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Notes from the Hyena's Belly: An Ethiopian Boyhood Paperback – January 5, 2002

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Nega Mezlekia (Author)
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4.4 out of 5 stars 35 customer reviews
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Product Details

  • Paperback: 368 pages
  • Publisher: Picador (January 5, 2002)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0312289146
  • ISBN-13: 978-0312289140
  • Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.8 x 8.5 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #258,199 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Top Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 starsMore than just a story of cruelty, war and terror...
By Linda Linguvic HALL OF FAME on February 24, 2001
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
This is a memoir of the author's boyhood and young manhood in Ethiopia. Born in 1958 to a middle-class family in the city of Jijiga, Mr. Mezlekia left Ethiopia in 1980 and is now a professional engineer living in Toronto. Narrated with a light touch and a mixture of myth and fantasy, he opens a world for the western reader that has too long been influenced by nothing more than photos of skeletal images of starving children and grinding poverty.
This story, however, is much more than that. From the start, there's a wide variety of interesting characters and a rich warm family life. There's Mustafa, the swindler, who boards at his home; there's Mr. Alula, the teacher, whose severe forms of discipline call for retribution by boyhood pranks; there's Wondwossen, his childhood companion, who joins a guerilla army with him; there are his sisters who never stop feuding. But most memorable of all is his mother, who holds her family together during the extreme hardships which inevitably come to this violent and war-torn land.
He was 14 yeas old in 1972, a time when idealism and student protests were sweeping the globe. In Ethiopia, however, students were gunned down and murdered. Young Nega was jailed often and regularly, and always tortured, but somehow his descriptions of this time in his life are told with a touch of lightness. Years later, in 1977, when over 100,000 people are murdered in seven months during the "Red Terror" and bodies laid out over the streets, he yearns for the time when they were all just simply tortured. Throughout the book, I couldn't help shuddering at the all the cruelty.Read more ›
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5.0 out of 5 starsDisturbing in its Calm
By A Customer on December 12, 2000
Format: Hardcover
Wow. People may shudder at the comparison, but this book reads a lot like Angela's ashes. There is comedy in what most would call tragic situations. The story is, at times, gut-wrenchingly sad, but the narrator rarely reflects upon it as such. A funny, bright, evocative book that doesn't play either the "Africa-is-mystical&beautiful" game or the "Africa-is-savage-and-primal" card. Frankly, I'm glad, because both are a bit tried. Good book, good read.
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5.0 out of 5 starsNotes That Matter
By V. Marshall on June 22, 2004
Format: Hardcover
This book is full of meaning, often insightful and completely unforgettable it is written with candor and wit despite its serious edges.
Nega Mezlekia has written a memoir about his boyhood growing up in Ethiopia during the fall of Emperor Selassie. He experiences all of the curious playful things that all boys are reared with yet he also discusses the harshness of the environment during the rise of Junta communism in which thousands of young people were ruthlessly slaughtered. He writes on page 183, "Apathy in the face of continual violence is something someone who has never lived through a war cannot understand......People simply gathered about themselves, like rags, what life there was left, deafened and inured to the inevitability of death." Although Mezlekia has many horrible atrocities to write about this is not all he adheres to. At times this memoir is very witty and I laughed out loud several times imagining some of his shenanigans. His adventures with medicine men and native cures is hilarious as well as his attempt to capture the loose cattle in his village with pepper.
I am always impressed with the attitude of Africans who survive the atrocities they have faced in their home countries. Their spirit and survivalist hearts seem to always prevail despite the horrible circumstances they are often forced to endure. Mezlekia managed to escape his country at possibly its worst moments, not without heartache, not without suffering, but with a true gift as a storyteller. I would recommend this memoir to everyone interested in a great true tale but especially to those concerned with the plights of our fellow human beings who suffer so gracefully for their native lands.
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5.0 out of 5 starsA balanced and beautiful book
By nagar on February 7, 2001
Format: Hardcover
I am an Ethiopian, the same generation as the author, but I am from another ethnic group, the Oromo, and poloitical group, Meason. Reading Nega's book has helped me come to terms with my past in ways that I can hardly begin to explain.
Like most of our generation, I had taken part in gureela momevent when life became unbearable in towns. I had, initially, belonged to the same political party Nega belonged to--the EPRP. Unlike Nega, I saw the falasity of the party and changed tack early, joining the military Junta. Unfortunately, Meison didn't fare any better than EPRP.
Notes from the hyena's belly is the kind of book I never thought an Ethiopian, particluraly someone from such a visious political group, the EPRP, would write. I salute Nega, I am proud of him. I can now reconsile myself with those Ethiopians that I have been avoiding for the last eleven years for political reasons. Africa's problems are not solved by recriminations, but by reconsiliations. Hope those Ethiopians with an axe to grind would see the beauty in this book and set aside their differences. Well done, Nega
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5.0 out of 5 starsReadable as History, Readable as Literature
By Andrew Czernek on March 16, 2001
Format: Hardcover
Mezlekia's story is about growing up in the second half of the 20th Century in Ethiopia, a period of upheaval that includes the overthrow of Haile Selassie and subsequent socialist governments. It richly describes the ethnic tapestry of the country, weaving in folk tales and folk medicine. The stories told by his mother and others are rich diversions in the story of his life and make this history more literary.
He has a highly developed sense of satire and irony, whether when plotting revenge against a strict teacher or when commenting, "To make sure that there was no mistaking the nationality of those involved in designing and building most of the (Addis Ababa) university, the various gadgets and fixtures within them had the 'American Standard' imprint on them."
Highly readable, whatever your knowledge of Africa might be.
Highly recommended if you want to understand what type of economic structures are appropriate in the developing world. Yet it's real strength is in the human story.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 starsFor example his admiration for his mother who taught him how to be a...

