The Picture is courtesy of Yared Tseggai

E R I T R E A: sketches of a trip

Issayas Tesfamariam


Note: This series has an introduction and five sketches. A total of six postings. This is ...


Sketch Three

A couple of days before a scheduled travel to Kohaito with Dr. Yosef Lebsekal, I visited the National Museum of Eritrea with a colleague from AVIE, Yared Teweldebrhan. The National Museum of Eritrea has different sections that represents different eras of Eritrea's long history. Pre-historic, historic, medieval (both Christian and Islamic periods), cultural eras are some of the examples that are represented in the National Museum’s exhibition. The pre-historic section houses a one-million year old fossil that was found by archaeologists in Buia, in the Southern Red Sea Zoba of Eritrea. There is also a fossil of an ancestor of the modern elephant, which is considered to be a missing link. There are many other unique historical artifacts, such as a small-sized sphinx, which make Eritrea an archaeological gem. The National Museum is a place where Eritrea’s rich history and culture is preserved. With minimum resources, the National Museum has managed to collect numerous historical/archaeological artifacts. However, for the National Museum to grow and prosper it needs financial, technological and human resources. As the motto states, “preservation is access, and access is preservation”! Thus, the first thing that the National Museum needs to do is to have its own website. Eritreans who would like to help in setting up a website for the museum, or help with resources can contact them at 011-291-1-122389.


From a copy of a brochure of the National Museum of Eritrea.
The National Museum of Eritrea had a pictorial exhibit in 2007
entitled, "From Buia to Nakfa: Journey into the Past."
The picture in the middle is the fossil found in Buia.


On the morning of our travel, my colleagues from AVIE (Yosef Habtai, Azemra Fitwi and Ruta Frezghi) and Hiyoba Ghirmay, and I met at AVIE's office and went to pick up Dr. Yosef. At 6:00 AM we left Asmara and headed south to Kohaito. After we ate our breakfast in Adi Keyih, we continued our journey. As we got closer to Kohaito, the fog and the sun were fighting for attention. The Kohaito plateau covered with aloe vera (E're') looked like Mongolian steppes. Half way on the plateau, we met Ibrahim Kelil, the very knowledgeable local employee of the National Museum of Eritrea. At the suggestion of Ibrahim, we went to Karibossa. Karibossa is not far from the famous Delhimna road construction that is being undertaken by Biddho Construction Company. The constant struggle between the sun and the fog rendered the scenery unbelievably fascinating. The shere size of the mountains in contrast to human beings and machinery makes one marvel with awe of nature. It is at this point that I realized that the pictures and the TV footage that I had seen before don’t do the scene justice. Firstly, one has to be physically present to admire nature; and second, the amount of brain, muscle and sweat that the dedicated workers are putting into this engineering feat is worthy of admiration. Seeing the construction workers working on one hand, at the edge of the cliff, and on the other hand at the mercy of the humongous rocks above them is heartening and at the same time fills one with pride. To top it off, the person who is in charge of this miraculous undertaking is a twenty-nine year old engineer.

Karibossa





Azmera Fitwi filming

After we left Karibossa, we headed back to the plains of Kohaito. We first visited the ancient trade route to Adulis. The ancient steps that are carved on the side of the mountain are astonishing. While Dr. Yosef was narrating for the film, an old couple in their sixties passed by us, returning from the same ancient caravan route that the people of Koahito had been taking for thousands of years. The couple told us that they had left the coast six hours earlier. It was at this point that Dr. Yosef mentioned to me that the National Museum of Eritrea had organized a caravan route to the coast three months earlier. It took the participants three days to reach the coast with their donkeys and camels. Ivory was one of the items that traders carried on the ancient trade route to Adulis. This Ivory Road was to Eritreans what the Silk Road was to people of Eastern Asia. I hope the museum makes the caravan route travel a yearly event. As I told Dr. Yosef, I would sign up for a travel like that anytime without any hesitation.


