BIG BLUE
Rafting the Abay Wenz: High Adventure in Ethiopia's Blue Nile Gorge
Story and photographs by BRUCE KIRKBY (continued from previous page)


I had arrived in Addis Ababa weeks earlier brimming with enthusiasm. But as each day of preparation passed, more dangers emerged, and I became more anxious. It was the autumn of 1999 and the war between Ethiopia and Eritrea was escalating; although the conflict lay to the north of our proposed route, tensions were high throughout the country. We arranged to make an aerial reconnaissance of parts of the river knowing that the only other civilian flight in Ethiopian airspace that month had been shot down by anti-aircraft fire. Army detachments guarding the Nile's strategic bridges had been instructed to shoot first and ask questions later. Although we had official government permission for the journey, I had little confidence that the "bush telegraph" would convey this message to the men in the field. One of the only men to have rafted major sections of the Blue Nile in recent history doubted we would survive the proposed journey.

The morning after the mule thief's visit, I rose early. The guards were energetically re-enacting their chase to everyone's amusement. We were camped atop a broad ridge dropping from the gorge's roof down towards the deep canyon below. A storm had passed during the night, soaking the valley. The morning sun slowly broke through successive layers of humid mist, revealing endless terraced fields carved out of the gorge's sprawling slopes. Far below rose the call of baboons, sprinting madly across the fields of maize and sorghum, dashing up the trees and noisily joining other groups.

As I quietly sat eating breakfast and watching sunrise wake the land, a young boy caught my eye. Wrapped only in a tattered blanket, with a series of infected cuts marking the back of one leg, he eyed my bowl of porridge. When I held it out toward him he simply stared. I placed the bowl on the open ground between us and retreated. Slowly he edged forward. He picked up the bowl, and after looking carefully at the contents, and then back at me, he sat down only feet away. Without speaking, or even pausing for a breath, he intently ate spoonful after spoonful of the warm oats until the bowl was clean.

The boy's name was Abush. He spoke Amharic, and Zelalem translated his story. Both his parents had died two years before, when he was 10 years old. Since their passing Abush had wandered the countryside, travelling over 600 kilometres on foot. He had survived by begging for food or eating the crops from fields. Every night he slept in the open. His only possessions were a tattered pair of shorts and the dirty blanket he wore over his shoulder.

Over the next days... story continued.