Book Review: West With the Night

West With the Night (North Point Press) by Beryl Markham was first copyrighted in 1942, so don’t look for this gem on the just-released shelf. Since I’m researching memoirs and am always interested in all things African, I found this book extraordinary. Markham, born in England but raised in British East Africa, shows a powerful command of the English language.

In her childhood Markham hunted with tribesmen, endured the same discomforts, ran the distance with the best of them. Later, she followed her father’s passion for horses, raising thoroughbreds for the track and keeping them for her own pleasure.

In the mid-1930's, Markham became enchanted with flying and learned from a master flyer, Tom Black, who taught her in a D. H. Gipsy Moth. She achieved her “A” license, then later, her “B” license which entitled her to earn a living flying. In the early years, she carried mail, passengers, supplies to safaris and occasionally joined in a search for a downed plane. Often, her destination was marked by a single column of smoke, or at night, a row of small fires or lanterns.

Hunting bull elephant for their ivory was popular in the 1930's. As I read these encounters, I simply had to put aside what we know now about extinction and the injustice of killing an animal for a single feature of its body. Markham became enamored with the sport of spotting herds of elephant, working with one of Africa’s best known white hunters, Baron von Blixen, whom Markham called Blix.

In 1936, Beryl Markham met head-on a challenge of a trans-Atlantic solo flight, east to west, England to America. She would fly non-stop a night and a day. However, somewhere off the coast of Newfoundland ice lodged in the petrol tank’s air intake, partially choking fuel flow to the carburetor. The engine failed, caught, failed again and again, but finally would not restart and, after twenty-one hours and twenty-five minutes, Markham had to force-land in a Nova Scotia bog, burying the plane’s wheels and tipping it head-first into the mud. Markham managed to crawl out of the plane and wandered in the muck for an hour before being rescued.

Beryl Markham was a remarkable woman and West With the Night a memorable accounting of her life. Ernest Hemingway said of this book, “...[Beryl Markham] can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves writers...” I won’t argue with that. It is an engaging, elegant book.

The Royal Wedding

When I hear reference to the “royal wedding,” it evokes memories of Africa. These memories, however, aren’t of round huts, friendly people and the sounds of exotic drumming. These memories are of being crammed into a house with 116 other people for eight days, of artillery too close for comfort, of wondering if we would see our families again.

In 1981, when my husband Bruce and I were in The Gambia with the Peace Corps, we happened to be in the capital city, Banjul, 250 miles downriver from Mansajang, the village where we lived. On the day we were scheduled to return home, a coup d’etat instigated by The Gambia Field Force (similar to our National Guard) broke out. All roads leading out of town were closed. Radio Gambia and the airport were taken over by the rebels.

Tanks and armored personnel carriers appeared in the streets. Obviously, we had to find safe shelter. Not knowing just what was policy–we’d never been instructed about what to do in the event of a coup–we ended up at the residence of Tom Mosier, local head of U.S. AID to ask for his guidance.

As we approached Mosier’s home, Tom came out, his normally cheerful face in a worried frown. I’d never seen anyone actually wring his hands before, but that’s exactly what Tom was doing. Now we were worried.

“Tom, what is it?” Bruce asked.

“We’re in a lot of trouble here. The Ambassador is ‘detailed’ at the Embassy. The Embassy radio is out for repair so we don’t have contact with Washington. We don’t even have contact with the Ambassador.”

Bruce looked surprised. “I can’t imagine the Ambassador doesn’t have a radio at his house.”

“Oh, he does. But it’s not assembled and no one knows how to put it together.”

“Tom, I can put a radio together. I’m a licensed radio operator.”

Tom’s eyes lit up. “Come with me, both of you.”

At the Ambassador’s house, not far from Tom Mosier’s, Bruce set up two radios, a short-distance radio with which he could talk to Ambassador Piper at the US Embassy in the capital city of Banjul, and the British Commissioner, just down the street. The other, a medium-range radio could reach Dakar, Senegal. Since the Ambassador currently had no medium-range radio at the Embassy, he sent messages through Bruce who then relayed messages via the medium range radio to the US Embassy in Dakar, who in turn relayed them on to Washington.

Bruce manned the radio about eighteen hours a day, playing a vital role in establishing and maintaining communication. For several hours during the night, atmospheric conditions prevented radio transmission, allowing Bruce time to rest.

We remained at the Ambassador’s for the next eight days. Within two days we had 118 people crammed into the house, Americans, Germans, Swedish, Indians, people from many different agencies and businesses, including about 20 of the 52 in-country Peace Corps volunteers and staff. Although it was the Ambassador’s residence, it wasn’t a particularly large or grand house and only had 3 bedrooms.

From the start, food and water was an issue. At our twice daily meetings, we decided the adults would eat two small meals a day, but the 17 children among us would have three meals a day. No one wanted to listen to hungry, whiny kids!

