Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown | Ethiopia | S06 E05 | All Documentary

Anthony Bourdain's Parts Unknown explores Ethiopia, with chef Marcus Samuelson returning to Addis Ababa to reconnect with his roots, food, skateboarding youth, and music.

Key Takeaways

Ethiopia is undergoing rapid urban and economic change that contrasts sharply with its international image of famine.
Identity and belonging are complex for diaspora returnees, who often feel both at home and foreign.
Ethiopian food and communal eating customs carry deep cultural meaning.
Youth culture, from skateboarding to music, reflects a new generation's optimism and creativity.

What the video covers

Bourdain presents Addis Ababa as a fast-growing, high-altitude capital that challenges Western stereotypes of famine and despair.
Chef Marcus Samuelson, born in Ethiopia, was adopted as a child after surviving tuberculosis with his mother's 75-mile walk to a Swedish hospital.
Samuelson reflects on his identity as a Swedish-American Ethiopian and how returning feels both familiar and uncomfortable.
The episode highlights Ethiopian cuisine, including injera bread, shiro, tibs, and the spice blend berbere, and the communal sharing tradition of gursha.
A grassroots skateboarding community, Ethiopia Skate, has grown in Addis from parking lots, with few local shops and boards imported from abroad.
The youthful population (median age under 18) represents a generation hopeful about the country's economic boom.
Musical legend Mahmoud Ahmed and Ethiopia's vibrant 1970s-era music scene are featured as sources of cultural pride.
The episode touches on Ethiopia's history, including Haile Selassie's reign, the Derg communist regime under Mengistu, and the state seizure of agricultural land.
Samuelson's wife Maya, from the Gurage region, is shown in her village, illustrating the country's ethnic and linguistic diversity.
The episode concludes with Samuelson's exhaustive search for his birth family, beginning in 2004.

Chapters

Why did Marcus Samuelson come to Sweden?

As a toddler in the 1970s, Marcus was stricken with tuberculosis and, with his sister and mother, walked 75 miles to a Swedish hospital in Addis Ababa. He survived and was later adopted by Anne-Marie and Leonard Samuelson, growing up in Sweden.

What is the skateboarding community in Addis Ababa like?

Ethiopia Skate is a grassroots community that grew up in parking lots around Addis. With no local skate shops, boards must be imported, and a couple hundred skaters are active in the country.

What is the significance of the gursha tradition shown in the episode?

Gursha is the practice of feeding someone by hand as a sign of affection and respect during shared meals. Bourdain humorously notes it is an awkward gesture in Western settings.

Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown

Speaker A

where is home [Music] most of us are born with the answer [Music] others have to sift through the pieces [Music] felt the cool rain on my shoulders [Music] i felt the rain [Applause] [Music] [Music] is [Music] admit it you hear the name ethiopia and

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you think starving children with distended bellies you think dust and famine and despair so awful you frankly don't want to even think about it anymore but take a look addis ababa capital city of ethiopia a cool high altitude urban

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center that will both confirm and confound expectations [Music] fueled largely by direct foreign investment and a returning ethiopian diaspora eager to be part of the new growth things are changing in addis it's one of the fastest growing economies in

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the world it's not the first time the place has gone through a growth spurt in the 1950s emperor haile selassie known as the king of kings embarked on a similar program of massive public works this was supposed to be the legacy of

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ethiopia the future but the next time ethiopia found itself in the headlines it was for this and for many of us that was the end of the story [Music] so i'm looking forward to this week i can't wait to show you ethiopia i've

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been waiting for you i mean i'm out there right now we couldn't have picked a better time because we have old ethiopia right here and we also have new ethiopia right here and that's like that combo is going to be so cool marcus samuelson

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maybe you know him from such shows as a lot of them or his many restaurants his best-selling memoir his status as america's most recognizable black chef but marcus isn't african-american he's swedish american or ethiopian swedish american or look it's complicated what

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is true to say is that marcus samuelson like his wife maya was born here in ethiopia so where was the last time you were you were in ethiopia four years ago and uh you can tell it's changed changed a lot

