Some peaks in the Simyen Mountains receive periodic snowfall, while the average temperature of the Danakil is 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the day time.
When I returned to the Danakil country, years later, I saw cars, tarmac road, service stations and convoys of lorries carrying petrol from Assab to Addis Ababa.
‘The Danakil rate a man by the number of men he has killed and castrated,’ says Thesiger.
In the Danakil region, women are nude from the waist up.
Neither Christians nor Muslims eat pork; the Danakil, Oromo, and Somali avoid chicken and eggs as well.