Timkat Press Pass

 

Today is Timkat, which is an Ethiopian holiday that you can read more about it by clicking on the link, TimkatWikipedia. I wrote about it last year on the blog and again, we are in Addis Ababa for the big celebration.

There are workers starting the parade by rolling out a red carpet and running the rolled up carpets from the back. The women swept before the people came.

Waiting on the street...

This little girl was serious about her drum...

Can you find the three boys seriously into their dancing?  :)

And then Little J and I were called into the crowd to ask if we could do a short interview. We were taken directly in front of the main tent where the ark of the covenant replicas were held.

We had earlier noticed news cameras but now were in front of them.

He called back to Jon and Little A who joined us for our little interview. 

After the interview, they invited us into the heart of the action to take pictures. Jon made the wise decision to take the girls to the perimeter and I pretended like I was a news photographer, only with no idea what to actually photograph. The priests would point me in different directions. “Here, move this way, you can really see!”  

It was so great to be able to mingle among the priests with their amazing umbrellas and see up close what was happening.

Watching

Dancing processional

These three men held the tabots on their head.

Two priests

The man on the far right is swinging an incense burner.

I finally wiggled my way out of the main circle as I felt a bit out of place, but as we so often experience in this hospitable culture, people were so sharing and glad to teach foreigners a bit more about their cultural celebration.

Today the music is still pounding outside as there is a holiday associated with Timkat and all the St. Michael churches, I think one day of parades was good for us. :)