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i'm i'm interested in seeing an african country that was never uh colonized it it was never taken by europe no that sense of pride and you you really hit the nail on the head i mean that sense of pride it's also that sense of

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that everyone wants to come back how does it feel coming back is it weird at all you feel like you're coming home it is weird but end of the day i always love it i miss it one foot of me is like just

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ethiopian but then the other food is just so swedish or american at this point right you do not speak the language here americorps or any of the dialects um you've since come back and you've reconnected with family yeah but it must

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be weird i mean it did you need a translator no but you i need a translator my wife is now my translator in life and in culture and so many things but i think when when you're a black man when you're

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an immigrant when you're ethiopian when you're sweden i've been put in so many situations that i put myself into so i'm actually very comfortable in the being uncomfortable in the 1970s ethiopia was hit with a tuberculosis epidemic marcus his older

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sister fente and his mom were all stricken with the disease [Music] with no possibility a medical attention in their village facing the almost inevitable death of both her children marcus's mom set out on foot with her daughter at her side and two-year-old

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marcus on her back walking 75 miles to the swedish hospital in addis [Music] against all odds they made it marcus and fantai recovered their mother did not [Music] marcus and his sister were adopted by anne-marie and leonard samuelson and

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raised from that point on in sweden ethiopia its language its food its cultures was largely a mystery marcus traveled and trained apprenticing in some of the great kitchens of europe he moved to new york and at the remarkably young age of 23 received

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three stars from the new york times at his groundbreaking restaurant aquavi it's been a pretty stellar rise since then and in 2010 he opened red rooster in harlem i always find it so paradox that i was born into very little food

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but yet sort of i made my whole life about food my sort of structure and pragmatism comes from being raised in sweden and my sort of vibrancy and warmth to cooking and field-based food that i love comes definitely from here

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weirdly enough the single aspect of ethiopian culture most westerners do know a little about is ethiopian food so maybe you've had this oh wow ah now that that looks good that that that is exciting what is it this is typical ethiopian vegetarian

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they make it really nice at katenga restaurant they do it classic and jira bread that's ethiopian 101. i mean when you think about ethiopian food right the foundation is really the injera bread it's not just food it's it

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implements it yeah we're having bianettu a selection of stews or watts as they're called around here that's goldman sauteed greens shirowat which is a chickpea stew and tico gomen sauteed white cabbage many if not most of the dishes spiced with the magical

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mysterious flavoring of the gods berbere can i can i give you one like nobody they do they say you have to this this stuffing of food in your fellow diners face is called gersha and it's what you do to show your affection

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and respect try this at the waffle house sometime and prepare for awkwardness now when you were born here i was born left what age 13. i grew up in holland and after that we all went to london germany and i'm in new york now

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so i don't want to say it's a rootless existence but but it's uh you know where's home i think for us now if harlem is really home but when i've been gone for two years i'm like i gotta go back because the

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beat is just so different than what sweden can offer me and definitely what new york can offer me the median age in ethiopia is under 18.

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that means most people here don't remember live aid or any of that coupled with a recent economic boom this might be the first generation in decades to enjoy a future with real hope things are indeed happening in this case at a vacant bus stop

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they're dogtown man they're the next generation from dog town in africa a few years back a couple of ethiopians who've been living abroad returned to addis with some skateboards today there are a couple hundred skaters in ethiopia and more on the sidelines

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waiting for their chance waiting for a board waiting for a pair of sneakers it's funny though because like skater boy culture came from white southern california suburban you could pretty much track all of skater culture back to like one parking lot yeah so what's

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coming out of this parking lot [Music] there are no skateboard shops in ethiopia none they have to come all of them from abroad nice little kids good little kid is amazing [Music] for those lucky enough to have them

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progression seems to be fast this gives me hope honestly that this can be a really cool town not just a great town with big buildings you know but a cool town too [Music] for skater boys and television hosts

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alike the thing to do in late night at us is something called turbo and tiffs i feel like a college party or something like that that's perfect turbo is a mutant concoction consisting of gin beer wine and sprite

