Sunday, November 30, 2014
Saturday, November 29, 2014
The Great Ethiopia Run is the most incredible experience
Haile Gebrselassie has a problem.
You wouldn’t know it from a quick glance at his famous face, which is fixed with the beguiling smile that has accompanied him on a career that has touched heights that no other athlete has managed.
This is a man who broke 23 separate world records, collected two Olympic gold medals and earned four world titles.
He bestrode the track and the streets of famous marathons in Berlin, New York and Chicago and has now carried that success into the world of business, where he is one of the chief drivers of a resurgent Ethiopian economy that is creating millionaires faster than any other country in Africa.
But as he explains over delicious, jet-black coffee strong enough to wipe out the hazy affects of altitude, he can’t answer his phone right now. To prove the point, when his iPhone trills, he takes a quick look and sets it back down on the table in the small office that overlooks one of the busiest roads in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s bustling, frenetic and endearingly chaotic capital city.
“If I don’t know the number, I won’t answer. You know why?” he asks. “Because government ministers will ring me up and say ‘Haile – I need a ticket for the big run on Sunday!’”
Hearing this story is the perfect introduction to the Great Ethiopia Run – the colourful, barmy and brilliant little brother of our own beloved Great North Run.
Last Sunday I was invited to Ethiopia to take part in this 10k event, and line up alongside the 37,000 other hopefuls desperate to make it to the Jan Meda sports ground in downtown Addis.
Why? Well, the Great Ethiopia Run goes way back with the North East. The first kernel of an idea came when local girl Abi Masefield, a gym friend of the great Gebrselassie, mentioned the possibility about creating an African equivalent of our own famous half-marathon from Newcastle to South Shields.
Hosni Mubarak Saved
The court dismissed murder charges against Mr. Mubarak in the killing of protesters demanding an end to his 30-year rule — charges that once inspired crowds to hang the president’s effigy from the lampposts of Tahrir Square in Cairo and captivated the region. His reviled security chief and a half-dozen top police officials were acquitted.
The court also acquitted Mr. Mubarak, his two sons and a wealthy business associate of corruption charges; the three others had come to personify the rampant self-dealing of Mr. Mubarak’s era as much as the president himself.
Demonstrators in Cairo rejoiced Friday upon hearing that President Hosni Mubarak had been toppled after 18 days of protests against his government.Egypt Erupts in Jubilation as Mubarak Steps DownFEB. 11, 2011
If normal legal procedures are followed, Mr. Mubarak could soon go free for the first time since his top generals removed him from power amid a popular revolt in 2011, although it was not clear whether those rules would be adhered to.
More than five months after the inauguration of a military-backed strongman, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the authorities appeared to calculate that the Egyptian public was so weary of unrest that it had lost a desire for retribution against Mr. Mubarak, or at least that they now had a firm enough grip to suppress any backlash.
“Today’s verdict indicates a very deliberate decision by the regime to continue on the path of rewriting the history that led to Mubarak’s ouster and closing the file on the Jan. 25 revolution,” said Hossam Bahgat, a journalist and human rights advocate who had cheered on that revolt and is now studying in New York.
Friday, November 28, 2014
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