Overland Travel From Alexandria to Cape(part one)

5.5.5 Ethiopia does not have an Independence Day, as Ethiopia is the oldest ancient country in the world that has never been colonized or controlled.

The human heart navigates grief along its own unique and deeply personal course. For me, my father's passing, he was the awakened patriarch, the anchor of our community, compelled me to be fully present during his final days. He was my compass, the proving ground where I learned so much. I was privileged to care for him in Seattle, a way to honor his profound influence on my life. Subsequently, destiny offered me two years in Ethiopia, head hunted to be the youngest COO of an international startup Bank from PNW, a precious window to bid him farewell, put my passion into practice, a significant grace given the geographical distance that had grown between my two worlds in Africa & Americas.

Human intentions often remain veiled, driven by the primal need for survival, revealing themselves most clearly in the pursuit of control and power. I witnessed painful realities during grief, change, and awakening. In my highest global success, I consciously chose a path guided by a higher purpose, embracing self-forgiveness and discovering detachment in stillness, to serve God. In sacred remembrance and legacy of my father's unwavering integrity, choosing to seek, explore, heal, and live an impactful and sustainable lifestyle, choosing peace over power. My father and I had challenged each other to finally negotiate advisor roles rather than dictator by my 16th birthday. I celebrated his life through my personal transformation, success, sharing moments of joy in the global world, and cherishing his indomitable spirit at my epic MBA graduation celebration I threw in a Pan-African restaurant in PNW.

In my focus, discipline, hard work, and going into my next phase in my career and personal life in my 20s, I chose the Pacific Northwest. I felt embraced, soothed, safe, surrounded by nature, and felt the Native Americans' spirit embraced me. It is a place of healing and growing, becoming successful with $100 in my pocket, alone in my feminine divinity. I chose PNW, away from my family, as a new adventure and beginning, to test and challenge my being into a new phase of adulthood. In my success, having traveled around the US, Europe, and walked the Bible, I felt ready to serve the family, community, society, and humanity where I am needed.

My solo overland journey through more than ten African countries began in Alexandria, Egypt, and eventually carried me all the way to South Africa, exhausted but unbroken. This was more than travel. It was a pilgrimage through history, memory, and mourning, to seek what was seeking me, to explore, inner engineer, and serve.

I climbed the 3,000 steps of Mount Sinai, tracing the path Moses walked to receive God's laws. I stood breathless at sunrise, cradled by sacred silence. In Afar—the cradle of humankind—I slept under open skies, beside an active volcano, humbled by nature's ancient fury. I traveled by plane, by road, and on foot across savannahs, deserts, and mountains. I went on safaris in every form: from game drives to trekking through the bush. I white-water rafted through Rapid Five on the mighty Zambezi, and journeyed along the Nile, from its start in Bahir Dar hopping across islands until it reached the Mediterranean Sea in Alexandria, Egypt, via a five-day cruise. I went whale shark diving, snorkeling on coral reefs, as well as sunset cruises on dhows. In South Africa, I stepped inside Mandela's prison cell. I stood still in museums where the past screamed in whispers—the brutality of apartheid, colonial racism, and economic injustice laid bare. Every place held its own wounds. Each nation pulsed with a rhythm shaped by struggle, strength, and resilience. I felt alive, interconnected, and multidimensional.

Along the way, I filled five journals with reflections, raw truths, fleeting insights, and hard-won revelations in solitude. This was not an easy journey as a solo Black woman. It was marked by hardship, solitude, and the kind of spiritual reckoning that only the road can bring. To experience Africa as a well-educated, spiritual Black woman, transitioning from my safe career in banking to being a digital nomad with an entrepreneurship spirit, in mourning, was to walk with both memory and vision. My Ethiopian genetics and ancestors instilled my sense of worth; my Ethiopian Orthodox Christian faith gave me God's laws, rituals, behavior, and spiritual living; the West educated and trained me in the facts of life, my ego, and instilled a sense of global ambition. Africa stripped me down and rebuilt me as a spiritual warrior—rooted, reverent, and awake. In quiet moments, I could hear the past breathing through the trees, feel the ancestors stirring in the dust. This continent does not just speak. It sings, it aches, it teaches. I was the only Black woman on almost all my travels in Africa, as I felt worthy just being my authentic self in integrity. Which shocked my naive ignorance, and made those around me feel threatened and uncomfortable.

