Sunday, Sunday, Sunday

This is one of my favourite beaches in the valley, Bennet's Bay. I absolutely love it.

Dave Fitch takes a swing

This is a photo of our family friend Dave taking a swing at a crab apple with a hurley club... or is it a hurley bat?

Friday - More Sunrises

This is my favourite part of the beach, again during the sunrise. I think it's the best part of the morning.

Beautiful Cat

This is my cat April, I've had her since she was a kitten. She's currently about 11, but doing really well.

Wednesday the 25th - Sunrise

Isn't this brilliant? I love sunrises much more than sunsets.
Sunsets are overrated.

24th Swing

This is the swing out back at Medford, it's been there for what seems like forever, but it used to be in Canning. It's a bit decrepit now, but still makes for an interesting photo subject.

I miss Ethiopia already

I bought these beautiful wool animals in Addis. I miss being there already, nothing would be better for me than a nice plate of kitfo.

Early Morning

Jet lagged me got up at five and took a walk on the beach as the sun was rising. I snapped this one with my Canon Rebel, and I think it turned out quite lovely.

Home Again

So happy to be back again. This one is of a farm on Medford Beach, one of my favourite places in the whole world. You can see the North Mountain in the background.

Amsterdam

I got to stop into Amsterdam on the way home from Jimma. The city was pretty cool, and the best part was certainly the bikes. This is a bike rack in Central Station. If I lived here, there would be no chance that I would ever drive a car.

Amis

Mary and Gary have a cook who comes in, she came along with their home. Her name is Amis and she was so lovely. I took this photo of her, and I hope that I can print it off and send it back with another Canadian returning soon. She is just so lovely, and talk about amazing cooking! She taught Dave and I to make chapatis.

Wednesday

On Wednesday Dave and I travelled from Jimma to Addis Ababa. We were staying with Mary Breen and Gary Wallace, two friends we met through NSAC staff. They live near the Canadian Embassy, and their garden was so beautiful, we had such a perfect stay there that I felt I needed to get a picture when we arrived the first afternoon. Here she is.

Silvery Cheeked Hornbill

Goodmorning Mr. Silvery Cheeked Hornbill. I'm going to miss the horrible noises you make all day and all early morning.

Hyenas

A VLIR driver took Dave, Adriaan, Matthias, Jochen and I off to see a few hyenas. We've been hearing them laugh all summer but this was our first encounter, I would think we saw about forty but it's not uncommon to see over a hundred in this area. A wonderful experience.

Sunday Skink

This is a baby skink I found on campus who crawled onto my hand when I put it down. When he got to my hand he pretended to be dead by just laying there. It was pretty cool

Saturday Cicada

This is a cicada I found on campus, up close and personal. I love these guys so much.

Heavy Rains

The rains have been coming hard in the mornings. This is some rain caught on an orange flower just on the way to the place I drink coffee in the mornings here.

Canadian Geography

I took a walk around the Merkato yesterday for several hours. I found this book of Canadian Geography in a orothodox christian store. It's very funny, I gave it to my friend Jochen because he is a geography MSc student. Some notable inclusions include; Canning, Springhill, Alliston, PE, Murray River, Bible Hill, Tabusintac, NB.

Flame of the Forest

This is one of my favourite trees here. It is called flame of the forest, for it's red flowers on top of the tree. This one was out and looked positively perfect. So I took this photo. I wish they grew in Canada.

Climbing

These are a few friends who are doing their MSc. Matthias is doing his MSc on apiphyte orchids. So he climbs trees looking for them, this is a little bit of a safer way to do it than the day before.

This makes a lumberjack look like a little girl

There is a tree on campus that is infected with some sort of fungus presumably. The bottom is all bulged out. It needs to come down. So men have started climbing up with about a 5 m ladder. The tree is about 30 m high. So after the ladder ended this man climbed up barefoot, an axe tucked into his pants. He then chops off these giant dead branches, both hands on the axe. Back leaned against the trunk, and feet on the limb he is cutting. It's a pretty daring feat.

Beautiful Pink Leaf

This is a leaf, that looks like a flower. I assure you it is a leaf, and oh what a beautiful leaf it is. Getting really excited to go to the dentist.

Trois Cent Soixante Cinq

Saturday,
This is delicious avocado juice. I was trying to demonstrate how thick it is, by making little bumps with the straw. It's so delicious. This is definatly one of the things I will miss most taste wise. Went to Lake Boya again today, simply beautiful. Though my camera went with a friend to Abbar Jaffer palace.

Giant Grass Hopper

I tried to get a coin next to this one for size comparison, but he flew off right away. Anyway, this guy was at least 10 cm long.

Creepy Spider

This is the spider that lives near my room. It looks poisonous, and scary. I don't like to get too close to it just in case.

Thank you CH3COOH

You make it possible for me to eat greens occasionally by not making me very sick.

Ant Pile

This is a photo of tens of thousands of ants. They are eating a mouse alive. We could hear it squeaking. It was like National Geographic. These little guys pack quite the bite.

Cloud Burst

This is a break in the clouds over campus. Quite beautiful.

Giant Larvae + Camera Glitch

Out for coffee today, we found a giant larvae of some sort of moth or beetle presumably. (I personally have the feeling it's of a giant dung beetle). I took a picture of it next to my keychain, but my camera glitched. I didn't look at the photo until the larvae was gone.

Hippo hunt

Dave, Jochen and I walked about 10 kilometers today looking for hippos in a place where hippos hadn't been spotted in 15 years. We didn't see any hippos, but saw lots of amazing birds including; black crowned crane, blue winged goose, pied kingfisher and abyssian roller. Super wonderful birds especially the black crowned crane. We were caught in a downpour, and some locals invited us into their home for chai to wait for the storm to pass. Anyway, I posted some pictures of the trip on my Ethiopian task assignment blog you can check out by clicking here. If anyone can identify the flower, it's unflorescense is like mullein we have in Canada, but it has a leaf similar to that of a pea, maybe it's a legume? Nothing here eats it either, in grasslands completely grazed bare, it's still around growing tall and strong.

Night Bajaj

This was one I snapped coming back on Thursday night, the toad should be Friday and this one is Thursday. I was reading ahead of my notes. Anyway, this is a bajaj night scene.

Toads

I still love these little guys. This one jumped from the position on to my face shortly after I took this photo.

Pentaradial Symmetry

This is a neat flower found often along side of the road. It looks like the flower "Colombian Devils Breath" which renders you unconscious if you smell it. However, the leaves look different. Dave and I haven't ventured to smell it yet, just in case.

Late afternoon light

I took this one on a walk down the hill last Tuesday, sometimes the light here is just perfect, perfect, perfect. This was one of these times.

Monday - Insects mating everywhere

These are two beetles I found outside on a palm. Pretty beautiful if I do say so myself.