While Christmas involves church services and family gatherings, Timkat (Epiphany, “baptism” in Amharic) is all about spectacle: parades, music, dancing, and most of all enormous crowds of people pouring down the street following the Arks. In the late afternoon on Timkat Eve (January 19^th), the Tabot, the model of the Ark of the Covenant found on every Ethiopian altar, is carried from the church to an open field for the people to see and pay their respects. The priests carrying the Tabot are dressed in lavish robes and sheltered by ornate umbrellas.

Once the Tabot reaches the field, there is plenty of time for praying, singing, dancing, ululating, and a joyous releasing of birds (ideally doves, but I’m pretty sure some were just pigeons). Services continue for the entire evening. On Timkat day, there is a ritual reenactment of baptism in remembrance of Jesus’s baptism in the Jordan River. In some places, like Lalibela and Gondar, people fully immerse in water – more usually, though, the priests bless and “sprinkle” water on the congregation. Catholic priests sprinkle; Ethiopian priests douse, based on my one observation of the ceremony in the soccer field across from the Green Valley hotel. After the baptism, it’s time for the Arks to return to the churches, and the second parade begins.

The National Museum, where I work, is less than a block from St. Mary’s Church and the Pope’s House, which means that it is an excellent, albeit crowded, choice of Timkat parade. (Ethiopia’s patriarch died around the same time as the prime minister last year, and a new one has not yet been appointed. Tekie told me that there is a dispute between the Church in Ethiopia and the Diaspora, and it is uncertain when things will be resolved.) Friday afternoon, we anxiously awaited the start of the parade. Without doubt, my favorite part of the parade is the running around of the men with the red carpets (see photo). Bonnie and I have decided that it must be part of the tradition that they don’t know exactly what to do and end up putting the carpet down in the wrong place, rerolling it, hurrying off to another wrong place, unrolling, rerolling, and etc. I don’t envy them the job of hauling around those heavy rolls!!

Once the carpet is in place, the parade can continue.  There are musicians, groups of holy men and women in white or brightly colored robes, priests with processional crosses, and finally the priests with the Tabot, sheltered by umbrellas. As the Tabot got close to us, we were swept up in a sea of people, following the procession. And then it was impossible to do anything except follow along upstream, gradually pushing our way to the edge of the crowd. Forget personal space. Once we reached the safety of the museum, I convinced the boys that we actually hadn’t seen enough and should take a back way up to Sidist Kilo to see more of the parade. They agreed, and we did, and encountered a different parade. Then, it was time to head home, where there was yet another parade, which we watched from the Green Valley balcony.

Since apparently that still wasn’t enough for me, I took Rahel and Konjit up on their offer to go to the St. Michael’s day festivities on Sunday. Konjit loaned me a nitella, the lightweight shawl that women wear, and I was so grateful for the sun protection it provided, as we spent the best part of the day out in full sun. Similar processions to Timkat, but there are only four St. Michael’s churches in Addis, so the entire city pours out to just those locations. What a crowd! I have never, ever been surrounded by so many people and so pushed and prodded. Getting through the gate to St. Michael’s grounds was particularly terrifying. The crowd compressed, I had people pushing me from every direction, and I was convinced that if I lost my balance, there would be no getting up again… I do want to add, though, that it was also a very excited and respectful crowd, and I felt far less stared at than I do on a normal day walking around Addis.

Before I sign off, one other fun note: We took a break from the sun and the crowd to have lunch with Rahel’s family. Her uncle is a huge sports fan and had lived in Chicago, so we discussed Chicago Bears teams past. I very rarely get culture shock anymore, but going from the giant parade to talking about the greatness of Gale Sayers was nearly too much for me.