By my 15th country in Africa, in Djibouti, I traced my ancient spirit in consciousness and awareness. I went whale shark diving, fearless, alone, and interconnected in the Red Sea. Djibouti is where I saw foreigners, Afars, Ethiopians, the Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and a new sea being formed to separate from Africa, just like India, Yemen, Middle East, Europe, Americas, and Madagascar.

As a focused, disciplined, and visionary woman, being at the right place and time, being headhunted and serving in Africa, as a successful, wealthy, healthy, spiritually led and free spirit, was often met with incomprehension, almost challenged by most, and skeptical of my intentions. As my position of power traveling solo, living a spiritual purpose as a digital nomad, choosing Africa specifically Ethiopia was clearly unexpected for all, as I stood out in my free spirit and serving God. Within my two-year test period, this immersive experience yielded invaluable data and insights on how to serve. Despite the barriers to entry, threats, my blindside, resistance, weakness, fear, doubt, and rejections I was met by, in prayer, meditation, Lent, and fasting, I had my confirmation, strength, courage, vision, opportunity, and calling that led me. Making my first venture into my ancestors' land successful.

In my evolution as a woman, after a once-in-a-lifetime epic adventure through Africa, I finally dedicated my business Deldeyoch (meaning bridges in Amharic) to my father's legacy, when he passed away. I chose a path less traveled, only equipped with faith, remembrance, and love. This is my story.

I observed that many people globally were armored, in survival, figuring it out and broke their covenant with God, to belong, to avoid confronting the present moment, desperate for control, power, to compete. Most of us afraid to feel our deepest fears, as well as doubting our worth, and masked in hiding to live in outdated institutions that is an illusion. Most travelers are seekers, and looking to belong, be valued, seen and heard, realizing the enslavement of the collective egoic minded false state identity that we inherited.

I faced resistance with my egoic identity false self attached to my mother, family, partners, the society itself, as well as humanity, when I chose my own path. I was determined to remain free and choose my own path. Living in a socially ancient culture, matriarchy, patriarchy and religious country that is complex in its social structure, as well as religious, I was challenged, tested and my tolerance was beyond my limited mind, in my conviction of my truth and spiritual purpose.

Having only my father's values as a guiding force in my life, surrendering ultimately only to God, intuitive, instinctive and trusting my gut feeling, I felt I was shielded, protected and content in love and being a disruptor. I had made a childhood vow of self-sufficiency, that resurfaced a decade later, as I returned to Ethiopia with what the world considers wealth, success, health, and a sense of inner power, intending to serve. I looked for my equally yoked spiritual partner and chose to heal myself, to serve and grow until he shows up. I chose to go on this phase in my life alone, carefully choosing partners on the way, being my purpose.

The degree of sabotage, manipulation, the sudden desperate need for affiliation, and the sheer number of vultures, vampires, and masked hijackers drawn to my success as a woman was astounding. It was like moth to fire. In my stillness, my privacy, and my inner journey, I succeeded in my calling, and buried my father, observed the politics of illusionary family, community, society and humanity armored and in survival, and left Africa just like how I came, in private. I also felt grief, anger, rage, clouded, gagged and coded by outdated social institutions, level of desperation, the level of theft, pathological lying and suppression of woman, even unconsciously to each other in desperation. I was in an inner battle, as my intuition, insight, gut feeling and instinct felt inspired, and alive, to serve where I am most uncomfortable, to confront my fears, doubt, chain, trap, trauma and limited mental prison, yet again on another phase in my life.

