Nightlife

Tonight we decided to go to the Black Rose, a trendy bar downtown. After
having a drink there, I asked if we could go to a less up-scale place
that wasn't full of expats and couples, so we grabbed a taxi and went to
a local bar.
Inside we found a table next to a tree--seriously, a tree--that seemed
to be growing out of the floor and up to the high ceilings. This was
intentional, part of the interior design apparently, but it was
positioned so that it rose up between our table and the bar, so everyone
had to practically grab on to it as they squeezed between the tree and
our table. The music was too loud to have any kind of conversation in
there so my colleague suggested we try another local bar, a little
further down the scale.
We took another taxi just down the road and stopped near my favorite
Italian restaurant in Addis, Don Vito. We sauntered into a tiny room
with about 20 bottles of liquor behind the bar, a counter and stools
that ran along the side of one wall, and on the other side of the room,
what looked like an oversized phone booth with a DJ inside playing Black
Eyed Peas on the stereo. We ordered a round of St. George beers and a
guy came in with one of those boxes vendors use at ballparks, except
this guy was selling gum and cigarettes.
One of my colleagues asked for menthol cigarettes, which the guy didn't
seem to understand, so I suggested "mint cigarettes" and he nodded his
head okay and said he would go find some. He came back 5 minutes later
with a pack of menthol Pall Mall, which my coworker said he didn't like,
but he felt he should buy them anyway since the guy had run out to find
the pack. When he asked how much, what ensued was a fine example of
bargaining. The first price given was 75 birr, which is about $7 and
clearly inflated. My coworker suggested 15 birr, to which the vendor
suggested 70. The negotiations went back-and-forth like this:
20-->65-->nevermind, don't want them-->60-->30-->50-->don't want them,
forget it-->45-->20-->40-->20-->35-->20-->okay, 20. In the end my
coworker smoked half a Pall Mall, said it was too strong, and left the
pack on the table when we left.