Today I'm flying home, and I've thought over Kuwait's problem.

Kuwait has been having a dispute over borders with Iraq for a long time. Iraquis occupied Kuwait in 1990, and Saddam Hussein declared that Iraq inherited Kuwait from the "ottomans" and that Kuwait and Iraq have never had a border between them. These are lies, and what Kuwait can do is build a wall, or ally with another country so that they aren't all alone and they can't get beaten up by Iraq.

And today I flew home. That was that. And now I've been around the world and back in three weeks, with a few minor delays (so now it's almost four). Now I'm going to develop my photos and go to sleep. I'm tired.

Yay, after being here for a few days, I found something really interesting to do. WATER PARK!

Even with some of the women wearing full dress clothes and men wearing turbans and headdresses, everybody gets into and goes to aqua park! Still in Kuwait city, it's full of fun water rides, a lazy river, go carts, paintball, and live entertainment. Paintball was a lot of fun, along with racing eople on the go cart track.

For dinner I reserved seats in an amazing resturaunt. See, there are three towers in Kuwait, one with tow speres on it, one with one sphere, and one without any. The one with two spheres has .5 million gallons of water in the bottom one, and the top one is a revolving restutaunt. The view was amazing, and the food was excellent. I tried the fish and had ground fish mixed with spices and red curry paste deep-fried and served with a sweet & sour sauce. I needed a LOT of water after that!

The one thing about the view from up there was the fact that there were just a few grassy spots, and those were by things like the towers. Kuwait is just all desert.

Until Tomorrow,
Andy

Today, I used a Taxi to get to the Port, and then took a ferry to go to Failaka Island. There, I went to see the Island's Greek Temple and Archaological Sites. We actually took a ferry, but we saw that traditional smaller boats, boums and sambuks, were still being made. The Greek Temple has history of Greeks Passing through Failaka Island and leaving an Icarus stone, which is what they wrote their myths and fables on. The tour guide said something about a war between a bunch of Arabs, and a two century long empire neary, but the words were really long and hard to spell, and I was too busy looking at the temple ruins.

For dinner I walked around the streets and stumbled across a cool looking resturaunt. I had a dish called machboos which was chicken on top of a huge plate full of rice. Delicious.

I know, I said that I was going to go to Isreal. But, with all the moving around going on in Gaza, I decided that I probally wouldn't be too welcome and I picked another country in the Middle East. I was afraid of going to Iraq, and Saudi Arabia didn't seem too interesting. So I went ahead and picked another country out of the hat. Kuwait was a cool name, and I hadn't heard anything much about it being dangerous, so I went ahead and booked a flight.

I left Addis Ababa at 5:00 AM, in western time, not Ethiopian time. We got there kind of late in Kuwait airport. I had fallen asleep the whole ride, so I ran right to the food stands at Kuwait International Airport. At that time I really realized where I was--in between Iraq and Saudi Arabia. It's a good thing that English is widly spoken there, because I could ask for a water. The storekeeper seeing that I was a tourist, gave me a lecture.

Kuwait is only about the size of New Jersey, so it's not huge. But what it does have is oil, which we Americans are greedy for, along with a few other countries. So you take it Kuwait is pretty rich, yes. but their one problem is that they don't have ANY water. Yeah, some of Kuwait is desert, but there is absolutly NO water. So they have to use their money from their resource, and filter water from the ocean.

I got my money changed into "Kuwait Dinars," each one is worth almost $3.50. I got a little bit changed into Iraqi Dinars and Afghan Afghanis, just in case.

I ran right to the taxis so that I could go to the Crowne Plaza in Kuwait (Yay, 5 star hotels!). Yes, even after all that sleep in the plane, I was still tired.

Until tommorow, and the day after that, and the day after that, and th......
Andy

Today I'm in Harar for a short time, and then I'm leaving for Kuwait. It was an 18-hour train ride, with once again, beautiful scenery. But the train was hard to catch, because Ethiopia has 2 clocks and 13 months in their year. Ethiopia is so close to the equator that they have basically constant 12 hour daylight, making each day the same length. Ethiopian time is exactly 6 hours behind western time.

Harar is an extremly holy Muslim city with a huge wall surrounding it, built in the 16th century to keep Christians out. It is considered The Fourth holiest City, beaten only by Jeruselum, Mecca, and Medina.

In the streets of Harar, there were ping pong tables. Right. The locals are really good at playing, too. In the streets, there's some weird plant, chap, or something like that. If you chew the leaves like gum, it's tasty, but if you chew them every day, you'll probably end up becoming addicted, like it's some kind of drug. And, a thing Harar is famous for, the strongest beer in the country. of course, I didn't get to try any, but there were plenty of stands selling it.

For country problems- AIDS and HIV. It's an epidemic all across Africa. 2 Million children have AIDS, and more than 12 million have lost their parents to the dreaded virus. 25.4 million people have HIV. What Ethiopia (and a lot of the rest of Africa) needs is an understanding of how these diseases are transmitted. In other words, they need sexual education. The also could learn about and use protection.

Tonight I'm going back to Addis Ababa and the taking a plane to Kuwait. See you then!

Andy

I took air travel to Addis Ababa yesterday, and of course, it got delayed. A while later, we set off for our destination. It was still blistering hot, but there was air conditioning. Even thugh it was mostly desert, the landscape was absolutly beautiful.

When I finally got there, I checked into a hotel. It was a little bit more, but it was nowhere near prices in America. Plus, it was much more fancy. But when I walked around, I was shocked. No credit cards were allowed, in Ethiopia's huge city! And a navigator's nightmare, there were absolutly no street names. And no matter how long I looked, I couldn't find a map. The place is full of alleyways and nooks and crannys, but they hold treasures. People are selling beautiful wicker baskets, and foods of all kinds. There are beat up taxis that you can't rent for a ride, but for a half a day. A personal cheuffer for $5. I love Ethiopia.

After hiring a cab, I found the natural hot springs. It's an amazing place, and the water is full of natural minerals for you skin. There are massages there, too, and if your a little creeped out by someone massaging you, you don't have to worry. To be a massage therapist here, you have to be blind.

I need to leave soon, so I can get to Harar. Sorry I'm off schedule, I blame the airplane delay.

Tommorow in Harar,
Andy

This time I'm in Lalibela. I got here by bus, but it took a while because I couldn't understand what the bus drivers were saying. It was an 8 hour ride. Once again, the hotels were $5 dollars a night. They have historic horse games dipicting epic battles and just for fun. The team with the spears goes after the team with the shields, etc. Also, in January, Ethiopia has a festival where everyone walks through the streets, some carrying replicas of the Ark of the Covenant and walk towards a church. Then there is a massive baptism. The largest of those festivals is here, in Lalibela.

For food, we have a a giant tortilla-flatbread like thing, with different foods in each section of it. There's spinach and cabage in part of it, and the rest is meat, which is picked from a dead cow. You get to choose the part of the cow you want with your food, raw. If you ask for lamb, you get beef here, so watch out.

A really big attraction here is the blue nile falls. 80% of the water in the nile starts here. Also, what people call the 8th wonder of the world is here. 11 churches that are carved into the ground, into straight stone, with tunnels connecting them. The locals say that they were carved by angels, because the tools were never found.

Until tommorow in Addis Ababa,
Andy