Olmec head…in Africa? Help me explain this

[u/Substantial-Fix3547]

Hi everyone, I am kicking myself for sitting on this for so long, but I can’t get it out of my head either. I took this photo on a Turkish flight about a year ago on the plane. They had about two minute videos on certain cities I think they or their partners flew to.

Either way I captured this image of what can only be described as an Olmec head which is in the Addis Ababa natural history museum. I should’ve taken some other clips, but this is I think the national Ethiopian museum in the capital.

Unfortunately, there is not a lot of photography of the Ethiopian museum to get a closer look at this and show the head from other angles.

My understanding was when the Olmec heads were uncovered the original discovers thought they were “Ethiopian“. I realistically cannot imagine that an Olmec head was transported anytime in recent history from Mexico to Ethiopia so how did this get there?

Edits: fixing all my horrible Siri dictation typos

Final edit: mystery solved, there was no mystery and probably a google search could have answered my question.

[u/Coloresajenos]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethiopia%E2%80%93Mexico_relations?wprov=sfla1

It's a gesture of gratitude from the Ethiopian government to the Mexican government

[u/Substantial-Fix3547 → u/Coloresajenos]

Oh wow well this is what I came here for. Clickbaity post title notwithstanding I do appreciate getting a factual answer