Mezlekia has a very pleasant way of telling stories but unfortunately in these stories there is sadness. Read more

Published 5 months ago by jkobi2011
5.0 out of 5 starsGripping and Educational

The story gripped me from the start. To see Ethiopian culture and history in such a clear way was so interesting. Read more

Published 8 months ago by Enat
3.0 out of 5 starssuperficial

ok but superficial

Published 13 months ago by medorz
4.0 out of 5 starsMr. Mezlekia has written a fast-paced autobiography that will ...

Mr. Mezlekia has written a fast-paced autobiography that will draw the reader in and give a glimpse of life in a very different time and place. Read more

Published 20 months ago by James O. Nelson
3.0 out of 5 starsAn enlightening view into a critical time in Ethiopia's history

My second review this weekend of a book about Ethiopia, and while the books are very similar in some ways, there are key differences that make each uniquely worthwhile. Read more

Published on March 23, 2014 by bdallmann
5.0 out of 5 starsAmazing

If you want to walk in another person's shoes this is the way to go! This book is amazing! A must read!

Published on December 21, 2013 by michaeljbeltz
3.0 out of 5 starsWorth reading

The story of a boy growing up in war-torn Ethiopia, this book has interesting anecdotes and offers a look into a culture far different from my own. Read more

Published on May 22, 2009 by K. Weiss
4.0 out of 5 starsNotes from an Eventful Life

The book is aptly titled because it is a series of notes. The first are notes are from Nega Mezlekia's childhood which is heavily influenced by folklore and superstition. Read more

Published on March 3, 2009 by Loves the View
5.0 out of 5 starsPowerful, Vivid, Amazing

Nega Mezlekia was born the year after my family left Ethiopia. My African American father had heart problems that didn't do well in the high country of Addis Ababa. Read more

Published on December 1, 2008 by Lola E. Peters
4.0 out of 5 starsNotes from the Hyena's Belly

Notes from the Hyena's Belly is a memoir that often reads like a novel. It depicts Nega's relatively calm childhood in sharp contrast to the growing unrest, civil strife and... Read more

Published on February 18, 2008 by Live2Cruise

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