Interview with Dr. Webshet Asefa

Book Review

 Title – Ethiopian Sports Games and Entertainments

 Author – Webshet Asefa (PhD)

 Pages – 284

Reviewed by Zenebe G. Tamirat,

BA, MBA,

About the Author,

Dr. Webeshet Asefa has been known to me since childhood. We were not only in the same neighborhood and went to same elementary and high schools but also a close relationship exists between our families. I would, therefore say that I know Dr. Asefa very well.

As a teenage boy, Asefa was profoundly devoted to his studies as well as to soccer and volley ball. In his days of college education, he was aware of the evils of feudalism and did not take him time to join the students’ movement for democracy.  As almost all of his fellow schoolmates, he was not free of considering Marxism-Leninism, as well as Maoism as a remedy for political problem in Ethiopia. All these considered; it was difficult for any youth of his time to live in Ethiopia as a productive citizen. Young Asefa, thus had to decide either to die uselessly as most of his contemporaries did or to leave that country and find out a way to bring a change in the society. He chose the latter.   

Coming to the U.S., he joined the Tillotson College in Huston to complete his first degree with Magna Cum laude. He then continued his education for a higher degree in Urban Studies, thereby obtaining a Master of Arts (MA) degree. He further went to make a doctor of Education degree in Educational Administration and added a teaching certificate course in Economics and Government.

While in Collage Dr. Asefa was brilliant enough to be elected as Who is Who among students in American Colleges and Universities. The list of social activities he was involved was long indeed. The followings are some of the activities to mention a few.

·         Served as president and Secretary of the Ethiopian Sports and Recreation in Huston TX in different terms

·         Secretary of the Ethiopian Famine Outreach Association (ECFO) which raised over $50,000 for Ethiopian Cause.

·         President of International Student's Union. 

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·         Editor of Harambee (Unity) college newspaper. 

·         Founding member of the Ethiopian Students Association in Texas. 

·         Member of Ethiopian Students Association in North America (ESUNA)

·         - Founding member, secretary and president of the Houston chapter.

·         Founding member of the Blue Nile Sports Club and founding member and player of Ethiopian Sports Federation in North America (ESFNA). 

·         Awarded by ESFNA in 1993 FOR CONSECUTIVE CONTRIBUTION TO THE ETHIOPIAN SPORTS FEDERATION AS A PLAYER FOR TEN YEARS.

  

·         Member of the Ethiopian Philatelic Society in the USA and Ethiopia. 

·          Founder of the New Economic Society (TNES) Inc.

After completing his education, Dr. Asefa worked as a teacher, college professor, International students Advisor, Research Assistance, Instructor, a district manager for Huston Post and as a Banker.

Introduction

Reviewing a book is somewhat a simple job for those who do not write. For writers, it is the reverse. For a person of my kind, reviewing is more difficult because I get puzzled by the thoughts that I may miss the central theme that the author may want to transfer to his readers. A reviewer is like a jelly in a sandwitch. The author expects of him a favorable commentary while readers want the critical points of the text. The biblical words a slave cannot serve two masters applys here. I am, therefore,  much worried as I may fail to serve the two masters of mine here.

The book has been set in three parts for review. This was made to reduce the stress on the reviewer. The first part is included in this paper. The book in general is a collection of Ethiopian cultural values in terms of sports, entertainment and culture. There is absolutely nothing new in the book about the Ethiopian assets. The great contribution the author makes by compiling the information in the book is that he is preserving the value of our culture, tradition and social practices from being lost. These values were on the verge of being lost when Dr. Asefa suddenly arrived for a rescue.

The Book

In the Introduction, Dr. Asefa gives us an overview of the Ethiopian sports and games underlining the traditional and the international competitions. Here, we are reminded if not introduced, (which I would incline to say introduced since most of us know little about them) to sports particularly endemic to Ethiopia in their structures, rules and regulations but not much in the practices; like, for example, Feres Gilbia is no different from horse racing in the international sports arena but the rules in the Ethiopian Feres Gilbia could be different from that of the international type of horse racing.

 Similar to feres gilbia   which I said is also similar to horse racing is ferese gugse.  Many of us are not aware of the difference between the two unless we read Asefa or otherwise have been the favorite children of our fathers. We lose to notice the difference because mostly we are obsessed by the means of the game, the horse and the horseman.  I, for myself, learned the difference between them after I read Asefa’s book, “Ethiopian games and entertainments” (Asefa 2014). Ferese gugse according to Asefa (2014) has little to do with horse racing or ferese gilbia, it is rather a  pattern of a horse riding in time of war. Here, the horseman not only rides the horse but also harasses and fights the enemy. The riding is correlated with patriotic chants coupled with scaring acts of the horseman to terrorize and rout the enemy. The shield known as the “gasha” and the spear or the sword are the scary weapons the horseman is equipped with during gugse. Asefa refers to this scary drama of the horseman as “Fukera” in another chapter. 