Ancient caravan route still being used.

Dr. Yosef Lebsekal

The crew filming


Yours truly, facing one of Kohaito's oblesiks.

We then went to the other part of the mountain where the landscape resembles the Grand Canyon. Still yet another amazing and spectacular scenery! After filming there we headed back to the place where the ancient market of Kohaito used to be. The sun by now had won over the fog, but the fog still was fighting its last battle. It was here that we filmed villagers who were collectively working to repair a fallen roof. The able-bodied villagers had turned out to help in this community endeavor. The elders were there in person entertaining and giving advice. We witnessed the traditional know how of constructing building of the villagers which were inherited from their ancestors. What Dr. Yosef had been narrating about ancient Kohaito and their masonry in the morning came alive through the traditional village masons in the afternoon. The hospitality accorded to us and the talk given to us by the elder of the village was what a filmmaker would dream of.

After the heart warming speech of the village elder we headed to Safira. Safira is where ancient and today's dam is located. It is a pleasant small village which is located on the Kohaito plateau. It has a big school and a beautiful mosque whose minaret can be seen from any part of the plateau. After Safria we went to the stele of Kohaito and the Egyptian tomb. At this time, the fog had a come-back and the sun was giving way to darkness. After we had tea in a small village, we headed back to Asmara. We dropped off Ibrahim where we picked him up earlier during the day. We had left Asmara thirteen hours earlier, and we still had to visit the rock painting not too far from Adi Keyih. After we had dinner in Adi Keyih we took a short tour from the main road to film the rock painting at Heshmele.

Finally, we hit the road and right before we arrived in Segenetti, the densest fog that I had ever seen blanketed us. Thanks to the driving ability of Yosef Habtai, we slowly arrived in Dekhemare. From Dekhemare, the fog had cleared and we arrived in Asmara at 11:00PM. We were up for a total of 17 hours straight and deserved a good night sleep.


Ibrahim on top of the world

Safira

The two pictures above are courtesy of Yared Tseggai
Next: A visit with Dr. Asmerom Legesse and Memher Tewldebrhan Amdemeskel.

E R I T R E A: sketches of a trip

Issayas Tesfamariam


Note: This series has an introduction and five sketches. A total of six postings. This is ...

Sketch Two

On the second week of my stay, I was notified that one of the steam-engine trains that have been meticulously renovated by Eritrean retired engineers, was going to Arbe-Robu’e. I picked up my digital video and still cameras and went to Ferrovia, as the train station in Asmara is known. We took off from the station with four or five wagons pulled by the main train engine. Each wagon has its own brake person. By the time we left the station was around 10 AM. The sound of the chu-chu train reminded me of the song by the South African Jazz musician, Hugh Maskela, who sang about the train that takes workers from Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Botswana to the gold mines of South Africa, but the big difference was that the sound of this chu-chu train was a sound of joy whereby after sitting idly for over forty years, the steam engine trains were resurrected from the junkyard by the highly talented former employees of Ferrovia who at the time of independence of Eritrea were in their late 70 and 80s. The ride was amazing. Looking at the train meandering like a snake along the steeply winding rail line, going into and coming out of tunnels is a must for every Eritrean. Looking through the window and get the feeling that one is suspended in the air is fun, exhilarating, joyful and exciting all at once. Once we got to our destination, the front engine was disengaged from the first wagon and reversed to be attached to the last wagon so that the journey of going up the mountains and back to Asmara begins. For the steam engine train, Arbe-Robu’e, serves as a water refilling station. At the station in Arbe-Robu’e a group of about 10 people who were friends and family members of a newly-wed couple entered the wagons to take pictures. Going up the mountains is as fascinating as going down the mountains. We returned to Asmara chuchu-ing around 2:00 PM. I thought it was an amazing trip until…..

A Ride in the Clouds

picture courtesy of Yared Teseggai.

