WE CHEAT EACH OTHER Texts by Salamawit Alemu and Yamrot Alemu. Photographs by Salamawit Alemu, Yamrot Alemu and Eric Gottesman. She was born Ruth Alemu, but she has many names: Ruth. Salam. Beti. Meron. Nefsua. She was begging on the streets with her mother when she was four, six when her mother died, seven when she changed her name to Peace ( Salamawit ), nine when I met her. Her sister, Yamrot, and she were left to take care of each other. They had no place to go after their mother died, so they stayed in the hospital. The nurses took care of them, gave them pajamas. It was two years before they found a home with a foster mother, Hirut. Three years later, when Selam was eleven, Hirut died suddenly. When we met, I gave her a camera and asked her to show me what her life had been like. She pushed the camera aside and pulled out a deck of cards. She dealt a game without explaining the rules and then cheated so she would win. She laughed until she was almost hyperventilating, her eyes squinting, her teeth shining. I couldn t understand a thing she was saying. For a while, she was the top in her class. After Hirut died, Salam started skipping school. I saw her at the Orthodox Timket ceremony celebrating the baptism of Jesus. Salam, now thirteen, had a flock of tenyear-old boys following her. She seemed at ease with them. They knew the streets. I learned the card game and we cheated each other every time we played. Eventually, she wanted to make pictures with me. She asked for more film every time I went to visit. A few years ago she invented a fictional character named Beti. Beti asked me to take pictures of her. She and Salam were similar: both watched their mothers die of AIDS, both were left to beg on the streets, both were likely raped, both found friends with similar problems. Beti went on to be a productive member of her community, helping others who suffered fates similar to her mother s. Salam ran away from home soon after we stopped photographing. She left her sister a phone number and said she would be working as a maid for some ferenji (white people). She packed up a few clothes, including a sweatsuit my mother had sent her, and she left. Yamrot waited a few days and called the number. The woman who answered spoke Amharic, said there were no ferenji there. She had never heard of Salam. A few months later, two boys went looking for her and found her. She had changed her name again: the other girls in the brothel call her Meron. Rough Draft -E.G.
Salam dancing the Tigrigna dance. Photograph by Eric Gottesman.
I Saw Mami Dead. Photograph by Salamawit Alemu. Rough Draft
One day, I saw a dream in which Mami, Mami s friends and my sisters and my brother were sitting together and suddenly a fire has begun burning the house and we ran out. Photograph by Amsale Shiferaw.
Above: Salamawit at the opening of her first exhibition. Minister of Labor Hassan Abdela and other officials stand behind her as she sings to exhibit attendees. Photograph by Eric Gottesman. Left: When I get married, I want to have a boy and a girl. And I want to gather all the poor children on the streets and give them food, and have a car and a house. I will be sure to take good care of my children. Photograph by Salamawit Alemu.
I am acting crazy. Photograph by Salamawit Alemu. Rough Draft
Salamawit acting as Beti. Photograph by Eric Gottesman Rough Draft
It is hard for us to look into the faces of fellow human beings, because begging is no different than being a thier. -- Beti. Photograph by Salamawit Alemu.
I Saw Mami Dead. -- Beti. Photograph by Eric Gottesman and Salamawit Alemu. Following pages: Images of Salamawit Alemu as Beti in the short film Maybe
A translation of a letter written by Salamawit s older sister, Yamrot Alemu. Rough Draft
I want to be a doctor. After I get my medical degree, I want to study the latest technologies by traveling outside my country. Photograph by Yamrot Alemu.
From a letter Salam s sister Yamrot wrote me in 2005: I tell you the same thing about Selam. She is not live with us. She live with her frindes. She almost three months. Also, she can not back into the house. M.M.M. also gave warning. And also, she stop the education. Sometimes she visit us and she call the phone. You know what I mean. More information ask Woini. I don t know about her but I advise her. I don t know what she is feeling. What you are say? Please write to her and advise. Rough Draft
Meron, 2006. Photograph by Eric Gottesman
Dear Salam, I don t know where you are. I wish I did. I wish someone did. When I was eight, I went with my mother to the market. She turned her head for a moment and I wandered away from her. I was lost among shelves of white bread. I started crying, wailing. A woman about my mother s age approached me and tried to calm me down but I could not say anything to her. I just screamed in her face and ran away. It was worse than a dream. Of course, I found her eventually. She was frantic and I clung so tightly to her that I tore a little hole in her shirt. She never said anything about it. Please write me soon. Love, Your brother, Eric Rough Draft Passport photographs of Eric Gottesman taken at various photo studios in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Salamawit is editing her pictures in my garden and looking at my through my glasses. Photograph by Eric Gottesman.
Salamawit as Meron, August 2007. Photograph by Eric Gottesman.
I asked her to work with me on the weekends. She came dressed as Meron. Friday and Saturday nights were busy for her, so she didn t have a chance to change out of her working clothes. I never asked her about her work; she told me she worked as a waitress. Some Ethiopian priest-healers write down the names of diseases in order to control them, to heal their sufferers. We had been working together for seven years, since she was nine. She taught me her card game. I know when she is lying. But I am no priest-healer. I cannot name her. I do not even want to. I call her Selam. She calls herself my sister in her letters to me. Still I do not know her. How can anyone who has lived on the streets of Addis Ababa be known by anyone who hasn t? I love her. I do not know her. It is scary. I asked her to write a bio for this book. Here is what she wrote: Once upon a time there was a girl called Selam. She lived in group home #1. Even though she likes to play, Selam never forgets about her education. She also likes to learn other things outside of school. Swimming with her friends is a lot of fun for her. But if her friends are not there, Selam is afraid. Now Selam is not living with her family. She works as a waitress and rents a room with her co-workers. What will be her future? Either she will return home or die like her parents if she does not take care of herself. Let us change her future and make her a good girl. Selam takes care not to indulge in bad habits. Rough Draft