Ethiopian team gets heroes' welcome

By Damian Zane
BBC, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Ethiopia's triumphant athletes paraded in front of thousands in Addis Ababa's national sports stadium on arrival from Paris where they participated in the world athletics championships.

Ethiopia put up the best performance in Africa, and came third in the medals table, behind the US and Russia.

The team seems set for continued success

The spectators cheered as the band played a famous Ethiopian victory song.

The winning athletes - and the rest of the team - were presented with garland after garland of flowers.

The singer belted out improvised lyrics, telling the crowd that the athletes had shown the world what Ethiopia could do.

He went through the list of runners, calling them Anbesa, or lion.

Staying cool

The high point of the morning came when the athletes, waving the national flag, started their lap of honour.

The Mayor of Addis Ababa, Erkubay Okubaye, summed up the mood, telling the athletes that they had made Ethiopia proud - and that what they had achieved was great.

And a man in the crowd agreed.

"I am very happy, this has been a very big ceremony for Ethiopia's big champions," he said.

In champions 21-year old Kenenisa Bekele - who seems to have replaced Haile Gebrsellasie - and 18-year-old Tirunesh Dibaba - celebrations like this seem guaranteed in the future.

But in typical style, the country's athletics mastermind - Woldemeskel Kostre - refused to get too excited.

"Well, not bad, It is good. You know with the marathon we expected to get, also the 5,000, but unfortunately, as you know, we missed," said Mr Kostre.