The universalities and idiosyncracies of civil service
The mail in Kigali works. I can finally vouch for it personally. It takes a while–one month, door to door, for a package from…
Read MorePlaces
A step, or a leap, or maybe nothing at all, for African women
About a week ago, the Christian Science Monitor ran an article I wrote from Sierra Leone on a new law protecting women in war…
Read MoreObservations in three acts
I. I have met only one person in Africa–though I’ve only been to four countries–who is, as a rule, early. But I’ve found the…
Read MoreStuffing yourself
I’ve been in Uganda, visiting my friend Glenna, who lives in Kampala. Glenna’s apartment has the feel of someone who’s been here a long…
Read More‘I conquered the Nile,’ or, a story that makes me sound far cooler than I am
I rafted the whitewater of the Nile River a few days ago. Please be duly impressed. I’ve been wanting to go whitewater rafting pretty…
Read MorePretty pictures of Uganda
Seriously, that’s all you’ll find here right now. I finally become literate, or un-lazy, enough to throw some photos up…course, it helps that I…
Read MoreIt is your moral responsiblity to begin growing rice
Food prices are high, blah blah, we all know. Not that that’s not important. But this seems more important: Donors–who presumably (she says with…
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Against representation
This is the closest I have come to being able to get my little Canon to record how amazing the sunsets here can be….
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In Africa, Justice for Bush Wives
FREETOWN, SIERRA LEONE — Fatmata Jalloh was just a kid selling pancakes on a rural road in Sierra Leone when a rebel soldier snatched…
Read MoreHow to improve tourism: Take history, add guilt, stir.
A few weeks ago, I decided to follow up my foray into what seemed the most foreign of “cultural” events in Rwanda — the…
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