Typical Ethiopian food: injera (a pancake made from teff flour) with a selection of wots (stews)

I’ve written before about the Ethiopian calendar versus our calendar (the Gregorian calendar) e.g. today is 21^st August 2006 in our calendar (GC) but it’s 13^th Neuhase 1998 EC (Ethiopian Calendar). An added complication is that Ethiopia uses “Ethiopian time” (also used elsewhere in Africa and known as “African time”) which simply means that 6am (our time) is 12.00 (Ethiopian time), 2pm (our time) is 8.00 (Ethiopian time), etc. It took us a while to get used to but there is a pragmatic logic to it. Since it is daylight for approx 12 hours, the day starts at 12.00 (6am our time) and ends at 12.00 (6pm our time) with midday at 6.00. After some initial confusion and missed appointments we now work in Ethiopian time, and have learned the hard way to always check, when making arrangements, if we are all talking in “Ferenji” time or “Habisha” time. So, right now it’s 3.30 in the evening of 13 Neuhase 1998!