life—that is the kind of experience I hope will be born out of the page.

    The reader on the other end of it is hopefully present and engaged by it. Hopefully, they feel that they are reading an experience that actually is complicated. I think they can connect to the complexity because the person they are reading about is actually fully alive. It is not because it is familiar to their own experiences, but because it actually has the emotional complexity of a real, living person.

    How do you think underrepresented voices in fiction can be more widely represented?

    I think there are a lot of systemic problems, and I think one is making sure underrepresented voices actually feel and believe that there is a world that will represent them accurately. I think so many potential artists and voices actually count themselves out of that conversation long before anything else even happens.

    Once we get a number of South Asian writers or African American or Black writers, then we have diverse writers. Why do we need another one? We have Toni Morrison—how many more of those voices do we need? There is a sense that we only need to occupy so much space. We only need to give so much room to those voices because those voices are important, but they are not really valued. They are important in the way in which they can be pointed to and signified, so we need to move further still in a cultural embrace of what it means to have a real diversity of voices.

    It is not about making sure we have that experience checked off, which is oftentimes where we still are. We want to make sure that we have certain narrative trends blocked off, and once we have them blocked off, it is really easy to feel that that work is done. I think that the creators of those stories, especially the younger generations, are aware of that.

    I remember the first time I tried writing my first novel, being told no one is going to care about a bunch of African immigrants in Washington D.C. I think that sense is still pervasive. I think people still feel like there is not much attention or care about who they are. So, I think we need to make sure that we are actively encouraging and inviting people to start making stories and know that there is a world of people who care about them and those narratives.

    What does the American Dream mean to you?

    America is very distinct in that it is the only country that has this espoused Dream. I remember writing my first novel, and people thought I was being critical of the American Dream. The characters in it do not acquire the usual trapping of American success. There is this idea that if your characters are not going around declaring how wonderful it is to be an American, they are opposed to this American Dream or this American value system. That is kind of ridiculous.

    I think that this American Dream is being honest about what America is while still believing you can be a part of it. That is the radical nature of that Dream. We were talking about Dr. Martin Luther King’s Dream speech on the Capitol. The fact that MLK still continued to believe in the possibility of this fight, having experienced this full-scale American violence and oppression—to still believe in something positive and better on the other side is something remarkable and a radical notion.

    It is not one that is connected or tied to a material wealth. It is tied to the possibility of worth and collectively to somewhere other than where we are right now. That is a remarkable thing to believe in.

    I think it is why immigrants continue to come to America. They do not believe that America is going to be a wonderful, perfect land. This idea that immigrants arrive in America delusional about the nature of America is ridiculous. They arrive fully aware of how problematic America is and yet still persist in coming and bringing their children, raising their children here and pushing America a bit forward, toward something fuller and more complicated than what it already is. That is the Dream for me. The ability to believe in it when it is giving you so many reasons not to.

    What insights do you have about the turbulent events of this past week?

    As people have noted, this isn’t a surprise. What we have witnessed is actually just a punctuation of four years. It is like the groundwork has been laid for years for us to get to this point. My curiosity has been: how has this been possible, and how have they created this narrative of this movement and these supporters as being somehow decent and law-abiding people? How have they managed to get away with that rhetoric when clearly what we witnessed is the exact opposite?

    It is violent and unfair. But the ability to continue to present themselves as this party of law and order, of people who believe in the Constitution and are supporting democracy—that is the thing that I am most fascinated by because it is the construction of a narrative, and it is a narrative that has a lot of political power and weight. It is a narrative that to some degree exists far more on the right in its ability to assert that whatever they do is good.

    Read the full interview at vanderbilthustler.com »

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    Hana Getachew, the Ethiopian-American Founder of Bolé Road Textiles

    Hana Getachew, founder of the Brooklyn-based Bolé Road Textiles that sells home linens, fabric, pillows, and more, all hand-woven in Ethiopia. (Photo via Refinery29)

    Refinery29

    For Hana Getachew, the Ethiopian-American founder of Bolé Road Textiles, a love of textiles can be traced back to childhood, stemming from one garment in particular: her mother’s dress for the Mels, an Ethiopian tradition that takes place during a wedding ceremony. She remembers it in excruciating detail — from the olive green shade and the waist-cinching A-line silhouette, right down to the gilded threadwork and golden daisies.

    “We’d always take it out and play with it. We were obsessed with it,” Getachew says. There were others, too, that she loved: dresses from friends and family, brought when they visited from Ethiopia. “In Ethiopia, weavers would come up with non-traditional syncopated patterns, with elements of symmetry and diamond designs. That has stayed with me, and I put a lot of it into my work today.”

    Getachew speaks about her career as two different lives: her life as an interior designer (before she launched Bolé Road), and her life after. It’s the latter — as the mastermind behind the home decor brand inspired by her own connections to family and the African diaspora — that has granted her the liberty to experiment and express herself genuinely through a world enriched in color, shapes, textures, and patterns.
    “I knew I was a good interior designer, but I felt like anyone could do it. It wasn’t unique to me; I wanted to find something that is essential to my soul,” she says about working at an architecture firm for almost 11 years, decorating commercial interiors and offices. “One day, my coworker told me her friend quit her full-time job to work on her pillow business. And I was like, Yes, that’s what I’m gonna do.”


    Bolé Road Textiles


    Bolé Road Textiles

    The concept for Bolé Road lived in her mind for almost eight years before she found the courage to execute it. In 2008, the same year Getachew’s ideas were growing, everyone around her was losing their jobs, which led many of them to dream-chase and become entrepreneurs. “The maker movement,” she proclaims. “I’m very risk-averse, which is not a good trait as an entrepreneur. That’s why I didn’t leap into this, but when I saw a whole movement happening, I thought maybe I could do this too.”
    ADVERTISEMENT

    Getachew left her career in interior design in 2014, but spent years prior to that preparing for the transition. She took free business classes at NYC Small Business Services and scouted artisans through word of mouth, the internet, and asking around in Ethiopia. A year later, she officially launched her brand on the same day as the Brooklyn Designs annual show. (The best piece of advice she received: “Just start, don’t overthink it.”)