Much of the fighting took place a short distance from where we were. One of the President’s wives and seven of their children were being held hostage by rebels only a mile from us.

During daylight hours, we frequently heard artillery, rifle and machine gun fire. We dismantled the beds and placed mattresses over the windows for protection from flying glass. At times the fighting was so close we hunkered down under tables for safety.

Peace Corps takes a neutral position on politics. We were told that if we stayed inside we’d be safe. We had no choice but to trust that this would be true. We flew the American flag above the house day and night. Both rebels and loyalists entered the house to check on us and to assure us of our safety.

So what does the royal wedding have to do with all this? The President of The Gambia, Sir Dawda Jawara, was out of the country, attending Prince Charles and Diane’s wedding in England. The Field Force took advantage of his absence to stage the coup.

After eight days, with the military aid of neighboring Senegal, the coup was put down. It’s difficult to get a definitive count in The Gambia, but it is estimated about 1,000 people were killed in the skirmishes. Everyone at the Ambassador’s residence remained safe, though a little thinner because of the slim food rations. We Peace Corps volunteers were evacuated to Senegal until things calmed down enough for us to return upriver to our villages.

I am currently writing my memoirs about our two years in Africa. The working title of the book is “Tubob.”

Book Review: Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight, an African Childhood

Alexandra Fuller’s Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight, an African Childhood (Random House) is a remarkable memoir about her family’s struggle for survival in southern and central Africa.

Spanning the period 1975 through the early 2000's, Bobo, as the author was nicknamed, makes unique observations about a life most people can’t even imagine. Born in England, Bobo moved with her family to what was then Rhodesia, later Zimbabwe, when she was three. Over the years the family eked out a living on a series of farms.

The author considers herself African and the story is told not from a visitor’s viewpoint, but from an African perspective. For a period of time, her father joins the side of the white government in the Rhodesion civil war, while her mother fights the battles at home–drought, wandering stock, reluctant crops and errant help. Her mother’s fierce love for her children isn’t shown with coddling, but rather as a model for hard work, self-reliance and dedication to managing their home. Her father seems fearless, determined to fight for what he believes, yet he’s quick with humor and wry wit. He throws himself wholeheartedly into whatever he’s doing at the moment, a profound example for his children.

Her family means everything to Bobo, yet at times it’s a tentative relationship–always with love, but often with shaky foundations

Fuller’s ability to show this unique lifestyle is extraordinary. With sly humor, she holds nothing back, but is always without judgement. Africa is a tough continent for anyone–the heat can be relentless, the mosquitoes deadly, tribal wars frequent, harsh terrain often unforgiving. Mere survival is a challenge.

At the beginning of each chapter, pictures of the family are shown, giving the reader a sense of being there (but without having to endure all the hardships). The first picture shown is Bobo as a very young girl loading a revolver.

Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight, an African Childhood is told with stark honesty and sensitivity. It’s hard not to be cynical, yet Fuller’s story is unflinching and captivating. I wholeheartedly recommend this book.

Live Your Dream: Make It Happen

Photo by Bruce Trimble: The road ahead.

You can live your dream. Let's look at some ways you can make it happen.

First of all, look at your dream realistically. Is it something you really want to do, or is it just a fantasy? Are you willing to make sacrifices to make it happen? Will it be in your best interest to have this dream fulfilled?

Pretend it has already happened. Although we can't always visualize just how a fulfilled dream would be, we can come close. Be realistic--drop the romance, the rosy glow that usually accompanies dreams. Acknowledge the challenges that are bound to happen. Does it fit? Can you see yourself there? Is your dream worth the tough times? If so, see yourself overcoming the obstacles.

For us, our dreams, among others, were going to Africa and cruising the South Pacific. Although we’ve had to make sacrifices to make them happen, we’ve never regretted our decisions to act on those dreams and turn them into reality.

I still dream of going places and doing exciting things. One way I've found to fulfil that dream is by volunteering with the American Red Cross locally and nationally. So far I've responded to 38 major disasters and have been able to help victims of fires, hurricanes, mud slides, floods, tornados and terrorism. It hasn’t always been easy. At times I’ve found myself in situations way past my comfort zone, with more adventure than I bargained for. But at the end of an assignment, I’ve felt great satisfaction that I’ve met another challenge and at the same time have helped others in distress.

Traveling with our camper also fulfils our sense of adventure. Our destinations are often out-of-the-way places, such as the Yukon or camping on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land with no amenities, sharing the land with wild habitat.