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what's the first rule of drinking don't mix ebenezer temescan adizu haley michael and bruseo julienne founded ethiopia skate the grassroots skating community that grew up in the parking lots around addis sean stromso is a founding member who's been documenting the group

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all right man my first my first turbo cheers it's like apple juice you're right sweet it's like apple juice shekla tibs are chunks of beef or lamb fried in oil and served in a charcoal heated clay pot called a shekla

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nice i like the fat line i love that they don't they don't hide the fat every tib's house has their own version but here at messe grocery it's served with a spicy dipping sauce called mit mitta and of course in jira bread

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yeah that's good that works [Music] how did this skating community form i mean do people watch what people other people are doing around the world definitely some of them they go to the internet cafe and they just see videos that's how i started

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back in the days no internet for me i had to do it like the hard way man i would tell you right now if i were ethiopian or if i even lived here i would open a skate shop tomorrow tomorrow

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so what's the best thing about ethiopia right now i think back in the days you know people want to get out from this country just leave but now they're like they just want to work and their mind has changed

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and everybody's working together and working for the better we're doing this for the next generation because the next generation is going to take this did we drink all that turbo i know we're terrible people yeah [Music] [Applause] [Music]

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so time to catch a buzz you guys need to be my bodyguard no problem oh this place is awesome this is a charming ethiopian institution called a tejbet they serve one thing and only one thing tesh an alcoholic

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beverage made from fermented barley and honey it's not highly alcoholic though right you gotta pretty much hammer back a lot of this stuff but so basically the people around here have got a load on they they've been working on this for a long time all day

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this is a working class this is where the workers go it's a cheap bus it's a cheap bus [Music] cheers he just knocked it back all right [Music] it's good man you feel the funk oh yeah right yeah it's working man

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i've never seen a woman in a bar like this it's forbidden this is sort of a guy thing it's my first time yeah guys after work or the farmers we breaking major rules here and you have all like the same picture

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there and you're drinking there's a lot of jesus in the bars it's the last thing i want to see in a bar the disapproving gaze of a saint [Music] in 1992 addis emerged from the stifling 17-year grip of a hard-line old-school

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maoist regime called the durg since then the town has been enjoying something of a musical renaissance but the story of ethiopian music all the way back to the beginning has been about finding ways to skirt authority to mock

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it even to say what you want to say one way or the other [Music] the azmari are ethiopia's original freestyle rappers they've been around for centuries voicing criticism dissatisfaction descent even when others could not so how old my how old is my debate i would say what

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2000 years the trick is they've always used a system of lyrical double meanings referred to as wax meaning the apparent meaning and gold which is the underlying or real meaning poking fun at the audience is fundamental to the forum

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[Music] [Laughter] hello yes [Music] when showed up [Music] the asmari influenced ethiopian popular music too the use of lyrical double meanings carried through into selassie's time they called it swinging attis a golden time between 1955 and 1974 before those

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fun-hating commies came and ruined everything [Music] post world war ii ethiopia was in the delirious thrall of american big band and swing groups like glenn miller and against the backdrop of a traditional and official obsession with military marching bands you had the means and the

Speaker A

will and the environment to make musical magic and this man mahmoud ahmed has always been at the forefront [Music] foreign [Music] when you looked to the west were there uh american musicians who spoke to you yesterday m [Music]

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combining elements of jazz swing r b and distinctive ethiopian scales and time signatures and an always killer horn section well listen for yourself [Music] me [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] all right [Music] it's where you come for what you need

Speaker A

what are we here to buy by the way what's the plan i want to make dorawa really the king of chicken dishes in ethiopia all right so we're going to go ahead down here get some good butter you smell the fermentation the fung funk

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an ethiopian butter in various stages of fermentation depending on what you like it is a primary ingredient in much of the cooking so there's between one is really fermented and another one is medium so she says we should use the

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medium for chicken soup and you use all the spices this is the most important thing [Music] people from maya's tribal area run the market so she knows the language and how to negotiate i could smell a frightened chicken yeah

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a mile off here we go guys how many do we need i just think we need three it's fine [Music] my mama done told me get something for dinner in this case chicken fresh please see you wouldn't want to be you