    “It was an amazing event, and it was an incredible way to launch, rather than hit publish on a website and wait,” she says, likening the experience to a graduation, being surrounded by family, friends, and former coworkers. “Those kinds of events are really great for understanding how people respond to [your product] and getting your first round of feedback.”

    Everything about Bolé Road revolves around intention, identity, and gratitude to the heritage and community that supported Getachew most, from the colors and patterns inspired by Ethiopian landscapes to the name of the company.

    Read more »

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    WATCH: An Ethiopian Immigrant’s Perspective on Chaos at US Capitol

    While most Americans have never seen anything like what happened at the U.S. Capitol Wednesday, the scene was sadly familiar for some immigrants and refugees. “What just happened today in the Capitol, just kind of reminds me of what our parents went through... in the 70s,” said Endale Getahun, who immigrated from Ethiopia to the U.S. in the early 1980s, when he was 10 years old [and now] runs an immigrant and refugee-focused community radio station in Aurora, Colorado. (ABC News)

    Channel 13, ABC News Now

    AURORA, Colo. — Immigrants who came to America fleeing political upheaval and violence in their home countries saw political violence on American soil Wednesday.

    For many, it was shocking.

    “What just happened today in the Capitol, just kind of reminds me of what our parents went through… in the 70s,” said Endale Getahun, who immigrated from Ethiopia to the U.S. in the early 1980s, when he was 10 years old.

    Getahun describes that as a time of political upheaval and conflict in his home country. Conflict continues today, with recent violence between the country’s government and the region of Tigray.

    Like so many other immigrants, Getahun’s family came to America looking for peace and stability. Watching images of chaos on Wednesday was unsettling.

    “I think it’s very shocking, to happen in this world, in a democratic country, which welcomes everyone to be safe from chaos – not just from Ethiopia but all over the world. The United States is a symbol of democracy, freedom, a dream to achieve,” he said.

    Getahun runs an immigrant and refugee-focused community radio station in Aurora, KETO FM. He said Wednesday, the conversation covered the U.S. Capitol takeover.

    Getahun can offer an immigrant’s perspective on those developments.

    “The other side of the world has experienced this kind of chaotic government takeover and the U.S. was the one that comes back and helps those countries,” he said. “So I think this is a very testing moment for all of us, including the American citizens as well.”

    Getahun said it’s up to U.S. leaders, specifically President Donald Trump, to calm the country and ensure people are safe.

    “Words matter,” he said.

    —-

    The Latest:

    Updated: January 7th, 2021

  • After chaos, calls for Trump’s removal as top officials resign
  • Congress affirms Biden’s presidential win following riot at U.S. Capitol
  • The grand finale of the Trump show: America watches farce devolve to horror
  • Explainer: How could Trump be removed from office before his term ends on Jan. 20?
  • Social platforms flex their power, lock down Trump accounts

    World Watches US Chaos with Shock, Dismay and Some Mockery

    The Associated Press

    PARIS (AP) — As the world watched American institutions shaken to the core by an angry mob, officials and ordinary citizens wondered: How fragile is democracy, and how much stress could their own political systems withstand?

    “If it can happen in the U.S., it can happen anywhere,” said Gunjan Chhibber, a 39-year-old who works for an American tech company in India, the world’s largest democracy. She stayed up all night, watching and worrying at her home in Delhi as the chaos unfolded many time zones away.

    In Germany, whose modern system of governance was nurtured by successive American administrations, Chancellor Angela Merkel was unusually blunt Thursday, drawing a direct line from President Donald Trump’s refusal to concede his election defeat to the atmosphere that made the storming of the U.S. Capitol by his supporters possible.

    “A fundamental rule of democracy is that, after elections, there are winners and losers. Both have to play their role with decency and responsibility so that democracy itself remains the winner,” Merkel said.

    Eva Sakschewska, a German who followed the news closely, said the events in Washington were almost inconceivable.

    “You can only fear how far this can go when populists come to power and do such things,” she said. “You know that in the U.S., democracy has a long history and that it comes to something like that – yes one is afraid.”

    Even the United Nations offered up the kind of statement usually reserved for fragile democracies, expressing sadness and calling on unidentified political leaders to foster respect for “democratic processes and the rule of law.”

    In Iraq, where the violent U.S.-led overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003 led to years of sectarian conflict and a deeply flawed democracy, many watched and marveled at the scenes unfolding in Congress.

    Iraqis have suffered for years under power-sharing arrangements among competing elites divided along sectarian lines. Backroom deals are common to avoid political paralysis, and democratic ideals have been tainted by an entrenched system of patronage through which state jobs are doled out in exchange for support. Political parties also have affiliated militias that wield significant power on the street. From afar, the violence in Washington had a contemptible familiarity.

    “Iraq calls on the U.S. regime to respect the principles of democracy, or it will intervene militarily to bring down the dictator,” said Mustafa Habib, a well-known Iraqi analyst and researcher, in a tweet that mocked Washington’s actions abroad.

    Venezuela, which is under U.S. sanctions, said the events showed that the U.S. “is suffering what it has generated in other countries with its politics of aggression.”

    Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has survived U.S.-backed opposition efforts to oust him despite accusations of human rights abuses, civil unrest and a humanitarian crisis that has forced millions to flee the oil-rich country.

    “We exported so much democracy that we don’t have any left,” American-Palestinian scholar Yousef Monayyer wrote on Twitter, the social network favored by Trump until he was locked out of it late Wednesday.

    His comment joined the growing strain of sarcasm bordering on schadenfreude from those who have long resented the perceived American tendency to chastise other countries for less-than-perfect adherence to democratic ideals.