Two days after the aforementioned, a group of about 20 German train enthusiasts came directly from the airport to the Asmara train station, having arrived at 4:00 AM flight from Cairo, Egypt, to go to Arbe-Robu’e on a 6:00 AM train ride. The morning was foggy. Some of the workers at the train station were dumbfounded to see a group of tourists going for a ride without resting or going to their hotel. This is the kind of enthusiasm that Eritrea generates! This tour had, as I found out later, an advantage than my previous trip because the tourists can request the train conductor and the coordinators to stop at any spot and ask the conductor to go forward, backward, come through a tunnel, etc. To do that, all the tourists would exit the train and run to the nearest hill to catch the best shot. The German tourists had all kinds of camera and video gear. The fog that morning was incredible. The train piercing through the clouds and chu-chuing down to Arbe-Robu’e was like riding in the clouds. I call the ride that morning the “Arbe-Robu’e Express”. We returned to Asmara around 11:30 AM to jump on a Litorina (a FIAT diesel engine train, which can hold about forty people) which I called “Janus of the trains” because of its double headed face. Again, a retired train conductor took us down back to Arbe-Robu’e with a young man as his co-conductor. By this time the fog had cleared away, but the trip was as spectacular as the previous ones with the steam engine train. At the end of the trip which ended around 2:00 PM, I had a total of 3 hours of incredible video footage of the journey. Even though the German tourists had reserved the steam engine train for the entire week so that they can travel to Massawa and back, I left the train station to get ready for my next trip to go to Kohaito, a most spectacular scenery and archeologically rich site in Eritrea with the first and foremost archeologist of Eritrea, Dr. Yosef Lebsekal, who is the director of the National Museum of Eritrea.








German tourists (train enthusiasts) relaxing .



Next: Kohaito: Archaeologically rich site in Eritrea.

E R I T R E A: sketches of a trip

Issayas Tesfamariam

Sketch One

After spending a couple of days with family members, I discussed with the director of Research and Documentation Center (RDC), Mrs. Azeb Tewolde, as to how to follow up on the previous projects that were started. I also checked the various documents and suggested various ways to preserve them. Every time I visit the RDC, I am flabbergasted by the wealth of documents archived there. For example, in the Ethiopian Collection, there are files of Ethiopian security reports on the activities of Idris Hamid Awate, reports of activities and lists of students during the Federation Era. There are also reports of the Ethiopian Consulate in Kassala reporting on the activities of Eritreans in Kassala in the 1960’s and much, much more.

During my first week stay in Asmara, I met my friend Senai Woldeab, a young Eritrean attorney (see his interview on my blog). He also introduced me to his group of friends who are highly talented and professional young people who are helping Eritrea in various capacities such as doctors, accountants, geologists, chemists, advisors to ministries, etc. I am glad to report that I see the future of Eritrea in these and other young people and the future looks great. One of the young people that I met, Dr. Bereket Tewolde, is a chemist and he is involved in collecting data of the various plants and their medicinal applications in traditional care and analyzing them scientifically (check out my blog: for the upcoming conversation with this young brilliant chemist soon). Dr.Bereket has come up with perfume extracted from chomer (Ocimum) plant.

I saw some of the research that these young people did on their own( some pictures are provided below). For example, they researched, interviewed the descendants and documented in a video documentary about the people who were involved in the translation of the bible to Tigrigna. They also produced pamphlets, brochures and calendars. It must be noted here that the first Tigrigna bible took 66 years to translate. The translation is a milestone because the impact of this translation on the development of Tigirgna and its literature is very substantial. Among the many prominent pioneers in Tigrigna literature were Aboi Woldeab Woldemariam (Welwel).

I also heard a lot of other research that they are doing such as the story of Mr. Zere Bekit, who traveled to Italy (by foot through Sudan, Alexandria, Egypt, and from there by ship to Italy) in 1909. After he arrived in Italy he became a business owner in the middle of Rome during First World War! Mr. Zere Bekit returned to Eritrea in 1916 during Italian colonialism and wrote an autobiography of his odyssey!

