Last Saturday, August 28, 2010, marked an important day in the history of Eritrean football. It was the final day of the CECAFA U-20 Championship Tournament and host country Eritrea faced Uganda for the coveted cup.
Tickets for the game were all sold out by Friday morning. I happened to pass by Bar Royal just before noon Friday and there were still huge crowds of people gathered in search of the tickets. I couldn’t recall any stadium ticket ever being in such demand before.

Prosperity, as desirable as it is, when too much tends to spoil. Some African countries, driven by either their abundant natural resources or foreign influx, are seen to cause turmoil for the black continent. But this is never the concern for Eritrea, which has long been sporting the slogan. And this carries a significant message to the young generation.

The Eritrean National Festival is always an event where one can get to know about the remote areas in the country without having to go there. At the expo grounds this year, I had the opportunity to see the traditional way of living of the five ethnic groups that live in the Northern Red Sea Region: Saho, Afar, Hidareb, Rashaida and Tigre.

All past week long, and especially this last weekend, all roads leading to the Expo grounds have been busy as a beehive with people, cars, and most public transportation all making their way to where the Eritrea Festival 2010 was fervently taking place.

“Look how they exactly sculpted the features of Shelshel’s face. He was a brave and dedicated freedom fighter,” were the words of Sembetu Semere, an ex-freedom fighter. She was looking at the bust of her comrade, sculpted along that of other martyrs for an exhibition prepared by the Ministry of Defense in connection with the Eritrea Festival 2010.

There are only two museums in Eritrea; the National Museum of Eritrea in Asmara and the Northern Red Sea Regional Museum in Massawa. Comparing these museums to the history of the country, however, they are hardly sufficient. Considering the ancient, the medieval, colonial, the armed struggle, nation building etc experience of the country and its people, you would expect more museums—an important assignment for the future.

Washington, DC: 8 August 2010 - The 36th Annual Festival Eritrea-Washington, DC kicked off with zeal on Friday August 6th, 2010 at the Washington DC Convention center in Downtown, with a traditional Eritrean musical show, welcoming thousands of Eritreans who made their annual pilgrimage from all over the United States.

The contents displayed at the booth of the National Museum of Eritrea (NME) in the Eritrean Festival 2010 in Expo Grounds are winning many visitors acclaims. The exhibition presents Eritrea’s major excavations including the 27 million-year-old elephant jaw bone and the million year-old Buya Lady locally refereed to as Hawa. The newly discovered fossil in Kudo Felasi, in Southern Region, which is a unique finding for most of the paleontological fossil excavations in Eritrea, carried out in areas where the Great Rift Valley crosses down, has also been presented in this year’s festival.