    This time, however, it was an attempt by Americans to stop a peaceful transition of power to President-elect Joe Biden after a democratic election in a country that many around the world have looked at as a model for democratic governance.

    In China, which has had constant friction with Washington over trade, as well as military and political issues, people were scathing in their criticism of Trump and his supporters, citing both the coronavirus pandemic and the mob action.

    Communist-ruled China has long accused the U.S. of hypocrisy in its efforts to promote democracy and advocate for human rights overseas.

    The Communist Youth League ran a photo montage of the Capitol violence on its Twitter-like Weibo microblog with the caption: “On the sixth, the U.S. Congress, a most beautiful site to behold.” That appeared to mock House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for her June 2019 comments in praise of sometimes- violent anti-government protests in Hong Kong.

    “The U.S. is not as safe as China, right? I think Trump is a self-righteous and selfish person,” said financial adviser Yang Ming.

    Iran, which faces routine U.S. criticism over violations of human rights and democratic values, jumped on the chaos as proof of American hypocrisy.

    The semiofficial Fars news agency called the United States a “fragmented democracy,” while Iran’s pro-government Twitter accounts gloated, circulating photos of the mobs with hashtags that included #DownfalloftheUS.

    The events tarnished the American insistence that it is a bastion of democracy for countries that have only in recent decades, in some cases, given up autocratic or military-controlled forms of government.

    “The beauty of democracy?” with a shrug emoji was the reaction tweeted by Bashir Ahmad, a personal assistant to the president of Nigeria, which has seen several coups since independence — including one led decades ago by President Muhammadu Buhari, who was elected to office in 2015.

    Some legislatures in Asia — South Korea and Taiwan, for instance — have at times been marred by brawls and screaming matches, but democracies throughout the region are normally staid versions of European and American lawmaking models.

    “This is shocking. I hope this will serve as chance for the Americans to review their democracy,” said Na HyunPil at the Korean House for International Solidarity, a Seoul-based NGO. “Trump is entirely responsible for this incident. After his four-year rule, the Americans find it difficult to tell other countries that their country is a good model for democracy.”

    Several countries, both U.S. allies and antagonists, issued travel warnings to their citizens, although with coronavirus infections soaring in the United States, arrivals from abroad are down to a trickle.

    Ally after ally expressed shock, followed by affirmations that U.S. democratic institutions would withstand the turmoil.

    “All my life, America has stood for some very important things: an idea of freedom and an idea of democracy,” said British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. “Insofar as he encouraged people to storm the Capitol, and insofar as the president has consistently cast doubt on the outcome of a free and fair election, I believe that was completely wrong.”

    But some, like European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, warned that the attempt to halt a peaceful transition in what many consider the world’s oldest democracy showed that no place is immune and that backsliding is reversed only with difficulty.

    “Democracy is never self-evident. It has to be worked on each and every day. It has to be won anew every day. And that applies to all democracies,” she told German news outlets. And that’s why we know that it starts as a very small thing.”

    For others, less friendly, it was portrayed as a last gasp and one that belonged solely to Americans themselves.

    “American democracy is obviously limping on both feet,” said Konstantin Kosachev, head of the foreign affairs committee in Russia’s upper house of parliament. “I say this without a shadow of gloating. America no longer charts a course and therefore has lost all rights to set it — and even more so to impose it on others.”

    ‘Moment of Shame’: Former US Presidents Condemn The Violent Mob Spectacle in DC


    Obama, Bush, Clinton, Carter all condemn the Trump supporter riots. (Photos: AP and Getty Images)

    Politico

    Former Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter on Wednesday each condemned the mob of rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol — and lawmakers who sought to delegitimize the presidential election results beforehand.

    “It is a sickening and heartbreaking sight,” Bush said in a statement. “This is how election results are disputed in a banana republic – not our democratic republic.”

    Obama said the insurrection, in which at least one person died, will be remembered as “a moment of great dishonor and shame” and that his successor, President Donald Trump, is culpable. He also faulted the Republican Party and the right-wing media ecosystem for the role they played in casting doubt on the integrity of recent elections.

    “Their fantasy narrative has spiraled further and further from reality, and it builds upon years of sown resentments,” Obama said in a statement. “Now we’re seeing the consequences, whipped up into a violent crescendo.”

    Bush similarly said the rioters who breached the building and remained there for hours were “inflamed by falsehoods and false hopes.”

    “I am appalled by the reckless behavior of some political leaders since the election and by the lack of respect shown today for our institutions, our traditions, and our law enforcement,” the 43rd president said.

    Clinton said the seizure of parts of the Capitol was the disastrous result of “poison politics” and the proliferation of misinformation. But he said it did not shake his fundamental belief in the decency of the American people.

    “If that’s who we really are, we must reject today’s violence, turn the page, and move forward together—honoring our Constitution, remaining committed to a government of the people, by the people, and for the people,” Clinton said.

    Bush also urged people upset about the recent elections to stand down for the sake of American democracy.

    “Our country is more important than the politics of the moment,” Bush said. “Let the officials elected by the people fulfill their duties and represent our voices in peace and safety.”

    Carter denounced the day’s events as a “national tragedy” and “not who we are as a nation.” In a statement released by the Carter Center, the former president said he and former First Lady Rosalynn Carter were troubled by the violence and hoped for Americans to come together to resolve the conflict.

    Carter’s statement notably did not assign blame for the Capitol riots.

    “Having observed elections worldwide, I know that we the people can unite to walk back from this precipice to peacefully uphold the laws of our nation, and we must,” the statement said. “We join our fellow citizens in praying for a peaceful resolution so our nation can heal and complete the transfer of power as we have for more than two centuries.”

    The mass of rioters began to breach the Capitol earlier Wednesday, disrupting the vote certifying President-elect Joe Biden’s victory over Trump and further delaying what was already expected to become a days-long affair after Republican members of Congress challenged Biden’s win in several states. The building was cleared by the evening and Congress has returned to continue its duties.