On the weekend of my first week stay in Asmara, I filmed the family (about 10 people) of the first Eritrean pilot. He received his pilot’s license in 1928 in Italy! What a fascinating story! You have to wait for my documentary on this story.

Keshi Teweldemedhin G/medhin one of the translators at the age of 20. Keshi Teweldemedhin G/Medhin spoke twelve languages.

Keshi Teweldemehdin G/medhin's original translations.

Interview with Wzr. Aberash Yehdego, the widow of Aboi Woldeab Woldemariam.

The late Aboi Woldeab Woldemariam and his wife, Wzr. Aberash Yehdego.

Young Eritrean scholars ( including a Georgetown University law graduate) learning at the feet of Eritrean elders.

Interview with Keshi Musa Aron.


Next on Eritrea: sketches of a trip: Ride in the Clouds.

E R I T R E A:
sketches of a trip.

INTRODUCTION

I returned to Eritrea on my regular negdet (annual pilgrimage) from December 28^th 2007 through January 18^th 2008. I went back to film more footage for my Eritrea DVD project in order to fill the gaps which I felt were needed from my previous trip in August 2006. As a result of the previous trip a picture book entitled “Eritrea: Colors in Motion” was produced. Also, a DVD entitled “ASMARA: City of Radiance” is on its final stages. In this trip, my colleagues from the Audio Visual Institute of Eritrea (AVIE) and I filmed over 11 hours of footage. I would like to express a heartfelt appreciation for my colleagues at AVIE for the success of the previous and this latest trip, and to Dr.Yosef Lebsekal and the National Museum of Eritrea for their incredible support in helping us film in the spectacular archeological sites at Kohaito.

Here are brief essay sketches of my trip.

NEW YEAR’S EVE

Two days after I arrived in Eritrea from Texas, after visiting my family there, 2008 was approaching fast and was staring me in the face. Fighting against my jet lag, it did not take me long to agree to an invitation by my friends who were going to hang out at Hidmona, a traditional restaurant/night club at the Expo ground in Asmara on New Year’s Eve. The place was packed to capacity, to the point where the people who were sitting in the two adjacent rooms of the restaurant were asked to dance in turns. The traditional band played various traditional, modern, revolutionary songs to the delight of the audience all night long. At midnight, champagne bottles were popped heralding the year 2008. Since I went from the US, my friends on my table believed that I was best qualified, or was it that they were being courteous of my guest status, to open the bottle of champagne. To their disappointment and to my chagrin, I was still struggling to open the bottle at 12:05 AM. With some help from competent people, I was finally able to pop up the bottle. With that ritual accomplished, we danced the night away! Despite the late opening of the champagne, my visit became very productive, compacted, educational, informative, as you will read in the sketches of my trip to be continued in the upcoming articles.

A conversation with artist and poet Ermias Ekube

“For my work is a manifestation of my intellectual and existential
behavior, I need both concentration and relaxation. Concentration
is sitting for the work and relaxation is playing on it”. Ermias Ekube

Issayas:Can you tell us about yourself?

Ermias Ekbue: I was born and brought up in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia,
where I studied art at Addis Ababa Fine Arts College, which was
a social-realism school at that time, and graduated in painting,
in1990. I practiced art in my private studio, studying and
experimenting on modern art techniques and concepts, for seven
years with two other friends. After my first and last one man show
in Addis Ababa, in 1997, I came to Eritrea to exhibit my works.
Since then I have been teaching art and exhibiting my works
in the country.

Issayas: Let me start with Cezan's drawing of you.
What does Cezan mean?

 
Ermias: I call my son Cezan, not my self, because Cézanne,
one of the post impressionist artists, and called the father of modern art,
is one of my heros, and his name sounds good and simple.
Though it is French, I made it simpler and shorter the written form of the
name.My daughter’'s name is Iris, the flower, the colored part of the eye;
and in Dutch it means the color purple. And more, back to the Greeks,
it is the name of a messenger goddess.

