Street talent

Their story is even more amazing than the company’s performances. “Before I danced, I was working on the streets as a shoeshiner,” Demissie said. Sendi sold tissues on the same streets.

In his book Mandela’s Dancers: Oral Histories of Program Participants and Organizers, author Rodreguez Kingdorset interviews Barry Ganberg, head of musical studies at the Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance in the United Kingdom. Ganberg describes how he went to Addis Ababa with British choreographer Royston Maldoom to do a “human rights project” in the 1980s.

Carmina Burana was a dance production on a massive scale to be performed by more than 100 street children from Ethiopia.

Two decades later, Demissie completes the story in Addis Ababa. “[A total of] 120 children were selected,” he said. Both he and Sendi were among them. While he was