    However, Bush and Carter did not mention Trump — who has promoted false claims of rampant election fraud and embraced anti-democratic attempts stay in power — or anyone else by name in their dispatch. Bush, the most recent Republican president prior to Trump, has largely been careful not to publicly criticize the party’s present standard-bearer.

    Obama and Clinton, both Democrats, were far more explicit in faulting Trump for his role in instigating the unrest.

    “The match was lit by Donald Trump and his most ardent enablers, including many in Congress, to overturn the results of an election he lost,” Obama said. “The election was free, the count was fair, the result is final. We must complete the peaceful transfer of power our Constitution mandates.”

    Trump has continued to speak favorably of the rioters, calling them “very special” and “great patriots” in several tweets that have since been removed by Twitter.

    “These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long,” Trump wrote on Twitter in one such message. “Remember this day forever!”

    Trump supporters storm U.S. Capitol, with one woman killed and tear gas fired

    The Washington Post

    As President Trump told a sprawling crowd outside the White House that they should never accept defeat, hundreds of his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in what amounted to an attempted coup that they hoped would overturn the election he lost. In the chaos, law enforcement officials said, one woman was shot and killed by police.

    The violent scene — much of it incited by the president’s incendiary language — was like no other in modern American history, bringing to a sudden halt the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s electoral victory.

    With poles bearing blue Trump flags, a mob that would eventually grow into the thousands bashed through Capitol doors and windows, forcing their way past police officers unprepared for the onslaught. Lawmakers were evacuated shortly before an armed standoff at the House chamber’s entrance. The woman who was shot was rushed to an ambulance, police said, and later died. Canisters of tear gas were fired across the Rotunda’s white marble floor, and on the steps outside the building, rioters flew Confederate flags.

    The Senate stopped its proceedings, and the House doors were closed. In a notification, U.S. Capitol Police said no one would be allowed to come or go from the building as they struggled to regain control. “Stay away from exterior windows, doors. If outside, seek cover,” police warned.

    All 1,100 members of the D.C. National Guard were activated, and Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) imposed a citywide curfew. From 6 p.m. Wednesday to 6 a.m. Thursday, Bowser said, no one other than essential personnel would be allowed outdoors in the city.

    The mob had arrived hours earlier, charging past the metal barricades on the property’s outer edge. Hundreds, then thousands followed them. Some scaled the Capitol’s walls to reach entrances; others climbed over one another.

    On the building’s east side, police initially pushed the pro-Trump demonstrators back but soon gave up and fell back to the foot of the main steps. Within a half-hour, fights broke out again, and police retreated to the top of the stairs as screaming Trump supporters surged closer. After police perimeters were breached, the elated crowd began to sing the national anthem.

    For an hour, they banged on the doors, chanting, “Let us in! Let us in!” Police inside fired pepper balls and smoke bombs into the crowd but failed to turn them away. After each volley, the rioters, who were mostly White men, would cluster around the doors again, yelling, arguing, pledging revolution.

    Sometime after 2:10 p.m., a man used a clear plastic riot shield to break through the windows on a first floor to the south side of the building, then hopped in with a few others. Once inside, police suspect, rioters opened doors to let in more of their compatriots.

    A police officer yelled from a higher stairway at the intruders, ordering them to stop, but when they didn’t, the officer fired at a man coming at him, two law enforcement officials said. Amid shouts and people rushing to get away from the sound of gunfire, rioters saw a woman in their group collapse. Police believe she was unarmed, a law enforcement official said, but the officer who shot her did not know that. Capitol Police had already been warned by D.C. police that many in the crowds were secretly carrying weapons.

    “They shot a girl!” someone yelled as a group of Trump supporters ran out of the southeast entrance.

    A team of paramedics with a gurney soon arrived and a Capitol Police officer stepped aside to let them pass. “White female, shot in the shoulder,” the officer said as they hurried past. They emerged minutes later.

    On the gurney was a woman in jeans, gazing vacantly to one side, her torso and face covered in blood. As the gurney was loaded into the back of the ambulance, pro-Trump rioters swarmed around it, screaming, “Murderers!”

    Capitol Police officers with long guns pushed them back, and the ambulance drove off.

    Inside, where the lawmakers had donned gas masks kept under their chairs, Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) could only think of his family as he and other lawmakers hid from the mob. Reeling from the loss of his 25-year-old son last week, Raskin had taken one of his daughters and his son-in-law to the Capitol to watch the debates unfold over certification of Biden’s election, he said, “because we wanted to be together.” Raskin was helping lead Democrats’ arguments against Republican objectors.

    “I thought I could show them the peaceful transfer of power in the United States of America,” Raskin told C-SPAN earlier. “What was really going through my mind was their safety because they were not with me in the chamber, and I just wanted us all to get back together.”

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  • The Weeknd: “My Natural Singing Voice Was Inspired, Shaped By Ethiopian Music”

    Ethio-Canadian singer, songwriter, and record producer Abel Makkonen Tesfaye, known professionally as The Weeknd, shares that his “natural singing voice was inspired" and "shaped by Ethiopian Music”. In a recent interview with the music and culture magazine TMRW discussing his upcoming album, the artist added: "The older I got, I was exposed to more music, and my voice became a chameleon going into different characters." (The Weeknd/ Instagram)

    Koimoi

    Singer The Weeknd says his next album will be inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement and Covid-19 pandemic.

    In an interview with TMRW, the singer, whose After Hours tour was postponed due to the pandemic, shared what to expect in his new album, reports billboard.com.

    “I have been more inspired and creative during the pandemic than I might normally be while on the road…The pandemic, the Black Lives Matter movement and the tensions of the election have mostly created a sense of gratitude for what I have and closeness with the people near me,” The Weeknd said.

