Words For My Pictures

Monks and Monasteries Play an important role in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church since the beginning of Christianity in Ethiopia. Ethiopia is one of the first countries to accept Christianity. Christianity became a state religion at the time of Emperor Ezana in the 4th Century and it continued to be the state religion until the last of the Solomonic Danistey's Emperor was deposed in 1974. Throughout these centuries monks had and still have a unique role in the tradition of  Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity.  Monestries can be found in different part of the countries from cliff caves to lake islands. Often monasteries are founded in very remote and inaccessible part of the country to keep the monks away from civilization and from worldly temptations. A Monks is revered as an example of pious individuals who gave up the material world for the love of God. Monks are seen as Prophets too because society sees them...

This picture was taken in Dire Dawa market in 2015. The young girl you see in the picture is posing elegantly to the camera with a shy but confident smile. The boys around her are acting curious or clowning as boys always do. The boys lack the elegance or the sophistication that the young girl has even though the boys are much older than her.  The girl is wearing a simple dress with a headscarf as adults do while the boy behind her is wearing a replica of an English premier league team jersey. I am sure the jersey is much more expensive than the girl's dress but the girl is more neatly dressed than the boy behind her. Throughout the world, boys are given the privilege to be just boys but young girls like the girl in the picture are denied of their childhood since society expects them to work by the time they start to walk. I am sure this girl was not in the market to just play and be with her friends. She is their selling things or accompanied her moth...

Dear Kettlebells You are getting heavier and heavier. The more I lift the heavier you get but I will keep lifting you up until the last second. Even if I can no longer lift you I will never drop you on the floor doing so will break my spirit. I will hold on to you as if my life depends on it. It might be painful but I will keep on lifting you or would hold you in the rack. I do this not because I love you in fact at this moment I hate you! It is because by holding on to you build my strength in mind and body. I learn not to give up for a meager pain which feels like it is internity.  I am in the zone now I am taking one lift at a time. Now I am not thinking about anything but how to lift you up above my head or hold you to my bosom.  At this moment noting matters that much anymore because I have concentrated my mind in you only, the past or the future doesn't matter anymore. I am in the moment. I will throw you away hard on the...

I didn't like dead flowers but they fascinated me at the same time. The reason I hated them is it reminded me of the last hours of my mothers' life. My mother was gasping her last breaths lying unconscious in the Intensive Care Unites of Black Lion  Hospital. Close to her hospital bed on the dresser, there is a bouquet of dead flowers in a vase which someone brought earlier in the week as a good gesture( of course they didn't bring the dead flowers but the flowers died and no one bothered to replace them or through them away).  I sat next to her watching her and watching the dead flowers which were in a way were there as a symbol of life's end. End of my mother's life. Hours later my mother passed away. I wish she had died without suffering but that was not the case she died in pain and it had been more painfully for people who know her and who were close to her. From that time on dead flowers to me is death but what is the mean...

Here is a  story of a fellow who had his feet into a cold lake on a warm summer afternoon. I have my feet into the cold water. It is a huge relief to plunge my feet into the cold lake especially a hot summer afternoon like this. Plunging my feet into the lake is not just to relieve myself from the heat of the afternoon. It was also an attempt to relieve myself from the heat of life that I had to endure. I wish I had plunged my whole self into the lake to cool down my soul and cleanse my suffering. A simple act of plunging my feet into the water this hot afternoon relieved me of the pain that I had felt before coming here. The cool water somehow calmed me down helped me to be in the moment. It helped me to admire the natural beauty of the lake and the ducks floating on it. I opened my eyes to see and suddenly everything is beautiful. Even my feet look better dangling in the cool water of the lake.  

Where do you find lonely people the most? Big Cities! It is ironic that you have a lot of lonely people where you have a large number of people living relatively in very close proximity. In big cities, even though people are surrounded and live with a large number of people close by they don't interact with strangers that they are surrounded with. Friends and families they have are also not available due to work or just because they are into their busy lives which doesn't give room for social engagement as much. Social media doesn't make it any better for lonely people either. Social media is meant to make people be with people without being physically being together but it mostly works to the contrary. The fact is that it makes people anti-social by limiting real interaction and conversations between people on a normal day to day activities sans smartphones and computers. Old and retired people are more prone to this ep...

This is not about a rock or a pop group. It is about a project born out of tragedy.  Susan and her husband started the Love Rocks project after losing their two daughters Anna and Abby in a tragic accident on October 20,2013. Even though they were devastated by the loss they chose to keep the fun and joyous sprite of their daughters alive by making Love Rocks and sending them out for all who need love. I found my Love Rock at my workplace at Bellevue WA, left for someone to find it. That someone happened to be me. I suspect it was left by a special Olympic athlete who was competing in the USA Special Olympics competition held in Seattle in June 2018. When I found the rock I had no idea what it was. It had a cut fabric in a shape of a heart glued on a shiny black river rock. Lucky Love Rocks were written on the back of the stone and I googled it. What I found is a touching story of tragedy and love. I saw that the parents who had to endure the greatest tr...