The village of Belessa was brought to the attention of Pathways through the story of then 10-year-old Zemene Tiget, who received life-saving surgery from Dr. Rick Hodes. Zemene’s precocious nature, passion for life in the face of overwhelming adversity, and the desire to give back to her community through the dream of a “real school” for her village resonated deeply with Pathways and the JDC, making it a perfect collaborative project.
In January 2020, the school was dedicated with Pathways donors making the journey to be there as well as bringing supplies for the school. Currently 325 children, in grades 1-4, are able to get an education at this new school. The villagers were eager to express their gratitude for the school including giving Grace Strangis, Pathways Executive Director, a prized goat. The pictures are from that dedication day.
Villagers also expressed the need to add an addition onto the school for grades 5-6. To continue their education, children must walk approximately 5 miles through very dangerous conditions. Girls are especially vulnerable. Please consider making a donation to Pathways to fund an addition on the school for grades 5-6.
Dedication of Belessa School
by Shelly Gill Murray
My phone alarm sounded at 6 am, but I was already awake listening to the call to prayer at the mosque close to my bungalow. Stepping onto the cold concrete floor, I wiggled my toes into my paper hotel slippers, then fumbled in the dark to the bathroom. Relieved that the hot water tank light is illuminated, I turned on the shower. Grabbing my towel, I shook off a large black bug, hoping it was far enough away to avoid crunching it under my feet. The hot water washed away some sleep, but I was desperate for a cup of coffee yet too lazy to run up to the restaurant before breakfast.
After toweling off, I put on my dust-coated but least dirty pants, a blouse and sturdy shoes, because crossing over five mountains seems like it would require good shoes, even if we are taking a jeep. Packing my backpack with hand sanitizer, a cap, sweater, windbreaker, gum, mints, Advil, sunglasses, bug-spray, phone charger, charger cord and a wad of Birr, the local currency, day eight begins in Ethiopia.
At 7:20 am, I lock my bungalow door and wonder how they can still be calling people to prayer. Trudging up the gravel path to the restaurant, I gulp down a cup of coffee, pour a second and order some eggs. My two companions chatter loudly at the table, coffee already fueling their conversation.
Our guide sat down to outline the day. At 8 am, two 4-wheel drive jeeps will pick us up—the roads are not made for any other kind of vehicle. Next, we will pick up two police officer escorts who will ride in the cargo section of the jeeps. Then we will find one of the narrow shops lining the bustling streets in downtown Gondor to buy school supplies to take to Belessa, a remote village four hour’s drive away. There we will dedicate a school built in 2017 by Pathways to Children and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC). The school was built to honor one of its young residents, Zemene Tiget, whose endearing story represents the thousands of Ethiopian children who have deadly spinal deformities related to, among other things, Tuberculosis.
When we get on the road, a blocked street forces us to retrace our route several times to reach the shops where boxes of paper, pencils and rulers can be had for a price double the cost in the US. We also can’t help buying soccer balls and candy, two treats new to Belessa.
Finally stocked up, we head up over the first mountain and away from the traffic, the smell of wood-fueled cooking fires, and unending poverty.
Within 10 miles, we turned off the pavement onto bumpy loose gravel. Our driver insists on keeping the air flowing with his window down as the dust seems to suction in like a vacuum. We are surrounded by arid farmland where the soil moves at the whim of the wind. Cattle, goats and sheep graze on what is left of roots and dry grass. The tops of trees are flattened by a mattress of straw stored just out of the reach of the desperate herds moving in waves toward anything green. The landscape makes me think we could be in the bottom of the Grand Canyon looking at the layered sediment surrounding us. We cross over a couple more mountains bumping and bouncing along switchbacks and curves challenging the tires not to slide and skitter across uneven surfaces rutted by the last rainy season.
After nearly four hours, our driver announces the village of Belessa is just ahead. It was hard to miss as we came upon 300 children lining the sides of the road chanting and singing to us like we are in a parade.
They are dancing and waving signs that say, “Thank you Grace!” and “Because of school, no underage marriage!” Pulling off into the school yard, the villagers swarm our vehicles. Taking in white skin for the first time, they recoil for a moment, but quickly envelope us into their community.
Still waving signs of gratitude, the children follow as we are invited into one of the new classrooms. The bright yellow walls and freshly painted window frames are barely visible through an over-capacity crowd of village elders and parents, the “school board” I surmise. We introduce ourselves through a translator and thank them for the warm welcome.
The room swelters as a woman squats on the floor preparing a traditional coffee ceremony. Then the school principal invites me to join my hand to hers as we ceremoniously cut loaves of bread with the only utensil available, a spoon.
Suddenly, a large sheep is pulled into the crowded room. It is a gift to us for the generous donation of a school. Before we can think about what one does with a sheep on a jeep, the program moves forward with an offer of coffee and then the unveiling of a framed certificate for one of the school’s benefactors, Grace Strangis, Executive Director of Pathways to Children. Honored to accept it in her stead, we preserve the moment on film.
Christian Orthodox priests line the front row of benches holding their heavy gold crosses in front of their chests and above the table. I wonder if they are warding me off as a strange foreigner or beckoning me in to receive a blessing, accomplished by touching the cross to my forehead and then to my lips. They only set down their crosses for a moment to partake in a piece of the bread we are breaking together. Once the bread is passed around, it multiplies like the loaves and fishes and half a loaf makes it back to the table at the front of the room.
At this point, the elders begin their speeches of gratitude and requests for an expansion on the school. They want more classrooms so that girls won’t have to go to school in the next village, where they are likely to be assaulted or taken for marriage. They also need latrines to help with hygiene. I listen attentively, feeling awkward and humbled all at the same time.
By the time the elders finish, the room is 95 degrees. I take a sip of thick flavorful coffee, steaming like the humidity surrounding me. Through the interpreter, I ask the elders to prioritize their list so I can take their request back to their benefactor for consideration. Then we shake hands in the American tradition and bow in the Ethiopian tradition.
Suddenly from outside, I hear our driver yell, “Pack it up!” I thank the villagers again and push my way through the people-clogged doorway and move toward the jeep. As I step away into the blinding sunshine, a woman quietly approaches me from behind and pushes into my hand a small plastic bag containing three hard boiled eggs. As I turned to thank her, she shyly lowered her eyes and quickly toddled away with a baby tied to her back.
At the jeep, I wonder if my eyes are full of dust or if the sheep, still alive, is actually tied to the top. It is.
We piled back into our seats and wave through the open windows as the children chase us down the road, a cloud of dust following us like an open parachute. I ask our driver if we are stopping down the road a bit to free the sheep, so we don’t appear ungrateful for the gift. “Nope, we will stop for a picnic lunch, but I plan to feast on mutton tomorrow,” he replies to my incredulous face. We stop for lunch under one of the few trees at the side of the road and we eat cheese sandwiches and “crisps.” The guide offers me a hard-boiled egg. “No thanks, I have my own,” I reply with a smile, still thinking of the shy woman’s gift in my pocket.
Around 6 pm, we finally turned back onto the pavement just outside Gondor and it felt like stepping off a boat navigating rough seas. Back at the hotel, the driver took the sheep down off the roof and let it graze on the grassy lawn. It probably thought it went to heaven. I felt uneasy that it was putting one foot in the grave.
I turned the key in my bungalow door and checked to see if the water heater light was still on in the shower. When the hot steam hit me for a second time that day, I wasn’t sure if it was still 6 am and I’d been dreaming or if the day really happened. Then, instead of the call to prayer, I heard the unmistakable bleat of a sheep.