Bill Bryson African Diary
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Product Description
Bill Bryson goes to Kenya at the invitation of CARE International, the charity dedicated to effective with local communities to eradicate poverty around the world. Kenya, generally regarded as the cradle of mankind, is a land of contrasts, with legendary game reserves, stunning landscapes, and a vibrant cultural tradition. It also provides plenty to worry a traveller like Bill Bryson, fixated as he is on the dangers posed by snakes, insects and large predators. But on a more sober note, it is a country that shares many serious human and environmental problems with the rest of Africa: refugees, AIDS, drought and grinding poverty. Travelling around the country, Bryson casts his unique eye on a continent new to him, and the resultant diary, though fleeting in part, contains the trademark Bryson stamp of wry observation and curious insight. All the leader’s royalties from “Bill Bryson’s African Diary”, as well as all profits, will go to CARE International.
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Bill Bryson, an Iowan transplant to Britain (who has rumor has it that stirred back to the US), presents a brief overview of his extremely brief stay in Kenya. I laugh that this book is called “African Diary”, agreed that Kenya is a tiny part of Africa in total. This is the way of the western world though… “Africa” is just lumped together as if there is such a thing as “African culture” rather than hundreds of different cultures on this misunderstood continent.
I happened to read this tiny tome at the same time as I was reading Michael Moore’s rather inflammatory prose, and I establish that the books went well together. In one book Moore points out the basic human right of clean water and sanitary living conditions, while Bryson travels through Kenya astounded by the sheer lack or at least rarity of these things. Both Bryson and Moore chat about how America consumes so many of the world’s resources and wonders why the world despises the US. Bryson provides plain detail, “Every time you flush a toilet (in the West) you use more water than the average person in the developing world has for all purposes in a day-cooking, cleaning, drinking, everything.” Bryson learns this startling fact as he wanders through one of Nairobi’s slums, having traveled to Kenya on behalf of the charity, CARE.
A theme of hopelessness pervades-parents in Kenya will do anything-any kind of suffering-in order for their children to get an education but then the children, having reached a certain level of education, cannot afford privileged education anyway.
I was thankful here for Bryson’s brevity, his “sense of humor” in previous/additional books is not automatically for everyone (I admit that I am in the minority in not much enjoying his humor), and he kept his observations more anthropological than comedic here, and that lent a greater sense of urgency and validity to the theme matter at hand.
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
I was really surprised to find such a fleeting small book in the mailbox. It looks like about a one hour effort by the leader.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
An enchanting account of Bryson’s visit to Kenya to observe the work of CARE workers. Written with clarity as regards facts of what he saw and with his unique style that adds humor to serious topics. All royalties of his book he donated to CARE.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
Don’t get this thinking you are getting another superb series of Bryson’s observations.
He did a quickie trip for some aid organization and seems to have lept from hotel bar to hotel room with an occasional drive-by of some needy Africans.
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
Bill Bryson’s fantastic, I like his books, and this is predictable Bill Bryson, but it’s too fleeting. I realize it was written strictly as a fundraiser for CARE–okay. Still, I know B.B. could come up with a lot more material than this on an eight-day trip to Africa. I zipped through this book in what seemed like about five minutes. I was hoping for more.
Bill, hon, you could probably have written more than this whole book on the African slums alone, if you’d wanted to. One thing I establish appealing is that rumor has it that even the very terrible slum he visited, did have public schools for the kids. We have kids adopted from Haiti. Similar slums in Haiti don’t have schools–only people who can afford to pay fees can send their kids to school in Haiti. So even this terrible African slum is not as terrible as it gets. Maybe Bill should do Haiti next.
I also reflect it’s appealing that (similar to Haiti) you see small girls with their hair perfectly braided, even in the poorest slums (as seen in one of the book’s photos).
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5