Soggy Injera, America

"Can I interest you in that last, soggy piece of our injera? You know, the disgusting part that nobody likes."

Chuckles and looks are exchanged.

"You want it? No?"

I distinctly remember this encounter with Andy Blunk in the early days of PST (Pre-Service Training) at Bright Hotel in Butajira, Ethiopia. I remember it, because we were all on the same page. The soggy injera was disgusting to us all.

After a few months of service, and after hundreds of plates of injera eaten, we learned the truth: The soggy injera is delicious. It is, actually, the BEST part. It soaks up all the deliciousness of the wat or stew.

Last night, Kate and Adam and I ate at Lalibela Restaurant in DC. Right before they arrived, I noted two guys sitting across from me. Struggling with the last of their injera, and the sogginess it presented. They looked at me as I devoured mine, incredulously. 

I knew precisely where they were at in life. They were being Andy Blunked.

This new title This is Surely My Elephant, is a work in progress. It was originally Things Are Adjust. Either way, whatever "it" is, it is my new writing project, aimed at articulating my adjustment to America, to life, to the soggy injera America presents me as delicious, but I find revolting. I have no initial goal, except to write. 

My first blog, The Skillet was a series of fictitious headlines and news stories, formulating a Timified version of The Onion. You Want a Peace of Me was an earnest pursuit at chronicling my experience in the Peace Corps, in Ethiopia, and the things that came with it.

This version is my post- not so traumatic therapy of adjusting to the soggy injera of life. 

During my site visit at my soon to be home in Azena, Ethiopia, I was hanging with health center staff. We were sitting outside on a beautiful night, looking at the stars, joking around. Only my language was terrible, so we were having difficulty communicating. The town looked desolate to me. It was the color beige. The color Louis CK jokes about in his new standup special - the color nobody chooses. It's given to you, because you're the low guy on the totem pole.

The town was at the tail end of dry season, devoid of water and life. Dry, dry and mo' dry. Mo' dryer than the inside of a Whirlpool appliance. Mo' dryer than a Mormon wedding in the desert. It was dry. 

Among a more successful series of communications and jokes, this guy, Alemu (which literally means - 'The World') looks at me with a smile and says 'All things are adjust'. And we had that moment where I am trying to interpret his English, derive meaning, and formulate an appropriate response. 

Then he writes it out. Hulum neger yelemedal - All things are adapt / All things are adjust. And the inner KG screams out in me : ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE!!! But I didn't yell that. It would have been perturbing in the calm serenity of the dusk.

Ethiopians helped me see this phrase as similar to the profound 'Don't Stop Believing' or 'Everything is gonna be alright', something that every Ethiopian knew to say, but had kind of lost substance. Trite. 

Now, I see a little meaning, a glimmer of the former, early days of this saying. 'Just' implies morally right and fair. 'Apt' means fitting, appropriate, or a tendency. 'Ad' implies towards.

I will reconcile America and its soggy injera. I will delve into racism, hip hop, gardening, cooking, wellness, the health care system, Islam v Christianity v Judaism v et al, how to throw a two-seam fastball, or none of these things! I will get to the juices of these things. I will call my demons out by their true name, as the protagonist did in the Wizard of Earth Sea. No punches will be pulled. Dogs will cry. Women will cheer. And I will write. Whether or not I have any readers, I will write.

And together - we will walk towards Zion, to the promise land, towards what is right. And at some point, I may explain and/ or discover why this is surely my elephant. But also, maybe not.