Kebrit

Hi my name is Kebrit. I am a pretty dog. I live in Addis Ababa. I have no home and I have no one to take care of me. However the villagers give me their leftover foods. They say, “It’s kebrit that keep the village from thieves at night.” They are right; I have never sleep at night. I know everyone in our neighborhood. And if watch or hear anything strange I won’t keep my mouth shut anymore. That’s why people call me kebrit, which means ‘match’ to lit a fire. I think they mean my barking is like ‘to light a fire’.

Sometimes dangerous people came to our village at night. They are not thieves, but murderers. They came to kill us. They call us ‘street dogs’. One of them throws poisoned   raw meat to where we are. Some of my friends ate this dangerous food and dies right away. Because of this I will never eat this meat even if I am starved. I heard these men talking we are dangerous for humans health because we didn’t get any medical treatment including vaccination. I wish I would get but there is nobody to take me there. These guys also say we should not get nearer to those ‘decent’ dogs from home for the reason that we may transmit diseases to them. It’s very funny. Frankly speaking except some of them most of these so-called decent dogs spend the night together with us. We are friends. I mean it. we recognize them easily by the belt on their neck. Some even come with the chain itself on their neck. They are very poor in crossing car roads. That’s why some of them found dead on the street.

In this place people don’t want female dogs. Many of us here are female. It doesn’t mean there’re no male. 
When we gave birth children steal our male puppies and sold to adults. They stole my 3 puppies too. That time I left them in the corner and go to find some food. When I get back I found nothing. I know they would not take them if I were around. Anyways I’m not that much cheerless to lose them because I know at least they are not STREET DOGS any more.