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oh that's fresh i love all the sounds like it's like chicken there music there how did he get the skin off he just one movie did it we used to use like a hot boiled water yeah after killing and eating there

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that's how i grew up morocco has rasal hanut india garam masala ethiopia has this the brightly colored berberine the color is amazing and those guys who grind this stuff are covered with it breathe it all day long [Music]

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marcus left ethiopia at age two so finding and reconnecting with his family has not been easy [Music] tracking down a mom who died in similar circumstances on the right dates following a thread to a dusty village in the oromo region where marcus found the

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man he has come to accept as his biological father he also found tiggest salem zebani ashu and daniel presumably his siblings by another mother together marcus and his sisters make dorowat a classic chicken stew i'm going to talk about old feel and i

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need it to be go back to new york and be the chef that i have to be i really need welcome to uh sega family meal sega family so we start with injera bread right besides the dorowat we have cabbage

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beets and collards root vegetables finished with the livers and giblets of the chicken actually it looks spicier than it is good very good though a continuing bone of contention with his father marcus and maya have sponsored the girls moving them all to

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the city and getting them into school in the countryside these girls face the likelihood of forced marriage even abduction and very little chance of the kind of future they might have now so how'd that go over with the family when

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you said i'm gonna try to help you i mean my dad was like absolutely not we need them on the farm right it couldn't have been done without maya that really not only translates but also understands the culture

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because i felt also bad coming in as the quote-unquote americans saying okay everyone should move to the city you had to be gradually two by two by two right so when i had to pick which two i picked the girls because otherwise i

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should have been out of school by second grade if she would have followed the tradition of the country second grade that's it [Music] what after that you stay you work at home [Music] it's been very enriching and loving you

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know for us and we have a purpose you know we know what our goal is our goal is to get them through school you're looking at a chemist in a couple of months whatever new ethiopia you see they're at

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farmers coming in and going to school and now have options [Music] [Music] addis is one thing a city experiencing a renaissance of sorts an economic boom outside of the city the farther away one gets one is reminded that in fact

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ethiopia remains one of the poorest countries in the world [Music] marcus and maya come from two completely different tribes two completely different regions of ethiopia with distinct languages and cultures all their own maya comes from the guragi region a more

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fertile green agricultural area than marcus's it's about three hours out from the city and it's beautiful [Music] maya it should be noted left home at a much later age there's no question of identity she's african she's garagi and

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she retains close ties to her family and to her village thank you she was here just last year it's been four years since they've seen marcus [Music] maya's mother bizanesh and de facto grandmother owl welcome us [Music] when visitors come everything starts

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with coffee traditionally it's served here with a bit of salt not sugar that's good maya's story differs from marcus's in a lot of ways it was not disease or famine or poverty that drove her and her brother petras to

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europe and a new life he was the brutal reality of politics so who was your father my dad was my hero and everyone's hero and this i mean everyone but my brother could explain a little bit more he was a

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local chief and also a member of the supreme or the highest court you can say during the haris lasse period he was engaged in more innovative and and experimental mechanized farm with during the communist yes period you know

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something unexpected happened in 1974 emperor haile selassie was deposed and the very unpleasant general mengistu and a hardline communist regime called the durg took over the country as in mao's china all agricultural property was taken over by the state and broken

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up into small parcels everything what my father had the land the property is confiscated and those who had authority they had the chance to work together to cooperate or they were enemies right anyone deemed an enemy of the state and

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this could be a very dangerously loose definition but usually and typically included the educated the well-off and anyone associated with a former government were hunted down shunned jailed harassed and often straight out killed maya's dad was all those things an

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educated landowner and part of the rural tribal administration from the salazi time most people who had the means left the country i know this guy who is appointed you know as a governor of the region killed 60 people in the region here in uh three

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years time you know nobody knows when he's coming right he just knocked our door and my mom she gets every time he comes he give her um bullets he tells her this bullet next time is yours if you don't bring your husband

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so my dad always came to visit us in night time so he never been really home around during the daytime so for most of that time your father had to live in hiding yeah yeah and we all survived by the grace of god and

