“The two hyenas moved into the middle of the backstreet that led to my house – between me and my front gate. I froze like the proverbial rabbit in the headlights: I was on foot, alone, and it was close to midnight on a rainy night in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s ramshackle capital where I’d recently moved. Nobody was at hand to help or tell me what to do. I was very scared.

This all happened a stone’s throw from Bole Avenue, the city’s commercial hub. Every day, I’d walk to work across fields dotted with cows accompanied by frog song. And this was the heart of the capital city, in the year 2002. I had, however, moved to the city just as it was on the cusp of radical change: globalisation had reached the country, and Chinese funds too (…)”

(continue reading @ The Guardian: Addis Ababa and its hyenas have a long and peaceful history).