The Ethiopian bookbinder connecting a city’s people with its forgotten past | Arts and Culture

Harar, Ethiopia – When Abdallah Ali Sherif was growing up in eastern Ethiopia, his parents never spoke about the history of his city.

“When I asked my parents about our history, they told me we didn’t have one,” the kind-faced 75-year-old recalls as he reclines on a thin mattress on the floor of his home in Harar’s old walled city. Shelves of dusty cassettes line the walls and old newspapers lie scattered about the floor.

The father of five and grandfather of 17 pauses to pluck…