After our cruise to the South Pacific (See Live Your Dream: Sailing the South Pacific, below), I dreamed of becoming a professional writer. I’d taken a few creative writing classes in the past and then began attending writing workshops and conferences. My first submissions were to boating magazines, destination articles and specifics about off-shore sailing. Later, as we became interested in overland travel, I submitted to RV magazines. Several months passed and although I'd submitted articles to many magazines, I had no luck in getting published, only in collecting a discouraging pile of rejection slips.

I wondered, "Is writing what I'm supposed to be doing?" I seemed to be taking the necessary steps. I spent all my spare time at my computer. Though I did meet family commitments, I usually turned down most activities that didn't point toward fulfilling a writer's dream of being published. Still, no success.

I prayed for a sign that I was on the right track. "Please," I prayed, "give me some sort of sign that I'm pointed in the right direction." Then, in the month of March of that year, three different magazines published my work, articles that had been submitted over a period of several months. I took that as a positive sign, one that I accepted as a go-ahead. Since then, I've had more than 400 articles published in magazines and newspapers, plus two books published with another to be released this year.

How do you know if your dream is worthy of the work it takes to turn it into reality? One sign is that if it's all up-hill, if things eventually don't fall into place, take a second look. Maybe you're dreaming someone else's dream. Or, maybe this dream needs to happen at another time in your life. If your dream becomes a struggle and that struggle makes you unhappy, regroup and pray for guidance.

How do you make dreams happen?

Stay out of debt. Buy on credit only the absolute necessities. Debts can control your life. To be in control, make the sacrifices necessary to keep out of dept. You'll find a wonderful freedom and increased options.

Let go. Let go of the trappings often associated with success. Acquiring possessions is all right if that's all you want out of life. But if you want to fulfill a dream, let go of the extras.

Get rid of clutter. Eliminating the clutter in your life paves the way to move on to other goals.

Simplify! Learn to savor simple foods. Reduce your wardrobe. Learn to enjoy long walks. My husband and I have found that most of our dreams have been planned on our daily three-mile walks. Keep activities to only those you enjoy. Eliminate parties you really don't want to attend or being with people you would just as soon not see.

Make yourself available for opportunity. In order to fulfill a dream, you must be ready. You never know how a dream's realization will manifest itself and open doors to opportunity.
Take action. Go beyond the planning stage. Take steps to make your dream happen. Take classes, attend lectures, research on-line and communicate with people who share your interests. Ask lots of questions. Set the stage for your dream to take shape. Taking action can steer you in the direction of your dream, and you will find the pieces falling into place.

Take care of yourself. A simple lifestyle is a healthier way to live. Many of the issues I've mentioned here help to keep us centered and free from unhealthful mental clutter and anxiety.

Pray for guidance. Is this the right goal at this time in your life? Ask for help in recognizing opportunities and overcoming obstacles.

Remember to live for today. Having dreams and working toward them is good, but living is a present state--not the future and not the past. Find ways to enjoy life now while working toward the future.

Go for it. In my father's basement work shop a small plaque hung on the wall quoting Dr. Samual Johnson, 1708-1784. It says, "Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must be first overcome." The plaque now hangs in my home office, and reminds me not to wait until everything is perfect before I act. Some obstacles can be ironed out as they occur and many of the problems we anticipate never happen. So, when most circumstances point toward success, make your move. Go for it.

Walking Through the Millet: Peace Corps reminiscence

Woman at a village well

The dirt path wound through a field of thin, withering millet. Although this staple grain towered above our heads, it wouldn’t produce much this year.

"This field is dry," I commented in Mandinka, the primary tribal language of this tiny west African country, The Gambia.

My walking companion nodded, his black face glistening with sweat. "Yes, we need more rain."

I tried not to think about the heat, now soaring close to 100° F. My dress stuck to my back, the long skirt caught at my legs. As a Peace Corps volunteer, I worked at a 22-bed bush hospital and was walking home at the end of a tiring day. "It's too bad we can't get ... water ..." I groped for the correct Mandinka word.

“Irrigation," he prompted.

"Yes, irrigation."

"It is too far from the river for irrigation, Mariama."

We stopped at a snake's twisting track, its thick impression in the sandy soil still fresh. The Mandingo held out his arm, holding me back until he determined we were out of harm's way.

We resumed our trek. The trail narrowed and I automatically stepped behind my companion. "Couldn't water from the river be piped in?"

"But how? Irrigation systems need motors and fuel and they are expensive."

We reached the end of the footpath which opened to the village. Pungent smoke from cooking fires greeted us. Voices and laughter drifted from behind woven fences which surrounded the compounds, each containing seven or eight round mud-brick huts capped with grass-thatched roofs.

My new friend gestured to the right. "I will go this way now."

"Yes. Thank you for walking with me."

"Mariama," he called over his shoulder. "Your Mandinka is very good."

Highly complimented, it was only then I realized my entire conversation had been in Mandinka; his had been in English. Without my even realizing it, we had been practicing each other's language.