Here’s my question, based on a paper I heard presented today. I ask with no malice.
90% of Eritrean women are subject to female genital mutilation. Is this a custom in your family? Have you had personal experiences with it? What are your thoughts?
I think JDM has been to a few too many Eritrean coffee ceremonies today.
*[sub]or some other ceremony[/sub]
!
1)Yes FGM is common is Eritrea but I have to disagree with the fact 90% are subject to it.
a) That study was dated 1997 when Eritrea was four years old. It is most likely that they took the Ethiopian(including Eritrea) percentage and spilt the countries but kept the same pecentage for both (It is done when contries change but there is no new data). This data reflects Ethiopia’s and Eritrea’s pecentage not Eritrea’s precentage alone.
b) The data is almost five years old, I hope things have changed since then.
c) In the cities FGM is thought of “stupid” or “scaring”. Urubin city dwellers look down on it as something that is done by the “poor” and “uneducated” people who live outside the city. FGM is practied mostly in the rural areas where education about it is rare if any. However due to education from the Government FGM is none less and less.
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No, when Eritreans leave Eritrea they generly don’t want their daughters to be circumcised. But they are strongly for male circumcion because it is part of the two major realigons in Eritrea. Eritrean(Coptic) Orthidox and Islam.
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My mother had it done to her when she was a baby. I don’t know about other relitives or friends.
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It is a harmful culturly practice that needs to be stopped.
Damn straight.
Efrem - I for one appreciate your insights. I have never had the opportunity to talk to an Eritrean before. Thanks!
Do you speak Italian? How common is it as a language in Eritrea?
I used to work with a guy from Eritrea, BTW.
Do you know the history of where your peoples came from?
Your welcome. It all goes back to the old saying:
There is never an Eritrean around when you need one :).
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No, I guess I am a slow learner :(.
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It is very common for an Asmarino (thats what we call the people who live in the capital city of Asmara) to know Italian. If you know Italian in Asmara you can talk to almost everyone. Elsewhere is more rare.
There is an interesting story for that reason. When the Italians invaded they all wanted to stay in Asmara because the city is high on a mountin, and is much cooler there then in the rest of Eritrea. So after awhile the city became Italianized, you can still see a few Italians there walking the streets.
sidenote: Asmara is often called Africa’s safest city (due to the nonexistent crime)
- Cool.
efrem: my mum grew up in Asmara. She lived there for 13 years; my grandmother stayed for 38. My mother says it was one of the most beautiful places she has ever seen (and she has lived all over the world) and she still talks about it as though she left yesterday even though she left 50 years ago.
Funny story: I knew my mum grew up there but I guess I was ignorant about what it was like. When I saw the movie Mississsippi Masala, part of which takes place in a lush, green, beautiful Uganda, I expressed surprise to my mother that it wasn’t all dust and tumbleweeds. I asked her if Asmara was so green and beautiful, to which she replied in an exasperated tone, “Of course not all of Africa is grass huts and lions. You Americans, you get all your weird ideas about the world from stupid TV shows.” And then she stomped off in a huff.
Whoa that is such a big question for so few words. There is no way I can cover such a large topic. People may see our country and might wrongly say “it is only 9 years old”. But we have occupided this reagion for many meliniea. We have a lot of history, too much to be explained.
Asmara is 700 years old and that is a new city :). We have Chirstian monstries that are over 1600 years old, and non-chirstian structres that are more that twice as old then that.
Here are some (very) basic Eritrean history links for you:
Some people have a blanket view of Africa without realising that it is a very diverse continent.
Thanks for the story.
- I heard shortly after independence that the government was forgoing western aid in rebuilding its railroads. The explanation was that by doing the project itself, Eritrea would create its own expertise and related industry. Also, there wouldn’t be foreign debt and/or meddling foreign ownership of infrastructure. The big disadvantage is of course that this makes it a very slow and inefficient process. How is this approach working, or has it been changed?
2)Are there any differences between Ethiopian Orthodox and Orthodox faith practiced in Eritrea? Is the liturgical language Geez?
3)Is there (was there?) as significant a Jewish population in Eritrea as Ethiopia?
- Have you ever read Notes from the Hyena’s Belly? If so, any comments on similarities or differences in Eritrea?
Thanks
- Well the railroad you are talking about was highly publicised. It was a rebuilt from the original railroad that the Italians built around 70 years ago. When the border war hit, the railroad project slowed down but did not stop.
The road between two of Eritrea’s largest cities (Asmara and Massawa) is very dangerous (it swerves down many mountains) and the railway was the safest mode of transport.
For more info here are some excellent links about the Eritrean transit system:
http://www.trainweb.org/eritrean/
http://www.trainweb.org/italeritrea/
- Okay, here I go.
The only difference between the Eritrean Orthodox Church and the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is the name.
Eritrea and Tigray (another province of Ethiopia side-by-side with Eritrea) were the oldest parts of Ethiopia. When the Egyptian Orthodox came into Axum (Old Ethiopia, that just coincides of Eritrea and Tigray) they founded the Egyptian Coptic Church there.