    “I was laser focused back then and I’m laser focused right now. This has been the story of my 20s. I feel like I spent the last 10 years creating a sound and most of my career, I’ve either been running away from it or duplicating it. After Hours was the perfect piece of art for me to show my tenure in the industry, said The Weeknd.

    Talking about his musical journey, The Weeknd said: “My natural singing voice was inspired and shaped by Ethiopian music. The older I got, I was exposed to more music, and my voice became a chameleon going into different characters with each album. By following my own path and breaking industry norms, it seems to be influencing others.”

    Take a sneak peek at tmrw x the Weeknd: a special edition 100-page zine all about the Canadian superstar.


    Since the Weeknd’s emergence into the ever-changing world of R&B he has pioneered his own sound, defying the restrictions of genre by fusing pop, hip hop and the sultriness of R&B together. (TMRW)

    In 2012, the Scarborough-raised singer Abel Tesfaye, famously known as the Weeknd, released Trilogy. Quickly this debut LP became a platinum-selling record with critics identifying him as being a pivotal artist who changed the landscape of R&B. Fast forward to 2020 – a tumultuous year for music and the rest of the world – and the Weeknd has delivered the globally renowned After Hours featuring arguably the biggest song of the year ‘Blinding Lights’.

    Over the 10 years of creating, the Canadian icon has barely sat still: whether heading off on mega world tours or releasing forty records in under a decade, the Weeknd has transformed himself and the music industry with his unique sound, aesthetic and performances.

    Whenever I try to describe the Weeknd’s sound, the first adjective that comes to mind is ‘cinematic’, whether it is Starboy being the perfect score to a sci-fi heist film or his debut album Trilogy being layered over a fast-paced action romance. The Weeknd has definitely mastered the sound and art of orchestrated suspense. The artist’s vocal range was notably inspired by the music of his heritage and cultural roots, heavily influenced by his immigrant parents coming to Canada from Ethiopia.

    “My natural singing voice was inspired and shaped by Ethiopian music. The older I got, I was exposed to more music, and my voice became a chameleon going into different characters with each album. By following my own path and breaking industry norms, it seems to be influencing others.”

    On the eve of his first mixtape’s tenth anniversary, tmrw has joined forces with the Weeknd on a limited edition zine. Here he opens up to us about how it feels to be a meteoric star, what it means to be creative during a pandemic, and pulls back the curtain on the origin of his distinctive, honey-sweet vocal style. Featuring 100+ pages of interview, images, quotes and more on premium paper, this is not to be missed so get a copy for yourself here now and have a sneak preview below…

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    UPDATE: Tributes Paid to Agitu Gudeta: The Ethiopian Farm Owner Killed in Italy

    Agitu Ideo Gudeta, who was killed on Wednesday, used abandoned land to start a goat farming project employing migrants and refugees in Italy. She started with just 15 goats, increasing the herd to 180 in just a few years. She produced organic milk and cheese using environmentally friendly methods. Agitu was attacked and killed, allegedly by a former employee, on her farm in Trentino. (Photo: Reuters)

    The Guardian

    Tributes paid to Ethiopian refugee farmer who championed integration in Italy

    Tributes have been paid to a 42-year-old Ethiopian refugee and farmer who became a symbol of integration in Italy, her adopted home.

    Agitu Ideo Gudeta was attacked and killed, allegedly by a former employee, on her farm in Trentino on Wednesday.

    Gudeta had left Addis Ababa in 2010 after angering the authorities by taking part in protests against “land grabbing”. Once in Italy, she tenaciously followed and realised her ambition to move to the mountains and start her own farm. Taking advantage of permits that give farmers access to abandoned public land in depopulated areas, she reclaimed 11 hectares (27 acres) around an old barn in the Mòcheni valley, where she founded her La Capra Felice (The Happy Goat) enterprise.

    Gudeta started with a herd of 15 goats, quickly rising to 180 in a few years, producing organic milk and cheese using environmentally friendly methods and hiring migrants and refugees.

    “I created my space and made myself known, there was no resistance to me,” she told Reuters news agency that year.

    “Agitu brought to Italy the dream she was unable to realise in Ethiopia, in part because of land grabbing,” Gabriella Ghermandi, singer, performer, novelist and friend of Gudeta, told the Guardian. “Her farm was successful because she applied what she had learned from her grandparents in the countryside.

    “In Italy, many people have described her enterprise as a model of integration. But Agitu’s dream was to create an environmentally sustainable farm that was more than just a business; for her it also symbolised struggle against class divisions and the conviction that living in harmony with nature was possible. And above all she carried out her work with love. She had given a name to each one of her goats.”

    In a climate where hostility toward migrants was increasing, led by far-right political leaders, her success story was reported by numerous media outlets as an example of how integration can benefit communities.

    “The most rewarding satisfaction is when people tell me how much they love my cheeses because they’re good and taste different,” she said in an interview with Internazionale in 2017. “It compensates for all the hard work and the prejudices I’ve had to overcome as a woman and an immigrant.”

    Two years ago she received death threats and was the target of racist attacks, which she reported to police, recounting them on her social media posts.

    But police said a man who has confessed to the rape and murder of the farmer was an ex-employee who, they said, allegedly acted for “economic reasons”.

    The UN refugee agency said it was “pained” by Gudeta’s death, and that her entrepreneurial spirit “demonstrated how refugees can contribute to the societies that host them”.

    “Despite her tragic end, the UNHCR hopes that Agitu Ideo Gudeta will be remembered and celebrated as a model of success and integration and inspire refugees that struggle to rebuild their lives,” the agency said.

    “We spoke on the phone last week’’, said Ghermandi. “We spent two hours speaking about Ethiopia. We had plans to get together in the spring. Agitu considered Italy her home. She used to say that she had suffered too much in Ethiopia. Now Agitu is gone, but her work mustn’t die. We will soon begin a fundraising campaign to follow her plan for expanding the business so that her dream will live on.”

