- I have talked to tourists who have been asked if they are going to Ethiopia and eat the food for the poor, says tourist guide Habtamu Kebadu.

He sits on the terrace of the Mountain View Hotel, watching the sun set over Lalibela, Ethiopia's most famous tourist destination. And he sugars over Europeans and Americans who are stupid enough to think that tourists are causing the locals to eat less.

- The last ten years we have got road, electricity, water and telecommunications in Lalibela, all because of tourism. But it is still only the beginning, he says.

The small town that clings to the mountain sides 2600 meters above sea level, huser magnificent churches carved in stone in the 1100th century, when King Lalibela wanted to build Ethiopia's answer to Jerusalem, so the Ethiopians themselves did not have to go to the Middle East.

- Welcome to Africa's Petra, Kebadu says today.

Ethiopia has always had a lot to show the tourists. In the 1960 century, under Emperor Haile Selassie, Ethiopia was a more important tourist country than Kenya. For Ethiopia, myth was the only African country to ever be colonized. Then came the coup, the war and the Derg dictatorship. And in 1984, Ethiopia became known for something quite different from beautiful churches, proud history and Africa's best food.

The song that shook the world

The rain failed in Lalibela, and in large parts of the highlands in the north. The dictatorial Derg regime that was in power kept emergency aid out, as part of a political strategy to crush the tormenting opposition. The famine disaster that would require one million lives was a fact. That's when rock star Bob Geldof got a good idea.

He launched the supergroup Band Aid and the song "Do they know it's Christmas", to save the Ethiopians from the famine. Pictures of hungry children and the lyrics "Where nothing ever grows / No rain nor rivers flow / Do they know it's Christmas time at all?" went around the world.

Although the song contains grave factual errors (Ethiopia is the source of the Nile and has the largest agricultural areas in East Africa. Moreover, the country became Christian long before Europe, so most Ethiopians know well when to celebrate Christmas), the song collected 100 million dollars to the hungry. The campaign inspired celebrity gatherings in Norway, Denmark and the US. But Bob Geldof, Bono and the gang also provided Ethiopia with an image problem the country is still struggling to get rid of.

- Have you listened to the text? Because of that song, people think that Ethiopia only consists of desert. They did not do research. They just wanted people to cry, says Tony Hickey.

He is originally from Ireland, but settled in Ethiopia in the 1970s. In the 1980s, he made films on the border between Ethiopia and Sudan, and fought with the current government against dictator Mengistu. When the Derg regime fell in the early 1990s, he became head of the new governing party's travel agency, Experience Ethiopia Travel. Later he started for himself.

- Journalists say that negativity sells. But today I like to invite film crews from abroad to Ethiopia, to show other pictures from the country. Like when National Geographic made a program from Lalibela. Aid organizations continue to talk about drought and starving children. But we do not want to talk about this. It is as if Germany was still talking about the war, he says.

The image that is stuck

"The fact that one particular famine catastrophe has provided the world with the misconception that Ethiopia is nothing but a desert says a lot about how the mass media works. That says far less about Ethiopia ", writes travel guide author Phillip Briggs in the preface to Bradt's Ethiopia guide. And today, Ethiopians are adamant that television images from the 1980s are a thing of the past.

The future is tourism. That is why we are on a round trip, invited by the state-owned airline Ethiopian Airlines. Two Norwegian tour operators and a journalist will get to see another side of Africa's second most populous country.

- We usually say that in Ethiopia you will find both Egypt and Kenya: We have history in the north and nature in the south. This is a country with a lot of culture. Unfortunately, this is not known. In the past, this land has only been known for drought. We must show the world that we are more, says Ethiopian Airlines' vice president, Busera Awel.

For neither drought, famine nor Band Aid were forgotten in the world. Tour operator Mekonnen Getahun (29) knows this. Three years as a used car exporter in Japan, the former history student raised enough money to start the company Stoneage Tour, which has 21 employees and offers organized trips in Ethiopia.

- We use the slogan "Ethiopia – behind the news", he says at a café in the historic city of Gonder.

Here the rulers of Ethiopia built majestic palaces that still reign over the city. Getahun wants Ethiopia's ancient history, left little to the Egyptians, to be known in the rest of the world. Certainly at the expense of the history of hunger in the 1980s.

- When you hear about Ethiopia, you hear about famine and war. If you look up "hunger" in the encyclopedia, Ethiopia is listed as an example. But today Ethiopia is not poor. We are rich in history, culture and landscape. My main message is: We Ethiopians are not what you think, he says.

Outside the cafe, built by the Italians during the invasion in the 1930s, stands a group of young people begging. Getahum stops and takes a serious talk.

- I told them that I too have been poor. That I have worked hard to get to where I am today. That it is no use begging, he says.

Live Aid 20 years later

In 2005, Mekonnen Getahun and Tony Hickey traveled from Addis Ababa to London to promote Ethiopia as a tourist destination at the World Travel Market, which is perhaps the world's most important tourism fair. On the same day that the fair opened, the world marked the 20th anniversary of the Live Aid concert, which came the year after Band Aid.

