Housing in Addis

Practical Travel Info: Housing in Addis

We stayed at the Weygoss Guest House for our 12+ week stay in Addis.  We picked the Weygoss due to it’s:

·      Convenient location (right off of a safe area of Bole Road, within walking distance of many restaurants—two of which deliver to the guest house, minibus routes, cab stands, and shopping buildings). This was far and away the best selling point for the Weygoss and the biggest reason we stayed there.  I cannot stress how much of a difference this makes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

·      Large room options (We originally had a Master Suite--2 rooms, 2 baths, and a private kitchen, but realized our first night that we only needed the Jr. Suite--large room with private bath in the hall and shared access to the kitchen with one other room.  The Master Suite is great if you are bringing older kids with you too).

·      Clean—we had no issues with bed bugs, fleas, or other non-mosquito bugs—even when a group of travelers who had fleas from their previous adventures moved into our floor (some other guests did get a couple bites, but we didn’t).

·      Competitive prices—the published prices are quite high, but we negotiated a rate that was significantly lower.

·      Recommendation of two other families who had stayed for 7 and 12 weeks respectively.

·      Outdoor space—common brick paved courtyard, common roofdeck, common lobby, hallways that could be played in when necessary, and a small private balcony off our room.  Especially during rainy season, we wanted outdoor options that would not be super muddy (e.g. paved courtyard was more attractive to us than a garden during this season)

·      Quiet and Safe-Typically, the Weygoss was very quite, felt extremely safe, and and was warm and welcoming

·      The other guests—we met some amazing people who were adopting, traveling, doing humanitarian work, or just visiting Addis. Most guests were adoptive families from Canada and some from the US.

Overall we enjoyed our stay, but there were several things we didn’t like so much.  Some of it is just life in Addis and some is unique to the WeygossJ

·      The staff was very friendly and helpful but in Ethiopian culture it is perfectly acceptable for strangers to walk up to you, take your child and hug them, walk with them, effusively kiss them, etc.  When someone feels they know your child (has seen them on several occasions) this is even more pronounced.  It is a warm and loving gesture, but for adopted kids who are processing their new family and for families who are trying to begin the bonding process with their child, it is not so beneficial.  Many of the Weygoss staff were very enthusiastic in their attempts to hug, hold, kiss, and interact with our child.  As a guesthouse that caters to adoptive families, it would be great to see staff have a better understanding of and sensitivity towards these issues.

o   Two particular staff we had strong reactions to were an aggressive cleaning lady who would literally take B out of our arms, try to shoo us away, turn him from us, and tell him he was hers/going home with her/did he want to go turn on the lights (one of his favorite activities…etc).  We spent much time trying to figure out how to avoid her as she completely ignored our protestations and attempts to firmly keep B in our arms. By contrast, Sintohta, the man who operates the gate to the courtyard during the day was amazing.  He was attentive to our son, but would gently redirect him to us, tell him we were his parents in Amharic, and do subtle things like if we were all “playing soccer” (as much as a 2 year old plays soccerJ) if he thought B was kicking the ball to him too much or not checking-in with us he’d kick the ball to B and say “kick to mama” or “kick to daddy”.  He was amazing and helped us a lot the first few weeks when B had some daddy confusion.

·      Weygoss includes complimentary breakfast—pancakes (which are thin crepes served with honey or syrup depending on what they have), scrambled eggs (which have peppers, onion, and tomato), and omelet (which was the same as scrambled eggs, but almost deep fried), or oatmeal.  They also had bread, jam, coffee, tea with cinnamon, and hot water available as part of breakfast.  At the end of the first week we realized B had a pretty serious allergy to eggs so we fed him plain oatmeal in our room.  We couldn’t eat plain scrambled eggs as he would develop a rash if just the oils touched him but we could eat pancakes if we washed our hands and mouths afterwards.  On average, the Weygoss did not have pancake batter at least 3 days per week so the complimentary breakfast wasn’t as valuable to our family as it could have been.

·      Internet-The Weygoss charges 30 birr per hour for wireless internet and 75 cents Birr for using their computer for internet.  The internet is very slow, went out frequently, and was entirely unavailable for over 2 weeks during our stay.  We ended up borrowing a mobile hotspot (EVDO stick) from a family who was leaving and our internet experience was MUCH better.  I would HIGHLY recommend buying a hotspot if you will be in ET longer than a month.  You can buy them in ET for about $150 US and then have to pay a monthly fee and load Birr onto it to use, but it is so worth it.  The two weeks that we had no internet access were very difficult and we almost missed some important correspondence from our agency.