    Gudeta would have turned 43 on New Year’s Day.

    The Tragedy of Agitu Gudeta: An Ethiopian Immigrant Killed on Her Farm in Italy


    Agitu Ideo Gudeta, 42, an Ethiopian migrant who became a symbol of integration in Italy, her adopted home, has been killed on her farm where she raised goats for her cheese business, police said on Wednesday. Agitu had made her home in the mountains of Trentino’s Valle dei Mocheni, making goat’s cheese and beauty products in her farm (The Happy Goat), which was built on previously abandoned land. (Reuters)

    Reuters

    Ethiopian migrant who became symbol of integration in Italy killed on her goat farm

    ROME (Reuters) – An Ethiopian migrant who became a symbol of integration in Italy, her adopted home, has been killed on her farm where she raised goats for her cheese business, police said on Wednesday.

    A Ghanaian employee on her farm in the northern Italian region of Trentino has admitted to killing Agitu Ideo Gudeta, 42, with a hammer and raping her, Italian news agency Ansa reported. The report could not immediately be confirmed.

    Gudeta had made her home in the mountains of Trentino’s Valle dei Mocheni, making goat’s cheese and beauty products in her farm La Capra Felice (The Happy Goat), which was built on previously abandoned land.

    Her story was reported by numerous international media, including Reuters , as an example of a migrant success story in Italy at a time of rising hostility towards immigrants, fueled by the right-wing League party.

    Gudeta escaped from Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, in 2010 after her participation in protests against ‘land-grabbing’ angered local authorities. Activists accused the authorities of setting aside large swathes of farmland for foreign investors.

    On reaching Italy she was able to use common land in the northern mountains to build her new enterprise, taking advantage of permits that give farmers access to public land to prevent local territory from being reclaimed by wild nature.

    Starting off with 15 goats, she had 180 by 2018 when she became a well-known figure.

    “I created my space and made myself known, there was no resistance to me,” she told Reuters in a story that year.

    Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

    The Tragedy of Agitu Gudeta: An Ethiopian Immigrant Killed on Her Farm in Italy

    Agitu Ideo Gudeta, 42, an Ethiopian migrant who became a symbol of integration in Italy, her adopted home, has been killed on her farm where she raised goats for her cheese business, police said on Wednesday. Agitu had made her home in the mountains of Trentino’s Valle dei Mocheni, making goat’s cheese and beauty products in her farm (The Happy Goat), which was built on previously abandoned land. (Reuters)

    Reuters

    Ethiopian migrant who became symbol of integration in Italy killed on her goat farm

    ROME (Reuters) – An Ethiopian migrant who became a symbol of integration in Italy, her adopted home, has been killed on her farm where she raised goats for her cheese business, police said on Wednesday.

    A Ghanaian employee on her farm in the northern Italian region of Trentino has admitted to killing Agitu Ideo Gudeta, 42, with a hammer and raping her, Italian news agency Ansa reported. The report could not immediately be confirmed.

    Gudeta had made her home in the mountains of Trentino’s Valle dei Mocheni, making goat’s cheese and beauty products in her farm La Capra Felice (The Happy Goat), which was built on previously abandoned land.

    Her story was reported by numerous international media, including Reuters , as an example of a migrant success story in Italy at a time of rising hostility towards immigrants, fueled by the right-wing League party.

    Gudeta escaped from Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, in 2010 after her participation in protests against ‘land-grabbing’ angered local authorities. Activists accused the authorities of setting aside large swathes of farmland for foreign investors.

    On reaching Italy she was able to use common land in the northern mountains to build her new enterprise, taking advantage of permits that give farmers access to public land to prevent local territory from being reclaimed by wild nature.

    Starting off with 15 goats, she had 180 by 2018 when she became a well-known figure.

    “I created my space and made myself known, there was no resistance to me,” she told Reuters in a story that year.

    Join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook.

    SPOTLIGHT: D.C. Honors Ethiopian Community With ‘Little Ethiopia’ Resolution

    The ceremonial resolution, which was sponsored by Council member Brandon T. Todd and unanimously approved by the D.C. Council this month, recognizes "the Ethiopian community’s heritage and culture, outstanding leadership and contributions to the District of Columbia’s economy and the 9th and U Street business corridor located in the Shaw neighborhood, and its partnership with the African American community in the fight for social justice and civil rights." (Photo: Facebook)

    Tadias Magazine

    By Tadias Staff

    Updated: December 24th, 2020

    New York (TADIAS) – The D.C. Council has approved a ‘Little Ethiopia’ ceremonial resolution to honor the business and cultural contributions of the Ethiopian community in the U.S. capital.

    The resolution, which was sponsored by Council member Brandon T. Todd and unanimously approved by the D.C. Council this month, recognizes “the Ethiopian community’s heritage and culture, outstanding leadership and contributions to the District of Columbia’s economy and the 9th and U Street business corridor located in the Shaw neighborhood, and its partnership with the African American community in the fight for social justice and civil rights.”

    The resolution notes that “more than 300,000 Ethiopian descendants reside in the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan area, one of the largest populations of Ethiopians in the United States. The region has a multitude of Ethiopian business owners, doctors, professors, entrepreneurs, community leaders, artists, and families.”

    In addition the ceremonial resolution points out that “Ethiopian immigrants initially settled in Adams Morgan, then along 9th Street NW in the historical African American Shaw neighborhood, where the 9th Street corridor between 9th and 11th Streets NW is fondly known as “Little Ethiopia.”

    The resolution adds:

    During the 1990’s, Ethiopian business owners selected the Shaw community as a central location and hub to establish new businesses that led to a vibrant flourishing business enclave that was largely responsible for revitalizing the community following the riots in the mid 1960’s, and returned it to a thriving corridor established by African American business owners prior to the riots;

    Ethiopian entrepreneurs have made significant contributions to the business community and have been outstanding leaders in Washington, D.C. and surrounding areas particularly retail strips where their strategy to establish a concentrated group of businesses has contributed to sustainability, and attracted members of both the Ethiopian community and local residents, ultimately enriching the cultural fabric of our international city and tax revenue.

