Ethiopian New Year

Ethiopia celebrates its new year on a different date - September 11. The calendar that the country follows is different from the European one. They are 7 years back of the European year, which means that the present year being 2005, they are still in 1998. Come September 11, 2005, it will be the beginning of 1999. Wonder if they will have Y2K problems on their millenium year and even if they do (they wont have the problem), whether they will even bother about it. Nah........they won't even know that it had existed and was solved.

The Ethiopian calendar has 13 months, as opposed to the European calendar of 12 months. This is because of the following reason. Of the 13 months, the first 12 have 30 days each. The last month has 5 days (and 6 days in a leap year). The local people are very proud of this fact and always advertise their country as a country of "thirteen months of sunshine". Its not exactly so...visit Ethiopia during the months of May through September (European calendar) and you wouldn't say that. This time is winter in Ethiopia - winter being otherwise known as rainy season. Jimma is a place more prone to rains than any other place in Ethiopia and believe me, you wouldn't wanna be there during that time.