·      Kitchen-The “fully equipped private kitchen” the Weygoss advertised is actually a sink, a dorm-sized fridge, and a hotplate that rests on the floor (our hotplate would give us a mild electrical shock each time we used it).  We also had 2 mugs, 2 cups, 2 forks/knifes/spoons, one thin pot that was basically made of aluminum foil, and one small metal tea kettle.  When we saw the kitchen, the price of groceries at the stores that cater to Westerners, and how affordable restaurants were, we ate out for almost all our lunches and dinners. If you plan to cook, bring a good multi-purpose pot and perhaps a few cooking utensils and a good knife.  These can be purchased in Addis but the quality is low and the price is about the same as Western prices, or higher.

·      Bathroom-Our bathroom was in the hall not en suite (which we knew, the smaller second room that we gave up had an en suite and most of the rooms here are en suite). Hot water was great and pretty reliable and the water pressure was awesome for Ethiopia, but the bathroom had a lot of mold and was quite dark so it felt kind of yucky.

·      Open Air Concept-The Weygoss is built around a central staircase that is open to the outdoors at the bottom.  During most of the year this provides breezes and ventilation (there is no heating or AC in most buildings in Addis, including the Weygoss). The only issue is that stray cats sometimes wander in at night and mate, fight, and dig through trash.  Not ideal, especially when your bathroom is not en suite!  This was only an issue the nights we stayed up, mostly we went to bed at 7:30 with B and slept through it all.

·      Rain-We were there during rainy season, but during the drought so the rainy season was much less severe than usual.  Our windows leaked significantly, so most mornings we would wake up with a 6 inch wide stream of water running from the corner of the window to under the bed. The Weygoss is trying to fix this.

·      The other guests—we had one group of particularly annoying travelers, an expedition from Canada Humanitarian who was rude, loud at all hours of the night, used our kitchen (including to wash their flea infested clothes), “borrowed” dishes from our and others’ kitchens, and were in general unpleasant.  Also, there were some kind of sketchy “business” travelers from various parts of Africa and the Middle East who seemed to enjoy the services of prostitutes on several occasions, monopolized the front desk staff, and continually tuned all of the TV satellites to all-Arab channels. In general though, the other guests were really nice and we met some amazing friends.

·      Cab from airport-Arrange your own.  The cab the Weygoss arranged for us cost an exorbitant amount ($10 US for a very short ride) and then the cab driver demanded an extra $5 for our luggage AND he let the unscrupulous airport porters load our luggage and told us we had to pay them too.  We had been traveling for 24 hours were jet lagged beyond belief, it was 11pm in Addis and very dark, and he was very pushy.  We didn’t feel very safe, so we paid.  All told, the ride cost us over $20 US. The Weygoss should protect their guests better than this if they are arranging the ride from the airport. (More on this in the transportation postJ)

·      Maintenance-They Weygoss did “maintenance” for about 3 weeks when we were there.  It was actually quite large and loud construction projects, namely knocking holes in all room’s ceilings, replastering, and then installing decorative molding.  It was loud, dusty, and not so pleasant for the few guests who were there during that time.

Despite this seemingly long list of issuesJ we did enjoy our stay at the Weygoss, would definitely consider staying there again, and would recommend it.  If you have bigger kids, the 4^th floor rooms actually connect and the roof deck is right outside your room, but the bathroom only has a shower, no bathtub.  The mastersuites on the second floor have a partial wood door that actually separates the entire suite from the hallway so that you have more privacy.   The location of the Weygoss is great and I cannot emphasize enough how much money and aggravation you save being able to walk almost everywhere you want to go!!!  The owners are open to suggestions, and were also willing to negotiate the rate a little lower midway through my stay due to the issues I mentioned above. Stay tuned for more details on our favorite restaurants, many of which are walkable from the WeygossJ

Weygoss Bathroom (the best one IMO-ours was a lot worse)

Weygoss Kitchen-All utensils, tubs, and kettle provided by tenants, there's also a dorm sized fridge