Mesgana Dancers

Every now and then the girls will ask me to bring up You Tube and find something Ethiopia. Today we stumbled across this dance troupe of young Ethiopian girls. As we watched, Marin began narrating to me............

" I know that song. We used to do that one to get food. We sing and dance and tell the people our belly is hungry."

" That girl is saying she misses her Mommy. When she does this (moves her hands and arms a certain way) she is thinking about hugging her Mommy"

" This dance is about asking for a drink. The girls is thirsty. Very thirsty."

" These girls are playing a game like baseball. Not baseball but like baseball. The bat is not round." (I think she is saying Cricket but does not know the English word for Cricket)"

" These girls are planting seeds to grow food and then they are singing to the sky to make rain for their food."


The detail and nuance Marin went into as she continued really caught me by surprise. She was very calmly narrating the action. The fact that she spoke in a continuous stream without any pause to think about what she was saying added to her credibility. Now I wonder whether she and her friends might have done some street performing/begging to get food.