Burnt Eucalyptus Wood On Origins, Language and Identity

Who are you, when you come from two places?

Ennatu Domingo was adopted from Ethiopia at the age of seven and transplanted to Barcelona where she learned to flourish. But she never forgot her nomadic childhood in the mountains and meadows of Gondar, near the northern border with Eritrea. Having witnessed the hardships of Ethiopian rural women at an early age, she was inspired to study the patriarchal structures that underpinned her individual experiences, both in Europe and in contemporary Ethiopia. She has lived in Kenya, Belgium and the UK, and has traveled across five continents, but keeps returning to the country of her childhood, to re-construct a lost identity guided by the echo of her first language Amharic and the weight of a rich cultural heritage.

Torn between forgetting and remembering, Ennatu explores the dilemma of international adoptees and migrant kids and their quest for belonging in a book destined to be a classic of its genre.

Ennatu Domingo was born in Ethiopia. She holds a BA in Political Science from the University of Kent in England and an MA in International Conflict and Security from the University of Kent in Belgium. She currently works as a research assistant for the European Center for Development Policy Management in Maastricht. Ennatu’s non-fiction debut, Burnt Eucalyptus Wood was published in March 2022 by Editorial Navona in Catalan and translated into Spanish. The book was an instant success across print and broadcast media.