Oh right, you blend.

I love eating Ethiopian food in Ethiopia. It’s at once a hypochondriac’s wet dream and worst nightmare. Before every meal, you typically get a ritualistic hand washing, and then proceed to dig into a giant communal platter with everyone else at the table, sans utensils. If you want to be a conversation starter at your next Ethiopian meal, definitely try to develop an open lip sore or two before you go.

And be sure to only put food into your mouth with your right hand. The left hand is used only for cleaning. This social requirement provides endless entertainment for us lefties, as we get to gimp it up every time we eat. I hear my lacrosse coach’s voice in my head, telling me to practice with my off hand, but to this day I only really took his advice during my special alone time.

Um….back to food. Much like eating with chopsticks, when eating with your hands, the ends justify the means. You become much more aware of what you eat, there is much more focus and attention paid to the food itself, which adds to the overall quality of the meal itself. It also helps you to block out any truly awful eating companions you may be forced to eat with. And given the style of Ethiopian cooking, most of the food arrives to the table in a partially digested state, so it’s less work for you.

I kid. The food is incredible, flavorful, and makes full use of an environment, while having an extensive growing season and a very temperate climate, is not conducive to producing a wide array of foodstuffs. It is mostly thicker stew-like dishes served on the typical spongy bread, but like well-prepared northern Indian food, simple appearances can hold many complex flavors. The gorad gorad is not for the limp-lipped individuals, being raw cubes of beef, tossed with local butter and spices. It’s a bit like nibbling on a woman’s ear, maybe a bit carnivorously, if said ear had been soaking in butter and spices. It’s hot, is what I’m getting at.

And needless to say, this isn’t the place to try and market my newest utensil: a spoon that has a scale embedded in the handle, so fat people can be more aware of the sheer weight of food that they throw down. We need less of them, these fat people. They are the bane of every airline, and they have caused a sharp increase in health care costs and the number of Old Country Buffets. Is that a shocked gasp I hear coming from you? What, too soon to talk about fat people? Not PC? Whatever, you love it, my writing. Bow before my words. Unless you’re fat, in which case just rock back and forth a bit.

Where am I going with this? It’s not like I was just inspired to go off about fat people because one walked by. It’s because I’m in a country that will most likely experience another grueling famine in the coming years, a country where one fat person could physically supply enough meat, or possibly enough shelter (I’d have to check the square footage of said fat person) for an entire family here. And because, as a redhead, I stand out, oh, just a tad, in this sub-Saharan country, but at least the beggars aren’t licking their lips when I walk by. Maybe I’m just afraid of what kind of response another famine here would evoke. I don’t think I could stand another Live Aid. “Don’t they know it’s Christmas time again?” Of course they don’t, stupid….they run on a 13-month calendar here….their Christmas is during our January. Obviously being a rock star does not mean you know how to count. “1,2,3,14?” Bono needs to take a lesson from Schoolhouse Rock. Three’s the magic number. Anything above that, and they begin to have trouble.