It had to happen eventually, but fortunately it wasn’t serious. I’ve driven here for 3½ years now without hitting anything – until last Wednesday. If you could drive here for just a few minutes you would wonder firstly why I don’t have an accident every single time I drive, and secondly how on earth have I managed to miss everything (people, cars, truck, dogs, donkeys, bulls, sheep, rocks, but mostly people) for a whole 3½ years.

“Enehid!” (“let’s go!”) I say to Tigist in my best Amharic as we pull out of the Bingham car park. We have just seen 11 patients in our Wednesday morning clinic, it’s just past midday and we have to go to HQ for the afternoon. “Dehina waloo” (a “goodbye” appropriate to this time of day) we say to the guards as we bounce past their guard house and out of the gate into the chaos that is the taxi stop on the road just outside. I’m successfully avoiding taxis, donkeys, crater-like potholes and hordes of milling people as we head towards where the Kolfe roundabout used to be. After the roundabout was removed the junction is now just a huge open space with non-functioning traffic lights and numerous traffic police. You drive in, and negotiate your way out. Confidently I drive in, and gridlock happens. Rapidly assessing the situation, I realise I can help if I back up – there will be room for a truck to go through in front of me. I check my door mirror – nothing there. Into reverse. Back I go. Bump. Oops. There was something there – I should have checked the other door mirror.

Were this the UK the other driver and I would have assessed the minor damage to his bull bar, we would have driven out of the way of all the heaving traffic in the junction, exchanged personal and insurance details and both been on our way. Not so here. Half a dozen slim young men emerge from the small van I have reversed into, one of whom is the driver, and start trying to persuade me that the loose, dented wobbly bull bar and wobbly front bumper are all my fault. The gentleness of the impact and the practically unmarked nature of my pick-up’s rear bumper belie this, so I’m prepared to negotiate. But not before an equally young and thin female traffic police officer arrives on the scene, armed proudly with a whistle, a notebook and a piece of chalk. She demands my driver’s licence. I oblige with a sinking feeling – getting your licence back can sometimes be a typically “Ethiopian bureaucracy” experience. A bit like Jesus in John 8:6 and despite the roar of the melee of belching vehicles all around us, she bends down and starts drawing on the ground, marking the position of the two vehicles’ wheels. Any resemblance to Jesus ends there, as she tells us to move out of the junction. She then returns to her traffic island and ignores us.

The traffic log-jam has cleared a bit, so Tigist and I drive over to the side of the ring road, stopping behind the small van - and negotiations start. “You should be on our side!” exclaims one of the passengers to Tigist, who is being very helpful, “you’re Ethiopian!” Tigist stares him down. “I’m on the side of truth!” she rebuffs, and he shuts up. I hear one of the young men say “shi birr” – I doubt he knew I understood. No way was I going to give them 1000 birr! I phone Sr Aster and she puts me on to Ato Worku at HQ who advises me of what to do and what to expect. Putting aside the fact that I hate negotiating and am not very good at it, I dive in. “Amist meto birr!” I say (500 birr). A cacophony of voices from the group helps me understand this isn’t acceptable. “Shi birr!” they counter. I had expected that. “Sabat meto?” I ask (700). More cacophony. “Semint meto!” the driver says (I would only speak to him). I hesitate then offer to shake his hand. He accepts. 800 birr. Deal done. Phew!

Now I need my licence back. It’s with the young thin female traffic police officer diagonally over the junction still standing nonchalantly on her traffic island. The driver and I take our respective lives in our hands and cross the junction which is suddenly busy again. Dodging pick-ups, taxi vans, Isuzu trucks and the odd huge Sino Truck I make it intact and the driver explains we have shaken hands, so she returns my licence.

Back over the junction, Tigist and I clamber into my pick-up, and off we go to HQ – only ½ hour late.

It is highly unlikely my 800 birr, vastly more than the driver should have received, would be used to patch up what was an undoubtedly already damaged vehicle. Tigist thinks it would be spent on quite a lot of celebrating that evening. But for me, 800 birr (around £28) was a small price to pay to avoid any further hassle. And it could have been so much worse.

“Egziabher yimsegen!” says Tigist as we drive off. Praise God indeed!