Energy independence

Addis Ababa runs on hydroelectricity to a good extent, and since this is
the dry season, there are scheduled blackouts throughout the city.
Tuesdays and Saturdays there is no electricity from 7am until about
7:30pm. This is during the daylight hours for the most part, so no real
inconvenience unless you are planning on watching television. But most
Ethiopians have too many things to do, and for a visitor in town, why
would I not take advantage of the time to go out and explore.
I met up with S, an independent consultant who has been coming to
Ethiopia for the past 30 years. He's well acquainted with the town and
is fluent in the local language. He recommended that we grab a taxi up
to Piazza, a somewhat posh street lined with jewelry stores and
traditional furniture and souvenir shops, and just walk around. As soon
as we arrived, S and I stopped at a fruit stand and I watched as S joked
around with the shopkeeper, eventually buying a small bag of oranges.
Although it is the dry season now, the rainy season is only a month or
two away and soon there would be countless watermelon, papaya and mango
lavishly displayed in similar stands around town.
Piazza used to be a bustling part of town, sort of like Ginza in Tokyo
or State Street in Chicago, but has since lost some of its luster as the
younger generation filters down to Bole Road, the main strip that leads
through the heart of the city. But Piazza had plenty to offer in terms
of people watching, window shopping and sightseeing. After going to a
few shops, we stopped for a Pepsi and had our shoes shined along the
side of the road. After walking a little further, S and I headed to a
celebrated Ethiopian coffee shop near a cluster of government offices
called Tomoca Coffee, a small space with a steady stream of customers
who would order a small cup of 20 cent joe and sip it as they stood
around the counter top tables along one wall. A few other
out-of-towners, like ourselves, came through and ordered bags of roasted
beans--a large selection of beans from around Ethiopia, such as Harar
and Jima. We added a little sugar to our short glasses of black coffee
and sipped it as we philosophized and talked politics under a yellow
sign that quoted Balzac, "When you drink a cup of coffee, ideas come in
marching like an army."