*3.12.4 Water, electricity, and telephone*

The interviewee from the community told us there is no as such challenging problem in these aspects. Water, electricity, and telephone services are available in the residence.

### **3.13 Members who do not share geographical location (theme-13)**

### *3.13.1 The graduated members*

Members of the community graduated students now become 70, some of them are working in the community who got related fields, some of them want working on unrelated fields in the community by saying that "we should serve the community who teach us without learning for themselves" and still others are who did not get their fields are working in governmental and nongovernmental organizations, which are out of the community.

#### *3.13.2 Members from the United Nations*

As the community promoter officer Participant:1, said "at the time when the united Nations team visitors come to us and they said 'we tried to settle peace around the world and different beliefs agreed on 'do to others what you want for yourself',

but the community members are doing in practice and living on it" and they bestow our community two gold medals and one trophy, and they also bestow our leader Zumra a medal by saying "you are peace ambassador. Then they asked us if we are voluntary, they want to be members of the community from the place they were living and working. We replied them, the community is the house for anyone wants to make peace, making black or white is our God's work so you can be the member of the community, so they are members of the community."

### **4. Discussion**

The general objective of this study was to capture an understanding of sense of community in the "Awramba" context. To achieve this objective, realist ethnography method was applied. From the study result, 13 major themes were found.

The first theme (theme-1) was the causes for the community founder Zumra to establish the community, which were four questions; gender role equality, children right, about helping elders, and fairness. Till the age of 13, Zumra raised and stayed with his parent house, he moved around different places of "Gondor" and "Gojam" to spread his ideas for 5 years. He also raised the fifth question about human brotherhood. At the time of traveling, he got some peasants who understood and accepted his ideas. He brought his family to the current place in 1971 and started establishing the community. People who ignored his ideas started working to avoid him. After that he and peoples who accepted his idea migrated through "Jimma" to the then SNPPR specifically "Bonga." They stayed there for 5 years. When they returned in 1992/93 to then place of "Awramba," their land was gone, and got a small plot of land. The community decided to create additional income generating activities rather than depending on the farm. After they promoted themselves in 2000/2001 on different media, Ethiopians and tourists around the world came and appreciated their ideas and way of life.

Regarding (theme-2), which is about membership criteria, the major criteria to be members of the community are respecting human being and adhering to the community norm. Adhering to these criteria, there were members who share geographical location and who do not share geographical location with the community. Members who do not share geographical location with the community (theme-13) were individuals who are members of the community but working in different places of the country and the accepted members from the United Nation, this result is in agreement with the study of [8], which showed that a community can exist beyond geographical borders as long as people share something in common.

Related to means of income in the community (theme-3), the community members cooperated and created different sources of income, such as: businesses, for example, shops, café, mill, traditional cloths store, guest house for tourists, and weaving workshops, which produces different traditional raiments.

Handicraft skill and environmental protection (theme-4), using their handicraft skill, they work environmentally friendly cooking hearth, which uses small amount of fire wood. Most of the materials such as: shelf, table, chair, and even bed made from some amount of wood and mostly through clay soil.

Once a year, the community celebrates the formation of the community on the last day of the year and first day of the Ethiopian New Year (theme-5). They celebrate gathering around a tree that is located at center of the village and pass those time on playing and relaxing.

#### *An Ethnographic Study on Sense of a Community: The "Awramba" Experience DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.105953*

In the marriage value of the community (theme-6a), there is no wedding ceremony, after signing for the marriage, the bride and the groom immediately go to their work. Their family gives the money for the married couples instead of expending it on wedding ceremony. This result is the same with Tilahun [4] findings about marriage value of the community, which indicated that, "Another distinctive feature in the community is that members do not celebrate any wedding ceremony. They believe that marriage ceremony is an extravagance which demolishes all the accumulated money of parents and couples within a few days. As a result, an informant of the member stated that they do not even make tea for any marriage celebration. The only required thing is that couples should confirm their agreement by putting their signature in front of a witness (the witness might be a female or male). The bride and the bridegroom are never given even a day to enjoy their marriage; they are expected to join the field work very soon."

Related to divorce, there are reasons that the community agreed upon for making divorce (theme-6b), If one of them is sterile, or if there is sexual problem that cannot be recovered by treatment, and/or if there is barney that cannot be fixed by advising, the community may accept the divorce.

The community mourning value (theme-7), the community believes that mourning should be in lifetime, through sympathy people should help each other. If it happened, only the assigned persons go to the mourning place to attend the funeral. After the burial, the community members bring the mourners to work place, not assuming that the mourners will do work, but to keep their mental health from the side effects of exaggerating mourning.

The community religious view (theme-8), the community members believe that they are believers in one god. There is no a single mosque or church in the community. Because they believe God is with them and they can get everywhere. This result is closer to the finding of Solomon [4], which indicated that the community does not have religion, but faith or belief. They believe in the existence of supernatural force or creator of earth and heaven. They do not give a name for this supernatural force … but, they accept prayer for the creator individually. The result also agreed with the study of Tilahun [5], which indicated that, "They believe that religion means being obeyed to the single super natural force. So, if there is a full consent for the presence of one creator, dividing him and the doctrine by giving different names is wrong of human beings."

Gender equality (theme-9), in the community there is no differentiated role for male and female. All males work what females work including work in the kitchen, and females also work what all the males work including working outside the home. This result agreed with the finding of Solomon [4], which said "in 'Awramba' community the role of men and women is identical."

In the community, honesty is one asset. In the commitment to be honest (theme-10a), if a person finds anyone's lost property, he/she should return to the owner. If he/ she did not get the owner, he/she should give to the committee that is already established to do this responsibility. In the community, taking people's money is a crime.

Commitment for the scheduled meetings (theme-10b), the community has family meeting in every 15 days during the night time, meeting once a month at each working institution to plan and put solutions for problems if they faced related to their work. And once in every 6 months, this meeting is the general meeting, in which all the community members participate. The family meeting result was confirmed by the finding of Tilahun [5], which says, "There is a regular discussion program in

which groups of two or more families meet together at every 15 days to evaluate their plan and control the behavior of members. It usually takes place at night when all members come back from their field work and after daily activities are nearly over."

Ways of handling conflict (theme-11), there is an established committee to solve, if any conflict happens among the community members. If the conflict happens, they consider it as ideas conflict rather as individual, solve on the following way: first, the individuals discuss on the issue, to understand each other and in order to solve the problem. Second, if they cannot, they take the issue to the grievance listener committee and try to solve it. Third, if the problem is serious and the committee cannot solve it, the issue is taken to the "woreda" court. Almost all the problem solved at individual level.

The community elder care (theme-12a), the community supports the elders in two ways: one is in their home, and in the elder's care center. They use two sources of income to support elders: one is income collected from the tourists as an entrance fee, and the second way is through the community members' work 1 day a week for this purpose.

Preschool and moral education in the community (theme-12b), in the preschool, children learn moral education, such as avoiding lying, being captious, making conflict between individuals, and so on. At the end of every daily lesson, children say the slogan, which strengthens their moral behavior. This result is closer to the findings of Tilahun [5], which indicated that, "the preprimary school has a potential impact in reshaping students' attitude. It makes them more ethical and freer to express their ideas according to the established local traditions."
