Lake Tana has tons of monasteries. Old monasteries. Each has its own history or story. But as I found out each looks kinda the same and the paintings inside all tell pretty much the same story. After three of them I was monasteried out. Each monastery charges Birr 30 to enter. It had also started raining. The boat ride back to the hotel was over an hour. Lake Tana is a big lake and I didn’t realize we had gone that far visiting the outlet for the Blue Nile and the first island. Now we were at a peninsula and a long way from where we had to go. It was a long, cold, wet ride back.
The first monastery claimed it and everything in it was over 900 years old. I’m including this wizened old monk in that age assessment as well:
Another monastery had a decent English speaking guide who explained the story behind all the paintings. Most people know the basic story: Jesus born, Jesus dies, Jesus rises. Somehow, Moses and Noah get thrown into the paintings along with many heads with wings representing angels. St. George is the patron saint of Ethiopia and you see paintings of his dragon slaying exploits over and over. Ethiopian Orthodox religious art is similar to the European medieval art with its portrayals of hacked martyrs and a fiery hell. The main difference is that Ethiopian Orthodox art is more cartoonish and colorful and it takes a few minutes of looking at it to realize how morbid it actually is.
Here’s the fisherman in the papyrus canoes or tankwa:
By the outlet of the Blue Nile we saw some hippos. We didn’t get that close and my camera isn’t that good but, by god, there are some hippos there. Right in the middle. Look at the one hippo’s back. Look at the other hippo’s ears. Hippos.
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