    The full resolution is posted below.

    A CEREMONIAL RESOLUTION
    ____________

    COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
    ______________

    District of Columbia’s Ethiopian Business and Cultural Community ‘Little Ethiopia’ Ceremonial Recognition Resolution of 2020

    To recognize the Ethiopian community’s heritage and culture, outstanding leadership and contributions to the District of Columbia’s economy and the 9th and U Street business corridor located in the Shaw neighborhood, and its partnership with the African America community in the fight for social justice and civil rights.

    WHEREAS, Ethiopia is an independent African country that has never been colonized and stands as a symbol for all African peoples in their struggle for freedom, dignity and respect;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopia defended itself from Italian invasion on March 1, 1896 at the Battle of ADWA. The Ethiopia’s landmark victory unified the country and marked the first defeat of a European power by an African Country;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopia is widely recognized as a pioneering nation in the decades long struggle against colonialism and an inspiration to people across the Diaspora, and other nations around the world;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopia’s root can be traced to the origins of civilization and is home to the remains of the first human ancestors found in the bones of Ardi dating back to 4.2 million years ago, and Lucy dating back to 3.5 million years ago;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopia is also home to the great Axumite Kingdom that rivals Rome, Persia, and China;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopia is the birthplace of Queen of Sheba and the enduring Solomonic dynasty;

    WHEREAS, there are nine United Nations World Cultural sites in Ethiopia including the eleven 13th century cave churches in Lalibela “New Jerusalem”, and the 16 41 th Century fortress42 city of Fasilades surround by a 900-meter long wall;

    WHEREAS, on December 27, 1903 Ethiopia’s Emperor Menelik II and President Theodore Roosevelt established diplomatic relations with the signing of a Treaty of Amity and Commerce;

    WHEREAS, the Ethiopian community has a long relationship with the African American community anchored by the historical spiritual struggle for liberation reflected in the Abyssinian Christian Churches;

    WHEREAS, a significant milestone in the longstanding relationship with the Ethiopian and African American communities took place in 1808 when Ethiopian seamen and African American parishioners left the First Baptist Church of New York, and founded the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, New York in protest of segregated seating arrangements;

    WHEREAS, the Abyssinian Baptist Church was inspired by the ancient name of Ethiopia, Abyssinia;

    WHEREAS, the relationship was enhanced through an education exchange that encompassed the training of pilots, teachers, and medical personnel at Howard University; and a cultural exchange of musical and artistic performances that together deepened the ties that connect Ethiopia with the United States;

    WHEREAS, the first African Studies Department in the United States was started at Howard University by Dr. William Leo Hansberry, who with the first Ethiopian medical school graduate Dr. Melaku Beyan, founded the famed Ethiopian Research Council. The department was founded for the unique purpose of disseminating information on the history, culture, civilization, and diplomatic relations of Ethiopia in ancient and modern times;

    WHEREAS, the first African American Rhodes Scholar and Howard Professor Dr. Alain Locke encouraged his students to recognize and incorporate their African Heritage in their work;

    WHEREAS, the great African American poet and District resident Paul Laurence Dunbar in “Ode to Ethiopia” promotes African Americans to look to Ethiopia for pride;

    WHEREAS, District native and jazz musician extraordinaire Duke Ellington traveled and performed in Ethiopia and received Ethiopia’s Medal of Honor in 1973, Ethiopia’s highest prize from Emperor Haile Selassie I;

    WHEREAS, it was Dr. Alain Locke and others at Howard that provided the intellectual inspiration for the Harlem Renaissance and U Street’s portrayal as Black Broadway;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopia inspired Pan African movements that gave hope to those seeking justice in the eyes of God and the world;

    WHEREAS, writers, artists, and activists such as W.E.B. Dubois, Frederick Douglas, Martin Delaney, Langston Hughes, Joseph Harris, Marcus Garvey and Edward Blyden built on these traditions culminating in the US Civil Rights Movement and African Independence Movements;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopians first began migrating to the United States in the 1970’s because of political persecution by the military junta that overthrew Emperor Haile Selassie I;

    WHEREAS, more than 300,000 Ethiopian descendants reside in the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan area, one of the largest populations of Ethiopians in the United States. The region has a multitude of Ethiopian business owners, doctors, professors, entrepreneurs, community leaders, artists, and families;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopian immigrants initially settled in Adams Morgan, then along 9th Street NW in the historical African American Shaw neighborhood, where the 9th Street corridor between 9th and 11 102 th Streets NW is fondly known as “Little Ethiopia”;

    WHEREAS, during the 1990’s, Ethiopian business owners selected the Shaw community as a central location and hub to establish new businesses that led to a vibrant flourishing business enclave that was largely responsible for revitalizing the community following the riots in the mid 1960’s, and returned it to a thriving corridor established by African American business owners prior to the riots;

    WHEREAS, Ethiopian entrepreneurs have made significant contributions to the business community and have been outstanding leaders in Washington, D.C. and surrounding areas particularly retail strips where their strategy to establish a concentrated group of businesses has contributed to sustainability, and attracted members of both the Ethiopian community and local residents, ultimately enriching the cultural fabric of our international city and tax revenue;

    WHEREAS, in 2019 the District of Columbia under Mayor Muriel Bowser’s leadership, renewed its Sister City Agreement between Addis Ababa and Washington, D.C. to create lasting partnerships and cooperation on economic development, public health, culture, tourism and education;

    WHEREAS, the Sister City agreement confirms that the two cities will promote collaboration, information exchange, and joint ventures, with a special focus on the growth and development of business investment, trade and tourism and public-private partnerships;