- We thought: "Not again!" It was the same 20-year-old pictures everywhere in the newspapers, of starving children. For us, it is an ongoing battle against this image. In a way, we and the aid organizations have conflicting interests. They want to emphasize the negative, while we in the private business world want to show that there is hope, and that things have changed, says Hickey.

Getahun also believes that the aid organizations are helping to build on Ethiopia's image from the 1980s.

- Some organizations blackmail the situation in Ethiopia so that they will get more money, he says.

Who is right may depend on the eye that sees. Ethiopia is still one of Africa's poorest countries, and aid supplies food to parts of the population. But economic growth has been ten percent annually for the past five years, with tourism, coffee and rose exports as important growth areas. And Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi regularly talks about Africa becoming less dependent on aid.

Now Ethiopia will instead make cultural tourism a living. For a long time it was slow, but now the infrastructure is about to come into place. In Addis Ababa alone, 50 hotels are under construction, and another 50 are under planning.

- In recent years, there have been roads, airports and hotels. And in Ethiopia, 95 percent of the tourism industry is owned by locals, so the growth benefits Ethiopians, says Hickey.

Everywhere on the round trip, the construction activity is great. New spa hotels are popping up. The goal is to be able to compete with neighboring Kenya, which has beaches, extensive wildlife and over 100 times as many tourists.
And it should be enough to take off for the culturally conscious tourists Ethiopia hopes to attract: The country has been Christian since the year 400, long before Christianity reached Northern Europe. Ethiopia has as many as seven UNESCO monuments, one more than Egypt.

Tourism becomes a secondary income

But what do Ethiopians have to gain from tourism? Some of the answer may be found in a village just below The Devil's Touth in northern Ethiopia. In a mud hut, four Norwegians and an Ethiopian family sit close together. The questions hail from eager Norwegians.

- Who lives here? What do you grow? Do the children go to school? What do you eat for breakfast?

The locals get a good laugh when the questions flow.

- We eat the pancake injeera, of course!

As the company breaks up, tour guide Mekonnen Getahun gives the village 400 birr (approximately 300 kroner) as a thank you for the hospitality. That's enough to buy a good goat. And now some villages like this have started to speculate on the income by selling things to the tourists, or inviting them to farm work. But begging and tourists playing aid workers, Getahun does not want any of.

- I say to the tourists: Please do not give coins to those who beg. Do not destroy my people. You are helping to continue the country's problems. Nobody dies here anymore. School is free and people can eat two meals a day. If you do not give today, people will not beg tomorrow, he says.

And Getahun thinks the admonitions work.

- Previously, no one in the villages sold anything. Now I see more often that people have something in hand when I travel around the country.

Currently, a small number of Ethiopia's over 70 million inhabitants benefit from tourism. The number of tourists has never been higher than 200.000. The money they leave behind still makes up 15 percent of the country's foreign exchange reserves.

Getahun is an optimist.

- In some countries, tourism is the heartbeat of the economy. We have the richest culture in Africa, so we need to be more attentive. We need to get people to Ethiopia, make something out of it, and change people's lives. We can be like Kenya, just give me five years. Then you will see the dramatic changes in the tourism industry, he says.

Sunrise for tourism

The sun has set over the churches in Lalibela, and the party has moved in. The Mountain View Hotel's restaurant serves gourmet food and local wine.

- Tourism is important because it gives us more sources of income. It can help us avoid a new 1984, says Habtamu Kebadu.

The young tourist guide survived the famine in 1984, but is too young to remember any of it.

- But I met Bob Geldof when he was back here five years ago, says Kebadu.

The conversation is cheerful in the airy restaurant, which boasts a chef from Jamaica and vegetables grown in the hills around the city. Solomon Dawit, who works for Ethiopian Airlines, welcomes the British rocker behind Band Aid back to visit.

- Bob Geldof helped us in 1984. Now he should help us change the image of Ethiopia, he says. ■

Ny Tid traveled to Ethiopia invited by the Norwegian embassy in Addis Ababa and Ethiopian Airlines, accompanied by Norwegian tour operators. Ethiopian Airlines covered travel and accommodation.

- Do not paint black

Plan Norway does not agree that the tourism industry and the aid organizations have conflicting interests.

By Kaare M. The picture

– I think the tour operator Mekonnen Getahun raises an important issue, but I do not agree that we have conflicting interests. In our communication, we are also concerned with showing that it is useful to care, that it is possible to create change, says information manager at Plan Norway, Jon Martin Førland.

- At the same time, aid organizations must show donors why they should give money. Is there a danger that aid organizations will paint the situation black, and thus scare away investors?

- Yes, but I think it happens to an ever lesser degree. For us at Plan, it is important to focus on what to do now, and we want both visually and rhetorically to focus on the positive, so that people feel like giving. We strive for the image we give to be correct. It must be possible to point out the challenges, without falling into stereotypes and black paint.

- What do you think when you hear the song "Do they know its christmas"?

- I think that Band Aid was a necessary and time-typical awareness of the situation on another continent, which focused on the fact that there are great challenges in the world. But we are working today to communicate a more nuanced picture of reality, says Førland. ■