Issayas: What does art mean to any society? And why do we need art?

Ermias: This is a very difficult question. But simply, Art is one of the major
knowledge of humanity. And since a human being is mainly a spiritual being
than other beings, perhaps that is why man’s life is more complicated than
other animals. The role of art, for me, is to feed a spiritual hunger,
and enhance beauty among people and societies, and reflect the soul of
existence in the mirror of Life.

Issayas: There is a tendency for parents to encourage their children
to study the sciences etc., but not the art why do you think that is?

Ermias: I understand the feeling both as a responsible parent and a
practicing artist. It is about uncertainty of life. A parent prefers to take
a risk for him or herself than on the future of his or her child. I think
most people know intuitively that an artist is out of the safe zone
of life, and the life of a real artist is unpredictable. Most of us
always want to plan the rest of our lives out of here and now,
but the artist lives right now and here. And so on…

Issayas: What kind of style is your art considered?

Ermias: I don’t believe in having a style or category. Every moment
I feel, I suffer, I think, I play, I love and  I live, and I realize my
existence then I paint or write, that is all. But I know how I started
practicing art. I know what styles I experimented with in the past,
which is as an experience as my life’s experience. Basically,
in my school period, I used to follow the social-realistic school,
and impressionism, and out of school I have studied abstract
expressionism and other modern and post modern schools, and
different literary and philosophical theses.  To follow all these
schools is meaningless, but to be inspired by different art
techniques, concepts and mediums is natural as your reaction
to any thing else in your life. Slowly and without a perceptive I
started falling in to oblivion of all those established aesthetic
criteria. And still I can see all my past tendencies in my works.
But I must be free from all these junk ideas and let my self
flow in my works. Don’t you think so?

Issayas: What are the inspirations for your work?

Ermias: LIFE! Basically my own life and lives around me. I think
I am not able to know beyond my surrounding, EVERYTHING that is
else where is here too, of course the articulation and the form varied
from culture to culture. My surrounding is my universe. This universe
of mine, perhaps, is decorated by invited aliens from other universes
through books, music, films, news, other works of arts, etc…ha!








Issayas: What struck me the most at your home is that you use
locally found materials and use them artistically. For example, the
numbers of fernellos (traditional stove) stack up like a tower adorn
the main door, the bed frames, etc. What do they mean to you?

Ermias: The found-object works are part of my universe. Let us quote
from a brochure of the exhibition ‘Frames of Consciousness’, 2008,
about this idea:

A story of object-personified

I try to assemble histories of objects (old and forgotten) to tell or retell
stories. Though the history of an object is factual and absolute it is not
really known but tells deferent stories to a soul or a mind that is able
to see the hidden light of the object in a new historical spot. Choice
and selection of an object is very much personal and an intuitive
fortune (but not an accident) that clicks the collective mental and
emotional experiences of the artist. You may not know what texture,
color or form of the object stands to what idea, feeling or concept
but it becomes a poetic object.

All the marks of time on the selected object tell of stories that
would be retold by every individual beholder; assembling different
objects change the stories again and again in the un-given mind
set and a given time and space.

History of an object-example:

·Made of (wood, metal etc.)
·Made by (a carpenter, a carver, a smith etc.)
·Owned by (a poor, a rich, a criminal, a woman, etc.)
·Stayed in (a house, a church, a garage, etc.)
·Functioned as (as table, as fork, a fence, no function at all etc.)
·How old (1, 3, 6, 7years, 37.345 years etc.)
·Etc…

To say something about these two pieces:
The fernellos are meant to be a tower entitled, ‘My tower, your
tower of day and night’. It is long back I came with the idea of
fernello as a tower.I got the image almost as it is in medeber,
perhaps with less number vertically. It is to represent small houses
shelved on a hill, which is a common scene all over Eritrea
(the number of the fernellos is 9) and the day and night idea
is the cycle of life begin from a day. And the idea of fire
represents basic energy of life which is derived from my nostalgia
of childhood siting beside my mother cooking on the fernelo. Etc…
The bed frame is found at a friend’s house. I had almost finished
the idea as immediate as I saw it. It took me only sometime to
fix extra elements and put some personal touches.
And the title is ‘Adam and Eve- perhaps in bed’.


