Melkam Addis Amet!

Endemen kermachuhal? Our wonderful and beloved New Year has dragged me out of the shell i’ve been in the past couple of weeks (or has it a been wee bit more?) Living in my head most hours of my day is what makes me crave sharing my thoughts with you. But surprisingly these past couple of weeks i’ve done the stepping out of the head and into the world thing more often. “Cogito ergo sum” Descartes had once said, but i’ve somehow managed to distance myself from this thinking, i am now not because i think, i am because i feel, because i live in the moment, because i feel the sun on my skin, the anger in my veins, the music in my soul, the swagger in my groove. As Eckhart Tolle redefined it, i feel therefore i am.

The positive attitude a New Year manages to bring out in the most cynic of a man/woman never ceases to amaze me. The smoker will throw out his cigarettes for the hundredth time in the hopes of beating his addiction. The chubby girl will sign a new contract at the gym in the hopes of becoming fit and fabulous ( Oh how many times have i been down that road). The student will aim for that A that will surely be achieved this year (books bought, syllabus read, mind ready). It matters little, really, weather these goals are achieved. It is the hope, the joy, the excitement of a second chance, or a third, or a forth. It’s very similar to spending your last 5 bucks on a lottery. Weather you realize it or not, your subconscious knows your chances of hitting the jackpot are slim to none, but you do it anyways – for the hope, for the possibility of what could be, for what you can be. The beauty of a New Year, though, lays within the fact that the possibility of achievement is much higher than winner a lottery. You can almost taste it – it’s right there in front of you, the world is bright again!

For most of us away from home, the Addis Amet might be bitter sweet. A New Year without Doro wet and defo dabo, without abebayehosh and adey abeba, without meto haya program and the oh so fabulous ladies, with birr plastered on their foreheads, hitting the eskesta like it ain’t never been hit before, hardly sounds like a new year worth celebrating. But we sure will make it. Some of us will get down to the hip version of abebayehosh by Teddy Afro at the habesha concerts and parties that will surely take place in every “habesha city.” Some will attempt to create their Ethiopia homes in their apartments spending half the time maragebign the buna chis away from the smoke detector, and some will spend it in the virtual world sending out their wishes for all the world to see that it’s their new year, their day.

Whichever way you choose to spend it, here is a cheers from my tiny corner of the world. I raise my glass to having survived the passing year. I raise my glass to endless possibilities, to bright futures, to unflinching dreams. I raise my glass to love, passion and compassion. I raise my glass to living each moment to the fullest, to embrace simple pleasures and to many days of laughter. I raise my glass to you.

Melkam Addis Amet!