Alrighty then!

Just as the last intensive therapy session had wound down (where we SELEDA understaffers discovered that our inner child was the end result of an exquisitely illicit affair between an overly enthusiastic idget be Hbret zemach and the bosomy molqaqa wife of a particularly avaricious mesafint-wannabe), we got lulled back into the SELEDA Boardroom after news of the Regime Change hit us like the stench of a QuTr Sost autobiss full of women with three-day-old qibE qeleT-leTT-ing down their necks.

Not that regime change. We refer, of course, to THE Regime Change where SELEDA upper management was ousted by a brave group of warriors who found compelling evidence of the previous regime’s Weapons of Mass Oppression tucked in several Marc Jacobs shopping bags.

Oh the joy we felt, SELEDAwiyan… after living under such dispiriting doldrums for such a long time, we dared peek into the world of liberty. We biqed into a realm free of dread that our bosses’ cappuccino was one Fahrenheit cooler than they liked, and then we Tliqed into a world where we could wear kefai jeans without fear of relentless denigration.

Our new leaders, it turns out, are champions of the “T.D.O” as we heard them refer to us—short for The Depressed Oppressed. They went as far as to intimate that even those who went to high schools with names that included words such as “aTeqali” and “komprehensive” were welcome at the New SELEDA, “as long as they were first shift”. Wow. So this is what it’s like to be in the presence of Saints.

Soon the movement towards egalitarianism corralled into high gear… AffleNa injera and shrro were added to the cafeteria menu so as to make “those people who grew up on that stuff feel at home”, as was Strawberry flavored ashuq. Hmm.

Happy days, no? How can we not love people who have convinced us that silets are tax deductible, although we have not yet quite figured out how much to deduct for carrying a shekm full of stones all the way from Mesqel Addebabai to BolE Mikahel for that umm, favor MikaEl did us, er.. with the rash and stuff. But that’s just a technicality, our new comptroller has assured us.

Dehna senebetachiu, SELEDochacn? Yes, we are back melkesskessing in these cyber-kliloch. Please don’t mind us. We’ll tiptoe around you lest we bum you out again.

Welcome to the Wedding and Leqso Issue! We being we, and the people we surround ourselves being more we than us, it appears that we all collectively have more issues with leqso than serg. ENass, ok, we are certified doomsayers. (The last positive thought we had, after all, was to wonder if we should stop wondering about what kind of fatal illness we should feign to get out of them marathon gmgema sessions.) Enante gn mn y’balal? But, bottom line, waiter, another round of giddy thank yous to our contributors- new and old- for saving SELEDA from mediocrity. It continues to amaze us that we are allowed to breathe the same air as our esteemed contributors; although we hear that (deservedly) their air is purified with lomi droplets and organically grown Tenaadam. Either way, we are ruinously humbled and indebted.

What’s new at SELEDA, you hesitantly ask?

Well, if we were half the people we claim to be, we would have apologized with the proper contrition versus mmmmskeen ratio by this stage. Our disappearing act was unwarranted and, well, downright imbecilic. We have no heart-wrenching excuse, at least none that would mollify anyone with a respectable IQ. Suffice it to say that we will try our darnest to continue to bring you SELEDA in a timely manner.

Which brings us to the issue of you closet SELEDifiers, you who are thinkers and writers, intellects and satirist who have somehow escaped being zeroed in on by the rusty SELEDA-Radar! Yes, you. Get in gear and join us in the virtual hot tub full of nubile, writhing SELEDeNoch. Enough with just peeking in from your heavily fortified kaporta-on-top-of-a-gabi getup! Abo. We need you to strip down to your cyber butanti and jump in. Your articles give us life… and seriously, you have not lived until you have menboraCHeqed in the hot tub with some of SELEDA’s regular contributors… one of them, we won’t name names, has certain opprobrious proclivities towards nqisat, and has on several occasions, been caught er, trying to convince newcomers to find all the nqisat on her body of her high school logo. AyTal. But that’s not the point. We need your contributions to avoid yet another agonizing stall on the Never-Neverland fErmata. Enough said.

So, what upcoming issues do we have for your writing pleasure? We’re glad you asked.

As planned, we are forging ahead with our 2015 Issue in July/August. All of you who have received our invitation to participate in the “Seleda Five: A Challenge” are hereby officially urged to submit your entries along with hulet Tassa of the best Tella your money can buy; as should the artists who we have asked/badgered/blackmailed to create artwork/icon symbolizing Ethiopia in 2015. Of course, we would be delighted to extend the call to all interested artists who’d like to participate in next month’s SELEDA Berenda. We are looking for original artwork/icon that, to you, will best represent Ethiopia eight years from today. Contributions for essays and artworks are due by June 20… June 21 if you were one of the bidders for a 30% stake of telE.

LeTiqo, we will inaugurate the New Year with our Paranoia and… issue in September. Huh? Mn? Paranoid? Ma? INa? Nyyyyyyyyyver. Paranoid sibal lemalet yetefelegew? Mn? Who told you we were paranoid? Articles are due no later than August 20… no, 19th… no. 20th. Don’t tell anyone though.

October will bring with it, yaw ye sew neger..ke afer wede afer, the Irony and Platitudes issue. Oh, yeah. It’s going to be hard to find platitude in the Ethiopian hemisphere, what with us being too busy meticulously metekossing the living daylights out the irony in our neTela. But, what the hey… let’s try, why don’t we? Deadline for articles is September 20, unless you’ve already asked the question “Innat SELEDoch… Regarding the previous issue… what does that mean, the ‘Paranoia and…’ Issue?? You made a mistake. Please let us know Paranoia and what?? Are you trying to say something else? By the way, who are you? Thank you for your assistant.” In that case, you can have an extra day to submit your piece. (September 21.)

So, you see, plenty of room in hot tub!

What else is new?

Aha! Who said we were worthless netrakoch with unstylish-ly pointless lives? Besides former upper management? And our parents? NO ONE. And as proof that we might have done something right in the past, we are proud to announce that we were one of the award recipients at the 2003 Society of Established Ethiopian in the Diaspora’s (www.s-e-e-d.org ) legendarily fabulous dinner and dance. Yessssss. Us. We knew that deep down we were somebody trapped in a nobody’s body… after all, per intensive therapist, part of us came from aristocracy. That blue blood flowing uneasily in our veins prevents us from telling some of our detractors where to take their smart alecky “observations” about our “complexaminet”. We, yenE nat, have been SEED’ed. (You can read our acceptance speech here).

Is enough too much, because we’re exhausted here. For cats who are just re-entering the scene we feel like we’re already working too hard. No more. Besides, according to new management Mondays are officially “be happy” days, and boy, have we been hurtin’ for some kinda saccharine overdrive! Ere we have to go. We have to go dig up MengE era “ekulinet” material and dress for a ye medeb tgl reenactment. We love these new guys. It doesn’t even matter that we don’t know their names.

It’s great to be back. And thank you for taking us back.

We look forward to getting your comments. Until next month, selam hunulin.
The Humble Editors
editors@seleda.com