Last weekend was a busy one for the family.
The ICS Model United Nations club hosted the PanAfrica ADDMUN conference. The first of the 260 participating students to arrive flew in from Austria and Kenya on Tuesday night. In his capacity as one of two advisors to the club, Andreas was on duty from then until after the closing ceremony and dance Saturday night. Alekka isn’t in Model UN this year (she’s chosen to get more involved with an organization called Global Issues Network instead), but she also put in some long hours as a volunteer MUN page over the course of the weekend.
The opening day activities and the closing events were hosted at ICS, but the business of the conference was all conducted at the the UNECA (United Nations Economic Commission for Africa) building. The official venue provided just the right amount of gravitas for the council meetings. By all accounts, the first ICSMUN international conference was a great success.
Here are some photos. I only attended the getting-to-know-you event and the Ethiopian restaurant outing, so credit goes to the crew of ICS student photographers for most of these pictures.
My big social event last weekend was the Diplomatic Spouses Bazaar. Kinda sounds like an embassy wife swap, but no, it’s better than that: it’s the best holiday bazaar in Addis. Just about every embassy in Addis Ababa (and because the city is home to the African Union, there are a LOT of them here) hosts a table and/or a cooked food stall where they sell the specialties of their various countries. It’s a great holiday shopping opportunity, and the only place in town to get certain exotic imported goods. Two of the most popular stalls are Canada (maple syrup) and Norway (smoked fish).
I can’t post the photo of all the cool stuff I came home with: I did all my Christmas shopping at the bazaar and Santa’s got to have a few secrets this time of year.
Lorna of Arabia 