As a knower, observer, watcher, and grounded to God, constantly in prayer, fasting, meditation and awareness from God's view, Africa overwhelmed all my senses after two years of immersion. I was grateful for my life, support, loving friends and family globally, as a woman blessed with my feminine divinity. I felt gifted, blessed and empowered, having overcome so much tests, challenges, worked hard, focused and disciplined, to be self sufficient in solitude, aligned to God, to serve where I am called and chosen.

By the age of 35 in PNW, having taken care of myself half my life, I had witnessed more than the average human, and become my feminine divinity in solitude, interconnected. I experienced a spiritual awakening and embraced a lean life dedicated to service, following ancient faith-based spiritual practices daily to cultivate presence and discipline my mind to resonate at a higher frequency. With spiritual practices, prayer, meditation, fasting and eating healthy to lead me to success, transformed into a quiet inner strength. Self-sufficient in the Pacific Northwest, influenced solely by God, in my success, I became acutely aware of the envy and toxic individuals drawn to my energy, including insecure partners from every continent, as men are hunters, but they find out quickly that my kindness does not make me prey, because I am a sharp equally yoked spiritual partner that forgives myself to learn, grow and move on. Grateful for the spiritual lifestyle I was raised in, had cultivated in love, and light in PNW, and chose to honor my father's spirit by becoming a digital nomad globally as such.

Despite my success, and ignorance, I chose to grieve, seek, serve and explore with an overland journey through Africa solo, a true pilgrimage of remembrance, as deep within me resided my authentic feminine divinity warrior, that felt stifled and that I wanted to honor.

Why the African brain drain? What can I do to be part of the change I seeked? So many around me in their 30s were trapped by fear, distrustful, lost, living in repetitive survival mode, often vengeful, power hungry, mistaking toxic systems for wisdom, clinging to labels assigned by human beings that held little true meaning, and operating behind masks of competition, control, force, and manipulation in a desperate grab for false power. All to belong, be validated, to be seen and valued.

My being deeply yearned for ancestral soil, to align to God's universe. I sought a deeper understanding of how to use my gifts, blessings and inner wisdom. By 35, I had began to question my purpose, keenly observing the fallibility of others. I found most partners I met that I felt safe, secure and protected with were not equally yoked spiritually, as most had chosen atheism, agnostic and become non believers to disassociate from their childhood trauma. I accepted, acknowledged and embraced God's choice for my spirit, that marriage, children and family was a long term process. You cannot imagine how free I felt once God revealed the insight that I can venture in life without the institute of marriage, and choose not to bring innocent children in this sinful world unless I was consciousness. My faith, vision and calling became my sole anchor. My spirit felt constrained within a Western system and an ancient religious practice, as well as having reached an awakening. Masked, hiding and labelled by global success, groomed by western education, wealthy, healthy, and ignorant as well as naive of the truth underneath it all. I confronted my egoic minded false state in grief. Something within me needed a spiritual awakening. I prayed for clarity regarding my purpose, there was a contradiction of ideologies as I felt at home in all. My ultimate go to at a crossroads, is to choosing to travel where I am most uncomfortable, to challenge my senses. This time it was overland across Africa to gain a profound understanding of how to live a spiritual purpose life as a woman in the 21st-century, whether in Africa or PNW.

This journey into serving and overlanding through Africa, despite my mental resistance and inner battle, spiritually ignited my awakening after two years in what felt like a stifling environment. An inner whisper urged me to confront deep-seated fears and relentlessly seek truth. Many around me mistook my heightened awareness for fear, or my kindness for weakness, attempting to manipulate me, but would soon learn I do not take projects without an exit strategy if I feel unethical practices. I continued to evolve, aligning myself with God in isolation, surrendering only to His guidance. Once a young banker, I held the position of the youngest COO in Ethiopia, and Assistant VP in commercial lending in the Pacific Northwest in the most competitive financial sector globally, all while honoring my father's enduring spirit. As the first CEO of Entrepreneurship Development center in Ethiopia, my focus, discipline and hard work baffled the UNDP head called me an enigma amidst a web of conspiracies between stakeholders, even withholding my salary to take sides. Despite their internal conflict, I inaugurated the Entrepreneur center from nothing, and delivered a well run center, structured and with regional network. When I resigned shortly after, stating clearly that God, not him, had entrusted me with the vision for the project.

