Ethiopian Safari

Ethiopia is not renowned for its plentiful wildlife
the way that Kenya and Tanzania are. However, they do
have some, and this past week I got to see a lot of
it.
The first spotting was a jack rabbit the size of a
medium dog. Its ears alone were the size of a typical
bunny in the States!
There was a group of 4 people visiting for several
days, and the General (he's the administrator of
Project Mercy; a retired leader in the Ethiopian
military who spent 11 years in prison during the
Communist regime. He's got some stories to tell!)
offered to take us out one evening to look for hyenas.
You could call this the Ethiopian version of
spot-lighting. There's a specific spot where people
dump their garbage that the hyenas frequent most
evenings. So we went at dusk and parked beside the
trash pile. As you can imagine, not many people sit
around waiting to spot a hyena. They can be quite
dangerous, killing small animals and children. We sat
quietly for about 20 minutes and I began to strongly
doubt that we would see anything. Oh me of little
faith…out of the village one lone hyena stalked over
to the trash. It was much larger and scruffier than I
had imagined. We had the headlights on, and it just
stared back at us. Hyenas usually travel in packs, so
I believe God sent this one to satisfy our curiosity.
On the drive back to the compound, we chased a fox
along the road and saw another rabbit, but this one
wasn't as big.
The next day, the General (that is what everyone calls
him) asked if we wanted to see monkeys. Well, I wasn't
jumping at that suggestion given my bad experience in
India of being attacked by one. However, I still went
along for the ride. The General knew of an eye clinic
nearby that also had a miniature zoo…only in Africa!
We pull up and the gate is closed, meaning the eye
clinic and zoo are closed…minor setback. I mean, we
are with a retired General. He honks the horn a bit,
and when no one came, he got out and opened the gate
himself. I was mortified at the audacity, but when in
Africa…. We start roaming around the property until we
spot a small sign that says "zoo." It wasn't 10
seconds after reading that sign that an unexpected
guest appears out of nowhere – an uncaged monkey! The
General had brought 2 bananas to feed them and it took
no time for the loose monkey to spot them. He was all
over the General. It scared the wits out of me. The
General gave him 1 banana, but he still knew there was
another. There were 2 other monkeys, as well as 3
porcupine, 4 goats and 1 duck all in cages –
everything one would expect to see at an eye clinic
zoo. The General wanted to give the other banana to
the caged monkeys, but the loose one wasn't going to
allow that. He hissed and clawed at the General and
eventually had his way. The rest of us stood back
with clenched teeth and white knuckles while the
General authoritatively let that monkey know who's
boss.

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