The Ache for Home: An Enduring Driver of Creativity

Shani laughed when I told her I was probably going to order the macaroni and cheese. We were sitting comfortably on the patio of Cremino Café on the second day of my visit to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and she was already aware of my tendency to order “American food” whenever I get the chance.

It’s an odd habit I’ve picked up after years of living abroad. I’ve hunted down American diners from Copenhagen to Hong Kong, chasing the comforts of home.

“Food is memory”

— Richard Morais, The Hundred-Foot Journey

See: Lunch at Cremino Cafe with Shani Senbetta, Mariam Khalifa, and Tihitina Mulushewa Legesse

Shani, of course, understands far more than I do the complexities and emotions of home. She is part of a generation of Ethiopians who were born and raised outside their country, influenced by a history of displacement and longing.

In 1974, Ethiopia’s centuries-old monarchy collapsed when Emperor Haile Selassie was overthrown. A military junta known as the Derg seized power, and what followed was a period of brutal repression remembered as the “Red Terror.” Tens of thousands of young Ethiopians—many of them students and intellectuals—were arrested, tortured, and killed.

It was during this violent period that Shani’s parents immigrated to the United States. They joined a generation of Ethiopians scattered into exile, taking refuge in countries all over the world. Shani was born and raised in Ohio, but Ethiopia was always present at home.

In the stories, the language, the food, and the sense of loss.

By the early 1990s, the Derg regime had fallen, and Ethiopia began a fragile process of rebuilding. When Shani finally traveled there as a teenager, she felt an undeniable pull. That sense of belonging began to shape her choices—leading her to study international development at Georgetown, to work in consulting and with NGOs, and eventually to pivot into business operations after earning her MBA at Harvard.

Throughout these years, she visited Ethiopia often, met her future spouse, and worked on several development projects during summer internships. At age 28, she moved to Addis Ababa full time and anchored her life and work in the country her parents had been forced to flee almost 40 years earlier.

Over the last 14 years, Shani has pursued multiple development strategies and made a significant impact.

She became COO of Zeleman Communications, where she helped expand the company’s reach from a small creative shop into the country’s leading advertising and production agency—producing everything from national campaigns to television shows that millions watch.

She founded Kidame Mart, a social enterprise that empowers thousands of rural women to distribute essential goods in underserved communities. What started with a handful of women has grown into a nationwide network delivering solar lamps, improved latrines, and health supplies to families far from traditional markets.

And she promotes the creative work all around her—just as excited to tell me about Zeleman and Kidame Mart during my visit as she was to make sure I met and interviewed other CEOs and founders in Addis who are running hospitals, manufacturing companies, and more.

See: Shani Senbetta and Kidame Mart Team Members

This impact has been hard won. The operational complexities she faces are significant; for example, sourcing goods from outside Ethiopia often means running up against foreign exchange shortages, a challenge that ripples through every stage of the business.

And yet the currency issues pale in comparison to the upheaval brought by armed conflict. In 2020, Ethiopia was thrust once again into violent internal conflict when fighting erupted in the north, spreading instability and violence across the country that continues to this day.

Millions were displaced, casualties mounted, and supply chains and businesses were impacted. Kidame Mart was not spared: several of its warehouses were looted, a devastating blow for a social enterprise built on vital community networks.

Shani carries the weight of the conflict, knowing firsthand about displacement, loss, and the grinding work of rebuilding. And still, she’s already iterating on next steps for Kidame Mart while continuing to manage Zeleman’s steady growth. Resilience and resolve became part of her life a long time ago—qualities she has learned to use with intention, guiding and propelling her entrepreneurial endeavors.

And at the center of her determination to keep creating—even in the face of uncertainty—is something universal, though many of us take it for granted at certain points in our lives:

“The ache for home lives in all of us.”
— Maya Angelou, All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes

In interviewing hundreds of entrepreneurs and researching thousands more, I’ve come to see this longing for home—or for what home can be—as one of the most powerful drivers of creativity.

Watch: Click the image below to view a video on Shani’s work at Kidame Mart

Longing can be dismissed as nostalgia, but in Shani’s life it has been nothing less than catalytic. It is what drew her back to Ethiopia as a teenager, what anchored her professional choices, and what sustains her through conflict and uncertainty.

“I’m fully driven by the desire to create a better Ethiopia and community; a place where we can pursue meaningful endeavors and pass them down to the next generation.”

- Shani Senbetta

Imagining what home can be and working tirelessly to make it real is something that drives creativity all over the world.

So it’s okay that while I was in Ethiopia, I missed my daughters’ first day back at school. I was home a day later, driving them to school through the winding streets of Salzburg and telling a story:

About missing home and ordering macaroni and cheese. About war, loss, and longing.

And about the people I meet whose stories weave into my daughters’ lives, expanding their understanding of what it means to carry home with you, to embrace the responsibility of improving it, and to create relentlessly to do so.

Creating. Meaning. Everywhere.

Thanks for reading about Shani and her work at Zeleman Communications and Kidame Mart.

This fall I’ll be teaching in Boston and traveling around the world to meet with people who are creating meaningful change in their communities.

About 3–4 times a month, I’ll share reflections on what I’m learning—stories from the road, insights from my work with entrepreneurs and leaders, and thoughts on how we create meaning through what we build.

If that resonates, I’d love for you to follow along.