Enkutatash (Ethiopian New Year)

Ethiopia follows the Julian calendar with 12 months of 30 days each and a 13th month of 5 days (6 in a leap year). It’s for this reason that Ethiopia has been nick-named ‘the country with 13 months of sunshine’.

The Ethiopian New Year, which is eight years behind the Gregorian calendar, falls on the date that the Queen of Sheba allegedly arrived back in Axum after visiting King Solomon in Jerusalem.

In many places, children dressed in new clothes dance through the neighbourhood, distributing paintings (mainly of angles). They will in turn be given bread or money in return for their New Year wish. During New Year’s Eve, torches of dry wood are burned in front of houses while the crowds sing and dance. Everyone will then jump the ash to mark the shift from the old year to the new one.