Puthumile Ngwenya

Imagine training for a moon landing inside a 200-litre oil drum while the world’s press laughs at your audacity. That was Edward Mukuka Nkoloso's Zambia—a newly independent nation daring to dream far beyond its means. Decades later, Circus Zambia is transforming that ridiculed history into a breathtaking theatrical rebellion at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Lusaka is on the move. From the glass-fronted business clubs of Kabulonga to the fairways on its outskirts, this is a capital that has outgrown its reputation as a stopover and arrived as one of Africa’s more compelling business destinations. It is a city where roughly a quarter of the nation’s GDP is generated, and where the service economy runs on relationships as much as revenue.