The Highlands

It may not be the most attractive prospect for a restaurant: a dingy room with gleaming aluminum tables, located just off a dung-strewn street where donkeys still outnumber vehicles. Sanitation would not pass an inspection back home: the bathroom is barely a gray slab of wall in the corner of an adjacent backyard, across the street from a bus stop from which, at any time of day, passengers awaiting minibuses to other parts of Tigray, Ethiopia, can observe local men as they nonchalantly urinate against the bricks.
I take a seat on one of the tables and it doesn't take long for the waitress –a slender, feline-faced woman with a black cross tattooed on her forehead– to approach me with a mix of curiosity and attentiveness. A few gestures and ten minutes later, she returns with a big plate of food. It’s a Wednesday, a fasting day for Ethiopian Christians, so the food –Beyaynetu is the name of the dish—is vegetarian by default. The platter consists of a round piece of injeera –Ethiopia's rubbery and sour staple– topped with an array of vegetables. The food is so full of color that I’m initially not sure whether to put it in my mouth or on a canvas: the carrots are bright orange, like soft drink. Split peas are the same yellow of the highlands in the dry season. The injeera itself is conspicuously the same earthy cinnamon as the skin of many Ethiopians. Just like Mayans believe they where made of corn, Ethiopians, I think, could easily believe that the people of the highlands were sculpted from tef, the ancient grain from which injeera is prepared.
Rolled into small, fluffy bundles reminiscent of towels at a bath house, the waitress continues to bring more injeera to the table. As I scoop up my lunch, a thought comes to mind, something about how the entire world tends to round, abundant staples. The Mexican tortilla, the Hindi nan, the French crepe, the Middle Eastern pita: all these foods are circular, like cycles, like ancient depictions of God. On the other hand: eating directly from the hand evokes a sensual world before tools, before intermediaries. The difference between using a fork and and simply using the fingers is akin to that between swimming in bathing trunks and skinny dipping.
With my stomach full, I stand up. I wave goodbye and smile at the waitress. She waves back with shy eyes but with a big grin on her face. I step out onto the sunny street and look down at my right hand: my fingers are crusty with the colors of Ethiopia.