The Ethiopian church came into existence when Ethiopia’s king Haile Selesase decided that he would cut the church from its Egyptian (Coptic) roots, and renamed it the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.
Before this change the church called itself the Coptic Orthodox Church. We (Eritreans and Ethiopians) still call our church Tewahdo (Coptic) Orthodox.
When Eritrea separated from Ethiopia, some Eritreans didn’t want to keep the name Ethiopian in their church. So they sent a party to Egypt to see the Pope (The Coptic Orthodox one). They asked if they can start a new (Coptic) Orthodox Church that answers directly to the Egyptian Pope, and not to an Ethiopian Abune (bishop) in Ethiopia.
The head of the Ethiopian church was mad and said he was going to stop this separation. The Abune claimed that the church is the same the only thing that changed was the political differences. The Ethiopian people (who never thought Eritrea was really going to separate) were extra mad.
The Ethiopian president (the person who the Eritreans had helped put in power when they left) replaced the head the of church with someone more accepting. The Pope then promoted an Eritrean bishop to be the leader of the new Eritrean Orthodox Church.
The Ethiopian church has all the same everything, with the Eritrean Orthodox Church with no differences so far, but as time goes maybe the churches will grow apart. The Ancient language of Ge’ez is spoken by the Eritrean church too.
Huh, think about it now. The Eritrean and Ethiopian church belong to the Egyptian (Coptic) church. The Coptic Church belongs to the Orthodox faith. The Orthodox faith is part of Christianity. That is a lot to swallow. If you are confused please ask me more questions.
- Yes, there was a big Jewish population in Eritrea. When the Italians settled in Eritrea they sent poor landless people (including Jews) to Eritrea. But during the Mengistu Era most Italian Eritreans left Eritrea for Italy. You can still see a Jew walking the streets.
If you are talking about the Falasha’s (Black Jews) that is tricky. When Eritrea was part of Ethiopia the Falashas were common in Asmara (Ethiopia second biggest city now Eritrea’s capital city) as beggars. They were often treated badly in Ethiopia and you would see a Falasha beggar at every corner in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia’s biggest city).
There were (not any more) Falasha communities on the Ethiopian/Eritrean border even, however I don’t think there was ever a Falasha city in Eritrea.
Mostly all of them were flown to Israel, left for Ethiopia when Eritrea separated or when the border war with Ethiopia started, I doubt that there is a Falasha community in Asmara now, they are not even in Ethiopia anymore.
- No, I have not read the book. But I did hear of it and after reading some excerpts I feel he has got the feelings of Eritreans of the Mengistu era down right too.
He turned Eritrea into a police state to keep the province from leaving, it did not work but he killed a lot of people on the way, too much to count.
So the Ethiopian Abune can be dismissed by the president? Is this also the case for the Eritrean Abune? Or was he (the Ethiopian Abune) not fired outright, but merely pressured to retire?
Also, in most regions where there is a national Orthodox church there is a parallel if smaller group which has broken away and allied to the Roman Catholic church (including Coptic and Ethiopic rites). See here and here. Are you familiar with how significant a group this is in Eritrea? I imagine the Italian occupation would have afforded a lot of cultural contact and opportunity for some rapprochement between the local Orthodox churches and Rome, but on the other hand anti-Roman sentiment may also have been high.
Does Eritrea have any agreements with Ethiopia regarding the use of its ports? I was wondering, since it kind of took the whole coast with it when it broke away, perhaps leaving Ethiopian ships at sea and such.
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The Abune was pressured to retire, and replaced by an Abune that was more friendly to the government. The government has no offical power in the matter.
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The Italians tried hard to convert the people to Catholism but they largely failed, because the Eritrean people had no desire to leave the Coptic Church. In Eritrea, people are very very serious about the church (it is no joke). However there is a Roman Catholic community in Eritrea. In fact Roman Catholic is the second largest Christian denomination in Eritrea.
Small fact: Eritrean and Ethiopian (rural)women sometimes have the Coptic cross tattaoed on their forehead. It is done to prevent conversion to Islam.
When Eritrea seperated one of the big issues was Ethiopian access to Eritrea’s ports.
Ethiopia was given full access to Assab(an Eritrean port) after independence. However some of the Ethiopian people believed that if Eritrea was really going to seperate, then their government should have claimed at least half of Eritrea’s coastline instead of letting all of Eritrea go.
So when the border war broke out Ethiopia started using Dijibotii’s ports at very high tariffs. This made some Ethiopians mad at their government for not claiming Assab by force before.
The Eritrean government claims that this whole border war was just a ploy for Ethiopia to steal Eritrea’s coastline. Some Eritrean soliders claimed that they have found fish hooks on the bodies of Ethiopian soliders.
First off, since it wasn’t very clear in my post, I wanted to clarify that I was asking about Coptic Catholics. I’ll assume you figured that out anyway.
A) Do they have access again?
B) What is full access? If I’m a Sudanese merchant, do I have to pay a higher usage fee for port services than an Ethiopian merchant?
Looking at the map, I notice that it is not exactly the most stable region. Did Eritrea play any part in, or was it much affected by, the civil war in Sudan, or between the two Yemens?
What a great thread!