    WHEREAS, the Sister City agreement shares best practices in the areas of government operations including public works, transportation, technology, infrastructure and housing; health polices to strengthen the capacity and effectiveness of prevention and treatment programs; sustainable environment, including energy conservation and the green economy; and promote the development of programs in the areas of culture, arts and education;

    WHEREAS, the 2019 Sister City Agreement was the culmination of first-hand efforts by a delegation to Addis Ababa of Washington, D.C. leaders, under the auspices, direction, and stewardship of Henok Tesfaye, a prominent and long-standing Washington, D.C. entrepreneur, civic leader, and humanitarian;

    WHEREAS, during the mission, the Mayor of Addis Ababa, Takele Uma Banti, unveiled a newly-named street, “Mayor Muriel Bowser Street,” and announced the renaming of Gazebo Roundabout to “Washington, D.C. Square”, an historic honor, as part of the signing ceremony for the renewal of the Sister City agreement between the District and Addis Ababa;

    WHEREAS, Mayor Muriel Bowser proclaimed July 28, 2018 as “Ethiopia Day in DC” in honor of the visit of Ethiopian Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed Ali to Washington, D.C.;

    WHEREAS, the Ethiopian communities’ contributions to arts, culture, and education in the District encompass four annual events to commemorate the fight for freedom by the resilient and the patriotic people of Ethiopia against Italian invasion and the annual holiday celebration;

    WHEREAS, the four annual events include the victory of Adwa on March 1, 1896, the Addis Ababa Massacre and Yekatit 12 on February 19, 1937; the liberation of Addis Ababa and Miazia 27 on May 5,1941; and Kwanzaa and Early celebration of Genna on December 26, 2004;

    WHEREAS, the Ethiopian community also commemorates Adwa and Miazia by placing a wreath with the colors of the Ethiopian flag in front of the African American Civil War Memorial in March and May of each year;

    WHEREAS, June 4, 2015 Mayor Muriel Bowser declared “Ethiopian International Food Day “where 47,000 students in over 100 schools were served Ethiopian food for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The event was held at Walker Jones Education Campus;

    WHEREAS, the program was planned by DC Mayor Bowser’s Office of the Secretary, Executive Office of the Mayor in collaboration with District of Columbia Public Schools, the Little Ethiopia DC organization, and an advisory group of ten Ethiopian chefs and restaurateurs guided food preparations for the event including the prominent Ethiopian Chef “Etete” Tiwaltengus Sheenegelgn; and

    WHEREAS, the Ethiopian community continues to make exceptional contributions to the District of Columbia.

    RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, that this resolution may be cited as the “District of Columbia’s Ethiopian Business and Cultural Community ‘Little Ethiopia’ Ceremonial Recognition Resolution of 2020”.

    Sec. 2. The Council of the District of Columbia recognizes the long history between the United States and Ethiopia, and congratulates the Ethiopian community for over seventy years of collaborative work in the areas of economic development, entrepreneurship, arts, culture, education, and government collaboration in the District of Columbia.

    Sec. 3. This resolution shall take effect immediately upon the first date of publication in the District of Columbia Register.

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    SPOTLIGHT: Eden Amare, Ethiopian-Israeli Rhodes Scholar Bound for Oxford

    Eden Amare Yitbarek, one of two Israeli winners of the prestigious 2021 Rhodes Scholarship to study at Oxford University. (Courtesy Eden Amare Yitbarek)

    The Times of Israel

    Eden Amare: Ethiopian-Israeli one of 2 Rhodes scholars bound for Oxford University

    Eden Amare Yitbarek, 23, studied at Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya as part of special program sponsoring Ethiopian-Israeli youngsters with leadership potential for BA degrees

    An Israeli of Ethiopian background is one of two Israeli students — and the first from her community — to win a prestigious Rhodes scholarship to the University of Oxford this year.

    The Rhodes Scholarship is an international postgraduate award established in 1903 with the fortune of British businessman Cecil Rhodes. Among its most famous recipients are Bill Clinton, Cory Booker, Kris Kristofferson, Dean Rusk and Edwin Hubble.

    Eden Amare Yitbarek served in the IDF as a truck and emergency vehicle driver before enrolling at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, within the framework of Israel at Heart — an IDC program that gives Ethiopian-Israeli youngsters with high leadership potential the chance to earn an undergraduate degree at the institution. Eden studied Government, Diplomacy and Strategy.

    The 23-year-old from the southern Red Sea city of Eilat received two Dean’s List awards for outstanding students and worked as a research assistant in the American Public Opinion toward Israel (APOI) lab at the IDC’s Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy, which studies the relationship between the US and Israel. In her final year at IDC, she was accepted to the Argov Fellows Program in Leadership and Diplomacy, which aims to prepare around 20 exceptional IDC students in their final year of BA studies for future leadership positions in Israel and in the Jewish world.

    Eden, who wants to study international development at Oxford, has volunteered as a teacher and mentor for refugee and migrant children in Tel Aviv.

    She is currently working in Tel Aviv for Eagle Point Funding, an international consulting firm that helps to match US federal support with American high-tech start-ups and companies seeking support for R&D and business development.

    Much of the Ethiopian Israeli community has had a hard time integrating into Israeli society, suffering from poverty, educational gaps and racism. Furthermore, many families have been split between those who managed to immigrate to Israel and those still waiting to do so in Gondar and Addis Ababa.

    Out of 100 Rhodes scholarships given annually worldwide, two are given to outstanding Israelis.

    The other Israeli Rhodes Scholar for next year is Eli Zuzovsky, 25, from Tel Aviv, who studies English and filmmaking at Harvard with a secondary field in theater.

    The Rhodes Trust pays all college and university fees, provides a stipend to cover necessary expenses while in residence in Oxford as well as during vacations, and takes care of transportation to and from England. The total value of the scholarship averages approximately $70,000 per year, and up to as much as approximately $250,000 for scholars who remain at Oxford for four years in certain departments.

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