When planning a family trip to Ethiopia (January 2024), I wanted to see as many places from the tentative list as possible. Dire Sheikh Hussein seemed like the perfect stop on the way from the Bale Mountains to Harar. In practice, however, something different turned out. The town is located in the middle of nowhere, but it has the mausoleum of Sheikh Hussein, the 13th-century scholar from Somalia who introduced Islam to eastern Ethiopia and founded the Bale Sultanate. The mausoleum is considered one of the most important sites for Muslims in Ethiopia and is a pilgrimage site commemorating the day of Sheikh Husein's birth and death.

We paid 3,000 birr to visit the mausoleum ($25 at the unofficial rate, as much as $50 at the official rate) and it was an obvious rip-off because the place is not worth it. We had to take off our shoes before passing through the main entrance, which made everyone very uncomfortable. We had to walk barefoot through an uneven path with incredibly hot stones and tiny thorns that kept digging into our feet. Even I was fed up with it, not to mention my children. By the end, my daughter was being carried in her arms, to the delight and laughter of the local children. Because of these thorns, I was even afraid that my foot would get infected, but nothing happened.

The mausoleum itself is tiny, lacking any decorations - even lacking a proper floor. The caretaker of this …