I feel a social responsibility. We need to open people's eyes. There is a lack of education in Ethiopia..

Athletics is in my blood..

You must do as your people do. If my people are poor, I must be poor. People ask me, 'Why don't you find a personal coach or a private car?' I can't.….

In the marathon a crazy athlete can just keep pushing from the beginning, at a championship you don't need a time just to win the race..

The marathon always starts after 30K. That's where the problems start. You start without any problems, without any pain. All the pain comes after 30K….

I wanted to experience New York, to look up and see buildings..

Athletes have to be confident and I am thinking like that..

My school was six miles away from where I lived on the farm. I had to walk and run, there and back every day, through gorges and over rivers. If I wa….

You need three things to win: discipline, hard work and, before everything maybe, commitment. No one will make it without those three. Sport teaches ….

I haven't done a marathon for a long time. So we'll see. I will need good luck..

If you're planning only to make money and nothing else, you'll be broke..

Schooling is so important..

In my life I do a lot of things but I never forget my training..

You know for me when I promise something I want to deliver. If you don't, you have to disappear..

Like some high official, you have to tell your brain: 'Do it. Come on. I have to do it.'.

In the rainy season, sometimes to get to the first lesson we had to run really quick, because we had to cross the river to school and we'd have to go….

It is not my duty to spend my money in my country, but it is what I want to do. There is nowhere else I would like to invest..

At the end of the day, people want to see how fast you run..

I was the kind of child who worked hard every day with the cows and sheep - I was a very aggressive boy..

That is not enough. Sport has been great for me, a great learning place that if you want to achieve you can, even if you are from the poorest part of….

Age for me is just a number..