On my overland through Africa, my spirit felt unconfined, yet so many readily labeled me "American." The Western curriculum I had absorbed couldn't fully contain the breadth of my being. It seemed the world, as a collective ego, exploited fear as a tool for control. After a decade, a sense of disconnect persisted. Returning solely to the familiar felt like a stifling of my spirit's true expression. True liberation, I realized, embraces the unknown. I knew that my authenticity and freedom would likely be met with envy, manifesting as attacks often masked by religious rhetoric. As someone that embodies the essence of working hard to achieve my visions, at times losing friends, family and partners, having achieved significant milestones privately, I consciously chose a different journey—an inward exploration through the heart of Africa, seeking my true essence, standing at a crossroads between a secure life and the uncharted territory of selfless service in Africa. I needed a spiritual awakening, the abundance of gifts I had received called for reciprocity. I departed, guided by a profound sense of divine purpose, recognizing my deep and intrinsic connection to the land.

This phase of my life was going to be career and social suicide as I will start from scratch, to go against everything I built, to understand what is needed from the source, and building policies, solutions and doing my advisory work based on projects that can heal the earth, my being, and the society, community and universe I serve. Which meant I had to get out of my comfortable, secure and resume life I was prepped for as a woman, and seek what was seeking me, and flow with life, to be in my masculine and feminine power, aligned to God's universe.

A profound realization in 2009 struck me: I had the courage, momentum, ignorance, naivety, fearless nature and innocence to venture like a child into a new venture. I have done the SWOT analysis. Why were so many so-called religious Africans limited in their sense of self-worth to survival, armored and to belong? How could I gain deeper truth to truly serve God? What will be my cost of venturing to be part of a change in a family, community, society and humanity? How should I structure my company, to limit my attachment, exposure to toxic energy, serve, thrive and be private to align to God not my weakness and threaten as a human being?

My father's wisdom guided me to trust only Christ. Torn between the familiarity of the Pacific Northwest and the deep pull of my ancestral land, I witnessed global self-sabotage and inherited chaos. In the realm of worldly success, nearly everyone sought to influence me through manipulation. Shocked by the perceived importance of power in these interactions, I gained a clearer understanding of my own ego. Ethiopia and Africa, with their ancient and rich societies, held a deep significance for me, yet I observed a sense of self-sabotage within Ethiopia. My quest became the foundation for Deldeyoch (2010), a means through which I could contribute authentically.

The journey itself ignited a new sense of purpose. Despite my Western education, I felt a profound lack in certain areas. If I could successfully operate a bank and simultaneously care for my dying father, as well as be part of a powerful group of Diaspora that came back to be part of Ethiopia and Africa's evolution, I knew deep down my worth and knowing I AM enough, worthy, and more than I think or imagine. As a free-spirited woman, in my feminine divinity, I chose to surrender to the unknown, so as to build the bridge between the past, present and future, and there warrior in my story.

The turning point in my overland travel in Africa, was between Zambia and Zimbabwe, getting into a routine of solitude despite being with a big travel group. I had buried my father, inaugurated a successful international bank, and chose to go back to PNW to my familiar lifestyle after almost two years saying my goodbyes, but wanted to grieve through mama Africa. I felt I had outgrown my old home, and family, as my father was my last glue. I was on a crossroads, in mourning of my old self, envisioning a new one, so I surrendered to God. After my 7th African country overland, I felt a surge of emotions, anger, and a profound sense of gratitude, having chosen to gift myself a year sabbatical to pray, meditate, Lent and fast to face my fears, and transition to where I can serve God.

**Continued in Part Two**    

By Dutchess @deldeyoch