Photo Friday: painted advertising in Harar, Ethiopia

These lovely ladies are painted on the outside wall of a shop in Harar, Ethiopia. I don't know when they were painted, but the lady on the top is advertising film, and you can't find much of that these days, even in Ethiopia. Two strange things about her is that she's (A) white and (B) missing a foot.

The more traditional figure below is right next to the Fuji film woman. She doesn't seem to be advertising anything unless it's the bread in the basket on her head and the milk in her gourd. She's dressed in the traditional Harari fashion.

This style of advertising is very common among the Somalis, and perhaps the large number of Somalis in Harar inspired this style of advertising. There are a fair number of paintings like this in the city, but much more in Somali towns and cities like Hargeisa.

You can read more about travel in Harar by checking out my series on Gadling.