Issayas: In a lot of your paintings, you use fanus (lantern), donkeys
and ladders. What are the symbolisms of the aforementioned?






Ermias: Most of my works tend to be poetic- symbolic.
I mean, not literally, represent infinite ideas and feelings with
few images that brought from my life’s vision and surroundings.
So I am not sure about the exact meanings. The symbolism of
objects and signs could be repeated here and there like syllables
but changes ideas or feelings contextually. But symbols such
as ladder, or wheels represent more or less constant ideas and
concepts with varied context.

Issayas: Are the messages that an artist sends to the society
important?

Ermias: Regarding my experience of reacting with great works
of art, art doesn’t have a message, but inspires or provokes the
established ways of seeing towards life and nature of an individual
or a society. But if it sends a message, that is only through the
interpretation of the beholder.

Issayas: When did you become a poet?

Issayas: I used to participate in art clubs in my elementary
school period and but later in the art school I start to read and
study poems by friends and other famous local and international
poets and slowly begun to write my own.

Issayas: Do poetry and painting go together as a visual and
audio medium? Poetry is written for the ear and painting
is  "written" for the eye?

Ermias: As I mentioned to you, when I started studying poetry
I found a very similar nature between art and poetry, except the
medium as object. But, for me, both play a visual role on the
imagination. A good painting is which makes you
see and listen and the same to a poem, it makes you listen
and see at same time. Both, beyond the medium they use,
write on the musical- visual- tactile- imagination of the beholder.

Issayas: Which ones are your favorite paintings and poem?

Ermias: Frankly speaking, I really don’t have a favorite painting or
poem. Of course I level my works in many ways: some give a new
light to the next consistent process, some strongly talk to many
people, some vibrate a kind of personal depth which never
happened to the previous works, and some reflect a new vivid
technical approach appeal to many eyes and so on. When most
of these behaviors happened in a single work, then that is
a master piece. But I don’t know which one is that among my
works or if I have done it yet.

Walking thoughts
Hasten to take a rest
In walking notebooks;

Haunting dreams
Captured on canvas
In clay or in stones;

Optical philosophies
Melt on paper
With analyzed light;

All these strange,
Transformed creatures
Are called ‘Works of Art’

 Erimias Ekube 

Issayas: Ermias, thank you for your time.

Ermias: Thanks.

Ermias resides in Asmara, Eritrea with his wife and children.

A conversation with Physicist Dr. Robert Van Buskirk

Dr. Robert Van Buskirk


Issayas Tesfamariam: Can you tell our readers about yourself?

Robert Van Buskirk: I grew up as a politically minded physics student back in the 1980's.
In the 1980’s, my work in anti-nuclear and Latin American solidarity movements, taught me that for a physicist with morals, a practice of increasing social and environmental value is likely more important than my purely theoretical physics calculations.

Since then, I searched for the places and people with the best social and environmental value production. The result is that I have concluded that projects organized in rural Africa can produce more than 1000 times the human, social and environmental value per dollar spent than projects in the U.S. or other parts of the developed world.

So I spend my volunteer time, energy and enthusiasm trying to figure out how to make such projects a reality and to replicate the best project models to hundreds, thousands, or even
hundreds of thousands of villages in rural Africa.

Issayas: How were you first introduced to Eritrea?

Robert: From 1984 through 1991 I was a graduate student in Physics. At that time I worked in solidarity with the Sandinista liberation of Nicaragua while the U.S. government was destabilizing that country. We formed a solidarity group that sent people to teach in the the Universities and tried to promote science education and research in the people's interest.