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we are blessed for this [Music] [Music] morning in maya's village [Music] marcus is a runner every day wherever he is he runs a few miles me not so much but what with my cardio shockingly improved of late i figured

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i'd give it a try [Music] foreign maya and marcus's return not to mention the invasion of a big foreign television crew is reason or maybe excuse for a big party and preparations have already begun maya slips seamlessly from her other

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life as a high fashion model back into her more traditional role in village life working along with an army of other women to prepare what looks like a massive feast how do they uh how do the ladies feel

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about you cooking this you see you're using a serious problem no you already crossed it because you're the first foreigner ever in that kitchen [Music] a lamb of course must be slaughtered actually in this case two lambs because

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here as in much of ethiopia muslims and christians live side by side one lamb gets the halal treatment one for the christians it's a peculiar history of peaceful coexistence here of which ethiopians are quite proud the christians came here during the time

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of the apostles from the very beginnings of christianity as a religion and the belief is that muhammad after being persecuted and driven from mecca by the quresh fled to ethiopia where he found refuge [Music] dog is happy oh yeah nice and bloody in his face oh

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yeah that's awesome the production continues women in the kitchen except for marcus who looks most comfortable there though his presence is a befuddlement to the others men taking care of the meat oh bro food traditions you're everywhere [Music]

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we know none of the people that cook kid today right consider themselves cooks but all of them like well like in rural communities when you kill a big couple animals right everybody in the village has sort of a

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chosen specialty like joe bob over there he does the the cracker over there does the boudin somebody else over there is like good at just scraping the fur off somebody else but everybody's gotta function you know it goes right back to the first fire i mean

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i'll bring the i'll bring the dip you know normally you hold it like this and then you have you put everything you want right here we got it so you guys could take some and then we're gonna take it around perfect

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gomen and ayb are greens like collards with a big hit of berbere and aye of cheese i like the cheese it's like a ricotta lamb prepared garage style laboriously diced amazing this is all like inner yeah i got some

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of that that's good that's that's delicious yeah this i love without reservation barbecue now we're talking man what a meal pretty impressive [Applause] then whiskey and music and the party really starts going thank you for coming to ethiopia

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[Music] [Applause] [Music] in 2004 at the prompting of his sister marcus began an exhaustive search for his lost family who was he after all where exactly did he come from who in his family had survived was left where were they

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he was told that his father was still alive living here in the village of abragundana southeast of addis for adoptees looking to return to reconnect the journey is complicated for marcus each trip has always raised more questions than it's answered this trip

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is no different every time that last five minute drive right it just just makes me nervous makes me really really excited and nervous at the same time right but it's it's just take the american hat out off and take

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the swedish hat off it's just a different grid saying 110th street it is not i come from a dusty place let's see that kid i'll change it let's turn it it makes it big yes [Music] i leave marcus alone with his father

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this is between them [Music] yes [Music] he wanted to see your foot he wanted to see how you guys would look alike i wasn't ready for this [Music] that's a good idea i wasn't ready for this [Music] so

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how does it feel to be back i got to tell you but i gotta be honest seem conflicted yeah there's a thousand thoughts going through my head i always feel a little guilty that i get out if you'd

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stayed what do you think you'd be doing right now i would have been a farmer or dealt with some type of cattle i'm pretty sure you would have been a farmer i wouldn't i just i can't see you okay

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you'd be the best dressed goddamn farmer that's for sure where's home for you man where do you think i know looking back on it all yeah that that's an internal question for me you know i i feel at

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home in new york i feel very much at home when i'm in africa but i also feel out of place and coming to this very place abrahadana it gives me a lot of humility but i can't say tom i can't say it

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[Music] happiest moment in africa happiest moment is i think when we had mars village for me the whole village comes together music food culture brings everybody together the eating together being together it's by far the happiest for me

Speaker A

[Music] you

Topics:Anthony BourdainParts UnknownEthiopiaAddis AbabaMarcus SamuelsonEthiopian foodinjeraskateboardingdiasporaEthiopian music

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