Filed under: Diary
Recently the boiler in my house at york broke, leaving me and my two housemates without heating or hot water for showers. At first I tried just ‘manning up’ and having a cold shower, but the water was so cold that it started to sort of burn my skin, so I needed to find an alternate option.
Although given the offer of using friends showers in nearby houses, I thought it would be nicer to go back to my African ways, so I boiled up a kettle, mixed in some cold water and had a bucket shower. It actually felt quite good to do and did bring back some memories of my trip. It also reminded me how much I enjoyed a real shower once I’d been having bucket showers for a week or two!
I definitely wouldn’t want bucket showers everyday if I could avoid them, and was glad that there was no great drama and our boiler was fixed the next day, but it’s always good to be reminded occasionally of these sorts of things and just take a moment out of life to stop and think.
Filed under: Uncategorized
Back to books of the week. I’m going to switch away from just African books and put up anything I’ve read and enjoyed now – although I’ll keep trying to drop a few more african themed ones in as well. For this post I have two books, War horse and Alone on a wide wide sea, both by Michael Morpurgo.
Firstly, War horse. This a short novel about a horse who is brought by a farmer and then trained to work the farm by a young boy before being sold to the army with the onset of World War 1, much to the distress of the young boy. He starts his military career as a cavalry horse before being captured by the Germans and working with other horses hauling ambulance carts and artillery. He also comes into the care of a young girl and her grandfather for some time, before again being taken from then. I won’t say anymore as I don’t want to ruin it for you. I think it is one of the best books I have ever read. It is both a very enjoyable and also very moving read. It also inspired me to read another Michael Morpurgo novel, since I loved his style of writng. Hence the next novel.
Alone on a wide wide sea tells in the first part about a boy shipped to australia to find foster parents and the life that ensues for him. The second part of the story is about his daughter and her trip across the seas to England to find her fathers lost sister. I would say more, but it is difficult to describe the book without giving the wrong impression of it. Again it was a wonderful book. Again very enjoyable and very moving and also very inspiring. All I can say is read it! It really is wonderful. Also, if you see a book by Michael Morpurgo I would read it as he seems a brilliant author – everyone I know who has read any of his books agrees, so he is definitely worth a read.
Filed under: Uncategorized
Thought I would do a post about a society and a website I think are good, both to do with Africa. If anyone knows anymore good ones then please comment so people can see them.
Firstly the website. It is http://www.safaritalk.net/
I was told about it on facebook by the game warden of the site who had seen the group for my book. He recommended I take a look at it and I so I did and was most impressed. There are loads of different discussion boards about various issues to do with conservation, safaris etc in Africa, as well as videos of hunts etc. I’ve seen a few similar websites before I wasn’t that impressed with, but safaritalk was one that really caught my eye and impressed me, so well worth a look.
The society is the Royal African Society, http://www.royalafricansociety.org/
I joined a few years ago and have gone to several of the talks they organise and as part of their membership receive the ‘African Affairs Journal’ which regularly has articles of interest. You can join online, and I think its wel worthwhile, especially if you live around London as most of the talks and meetings are held there. Even if you don’t live there, membership is still worthwhile in my opinion – I’m at York uni but still keep my membership up even though I can only very rarely attend any of the talks.