After I graduated, I got a job with a consulting company owned by Woldetsion Mesghinna, and decided that I would go to Eritrea and see if I could apply some of the lessons we learned about post-liberation science and technology development in Nicaragua to the Eritrean experience.

Issayas: What are the projects you are involved in?

Robert: I have been working with Eritrea for almost 15 years, since 1993. I first taught at the University of Asmara for about two years and then worked with the Eritrean Energy Research
and Training Center for two years. My research has focused on energy and environment.

Since then I have been based mostly in the U.S. but I visit Eritrea about 2-3 times per year.

One of my side projects in Eritrea was helping set up the country's email system which operated
from 1995 to 2000. That effort is described at:

http://www.punchdown.org/rvb/email/Wiring-Eritrea.html

I have helped a little bit with wind energy development which is currently resulting in the installation of about three 250 kW wind turbines in Assab. This is described at:

http://www.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/EETD-Eritrean-energy.html




Wind-swept acacia tree at Rahayta, 60 kilometers southeast of Aseb



with technical details and reports provided at:

http://www.punchdown.org/rvb/wind/

More recently I have worked doing studies in support of Debesai Ghebrehiwot's work with the improved (Adhanet) mogogo. Again the research work is described at:

http://www.punchdown.org/rvb/mogogo/



And now I and some Eritrean colleagues are creating a new development credit financing scheme that we hope to use to fund improved stove, solar lighting, reforestation and other progressive development projects in Eritrea and throughout Africa. In fact this year, we are replicating
some of the lessons we learned in Eritrea to Senegal, Ghana, and Zanzibar.

You can see the beginnings of this work at:

http://www.villageprojectsint.org/

And by doing a youtube search, you can see a whole set of video clips from village meetings and discussions what have had regarding our new combined solar lighting and improved stove projects in Eritrea. The videos are pretty unedited, and a bit disorganized, but you can see them at:

http://youtube.com/results?search_query=Eritrea+Village+Projects

We have distributed 40 solar lighting systems as an incentive for villages to build improved stoves in about 20 villages in rural Eritrea over the last year and a half. The incentive worked!
hundreds of improved stoves have been built in response.

In the last few weeks the most recent shipment of 100 solar lighting systems finally arrived to Eritrea (and is now being cleared through customs).

When I was in Eritrea in November, I was able to check up on the projects and nearly 1000 villagers in these project villages have now built the stoves. Our goal now is to get at least another 200 to 300 solar lighting systems to these villages over the next six months. If we can accomplish that task, then we can start branching out to organize similar projects in the next 20, 50, or 100 villages over the next several years.

Using solar lights to help motivate improved stoves helps to accelerate and expand the main stove dissemination project which has distributed more than 40,000 improved stoves through a large variety of government agencies and organizations since 1999.

The main improved stove program is disseminating more than 10,000 new stoves each year. But the goal is to get up to 20,000 to 30,000 improved stoves each year. Then the whole country can be covered in about a decade.

If we can get the rate of distribution of solar lighting systems up to the same level as the stoves, then in one to two decades, everyone in Eritrea can have access to clean, safe energy, no
matter how remote their village is. And that would be a very beautiful thing to see.

Issayas: Robert, thank you for your time.

Robert: You are welcome.

(pictures courtesy of Dr. Robert Von Buskirk)

A conversation with graphic designer, Ida Woldemichael

Ida Woldemichael


Issayas Tesfamariam: Can you tell us about yourself?

Ida Woldemichael: I am a graphic designer, an Eritrean-American, a neat-freak, a color lover, a sister, and daughter.

Issayas: What is a graphic designer?

Ida: To me a graphic designer is an artist that communicates a message visually. He/she uses a combination of things to communicate: color, illustration/photography, paper/internet, concepts, writing, type, and more. Graphic designers are inspired by their culture and environment, almost unknowingly, and I think they use these things almost because they are such a part of who they are. I think my fascination with certain colors (turquoise and coral) relates to my true Eritrean roots.