The purpose of the “fukera” in war time is dual. One is self-motivation with encouraging words to avoid fear, and the second is to terrorize the enemy. In a time of peace gugse is practiced as ordinary, or I may say here as extraordinary sports game completed between young worriers. Asefa (2014), beautifully describes the objectives of the game and the decorations of both the horse and the horseman during the game and the rank and file of the player in the society (see page 24). Hence, ferese gugse is not only a game here but also an assertion of a place of honor in the society.

            What makes Asefa’s book different is the correlations of the content of the book with tradition of Ethiopian life during war and peace. Ethiopia’s freedom has been persevered with this correlation of peace and war time activities. Not a single day has been passed without alert; the people thus were on exercise of one type of military exercise or another or beware of the threat to their independence through chants, poems and or songs.  What Assefa referred in his book as “Fukera” is part of this trend. It starts with warning that a boy should be as bold as his father and goes on with appreciation or admonition depending on the achievements of the individual. This is poetically expressed in Asefa’s Ethiopian Games and Entertainment, like lyrics for instance,

Wondeledge teweldo kalhone endeabatu

situt amelmalo yiftel indenatu

Literally meaning if a boy cannot be as bold as his father, give him a pad of cotton and let him spin it (spin the pad of cotton) like his mother. In Ethiopian society division of labor is determined by sex. Females perform works inside homes, preparing food, and housekeeping including cotton spinning for textile clothes, which are considered cheap or less important when they are not. Men work in fields, like farming, hunting and or defending the society or the nation from potential threats. If a boy ends up as bold as the society needs of him and demonstrates his bravery by practice, the reward is praise as Asefa vividly put it in his book. The best example of such a praise is a lyric perfectly chosen by the author that runs as

                                     Enquan Enatu yewoldechew,

                                     Amatum qurach yetgabachew

In a well version of translation Asefa expresses the above lyric in English (that I actually tried to manifest it differently but gave up deciding Assefa’s expression was better ;) as follows:

                                    Leave alone the mother

to whom he was born,

Even the mother in law

became proud of him

Asefa continues with some more interesting fukera lyrics that of course can never be representative enough but good for initiation. While appreciating the effort in this regard much more remain to be done on this line of study, in the future.

The author, who has always been in the world of sports since his early days, has devoted a number of chapters in his book to sports both traditional and international. One thing I noticed after reading Asefa’s book was that Ethiopia was quiet competitive in the adaptation of sport activities. In fact, I have come to notice that, in some cases, she may be capable of contributing to the practice of sports and games like, for example, of Hurbe that I was introduced in Asefa’s book. I had never heard of this type of game previously. The hockey of course is common in the Ethiopian society as is in the international but what is different, in the case of Ethiopia it is attached to Christmas. In fact, it is known as Yegena Chewata, “Christmas Game. “ Asefa has the explanation for that. He attaches the game with shepherds, who heralded the birth of Christ to the society. If that is the case, it is interesting. In Ethiopia, all things are given serious attention when kings and emperors are involved in the practice. Asefa tells us genna reached its maximum popularity during the reign of Emperor Minilik II because he was playing the game himself.

            Another thing I noticed in Assefa’s book is the peculiarity about depicting some of the normal life of some Ethiopian communities as part of sports. Who would have depicted the everyday life of the monks at Debre Damot as “Mountain Climbing” if it were not for Dr. Webeshet Assefa’s resourceful information on Ethiopian traditional sports? He admits that what is known as Quategn Mewtat” (A term I came across for the first time I read Assefa’s book) or rock climbing is not yet identified as sports and yet inform us places like Debre Damot Monastery are accessed by ropes, climbing up and down of a height of 1400 meters. They do that as if they were stepping on steps!  The picture in the book illustrates this routine of climbing on amazingly sloppy and rocky mountains in Debre Damot, and affirms Ethiopians competitiveness in the world wide mountain climbing. These are some of the hidden prides of Ethiopians that are now being revealed by scholars like Dr. Webshet Assefa and are now open not only to the outer world, but to us, Ethiopians, as well.

            Dr. Asefa continues with his book covering a number of other interesting items of various sports like swimming, wrestling, camel racing, donkey racing, bull jumping, the dangerous sword playing door games and many more. In chapter 3, he impresses us with entertainments, like traditional dancing, traditional instrument and drums playing, traditional foods and drinks and what not. 

            Conducting a review on such vast and resourceful book is almost like writing the book itself and so, requires sufficient time to quench the thirst of readers.  I shall, therefore, end part I of the review here to come back with part II energetically and at the earliest possibility.

To continue in part II