Issayas: What do you think of Japanese graphics? A lot of graphic designers and filmmakers seem to be obsessed (I don't know if obsessed is the right word) with Japanese graphics and anime, respectively.

Ida: Japanese graphics are beautiful. I like them but don't necessarily use that aesthetic in my work. At least not yet! I purchased the movie Kill Bill mainly because of the animated scene. I was really fascinated by the movie's switch of mediums (film/animation). I also like the artist Hokusai's work because it is so graphic.

http://www.craftconn.com/images/cpljhkwavethm.jpg

Issayas: Japanese graphic designers use the Japanese alphabet as graphic design elements in their work. Eritrea has its own script for thousands of years. I have not seen many Ge'ez (Tigrigna, Tigre) alphabet being used as graphic design elements. What do you think?

Ida: I have tried to use it. Actually I initially began the Eri-tees logo using the Ge'ez alphabet. But this has been used. A very popular example is Bob Marley's Exodus album. http://991.com/newGallery/Bob-Marley-Exodus---30th-Ann-400727.jpg

Issayas: In the book Che: Revolutionary Icon, the author mentioned that the death of Che, the demonstrations across the world in 1968 and the invention of silk print, easy accessibility and etc.) made Che to be popular. Eritrea, with it's long history of the struggle for independence has a history of producing posters as part of the struggle. Poster design has been part of the struggle. Now posters are being replaced by photographs. I think we need to continue and use our experience in poster design and use it for various purposes, including for films. What is your view on Eritrean poster design?

Ida: I have seen a few Eritrean posters lately. All of them are photographic with some type on it that says something generic like Eritrea or Tourism. Some of the photos are beautiful but they don't carry the same impact as posters. Poster design is one of the most exciting things to me in graphic design. Posters are about expression, a message, image, type, ink, etc! I prefer non photographic posters. Check out a few screen printed posters about Eritrea I made:

http://idawoldemichael.com/wedidit.htm

http://idawoldemichael.com/devastatedLand.htm





Music and posters seem to go hand in hand, here are some I really like, most look screen-printed:

http://www.blackcatdc.com/postergallery4.html

Issayas: Are there Eritrean graphic designers?

Ida: Sure there are but I don't know any personally yet. I am working on it.

Issayas: What are the differences of the works of filmmakers, photographers and graphic designers?

Ida: There are definitely elements that overlap in each of these things. These things are concepts/conceptual work, Web/motion designers may use film to create something, print designers may use photography to create something. Overall, some elements exist because of the other and they also build on each other. The main difference to me are: Filmmakers deal with time, things in motion. Print designers deal with flat/paper things, Web designers deal with the screen. Photographers deal with a composition (framing what they want to be seen) and color/lack of color.

Issayas: Ancient parchments that were used and are still being used by the monasteries in Eritrea are bound by different designs. Did you have to learn about book binding design in your design school. If I am not mistaken they are called Coptic bookbinding design. I think we need to
explore this aspect in Eritrea. What do you think?

Ida: Yes, bookbinding is interesting to me, though I never got a chance to study it in depth.
I found a few links (below) that say a bit about the subject.

http://myhandboundbooks.blogspot.com/2007/11/chain-stitch.html

http://etsybooks.blogspot.com/2007/10/chain-stitch.html

In general, the fine arts (painting, sculpture, drawing, etc) which involve a more hands on approach are a great foundation for design. It makes a designer more knowledgeable of various processes. A few examples: If a book designed on the computer was getting printed there are a variety of binding options. A designer with bookbinding/making knowledge can grasp a better solution for the book. Tools in the program Photoshop relate to functions of an actual camera.

Issayas: To check out Ida's creativity, please visit

http://www.idawoldemichael.com

http://www.eri-tees.com

Finally, Ida, thank you for your time. And keep up the good work.

Ida: You're welcome.