How Did We Get Here?

A new flight, a new morning, a new country.

A new language, new customs, new uncertainties.

Different food (again), different money (again), am I paying too much for this?

Thailand was never on the top of my lists of places to go. In fact I had little desire to visit SE Asia in general. But at 3:30am this morning I stepped off an airplane and into 80 degree heat. So how did I get here? The easy answer is that I got drunk with my friends in Kampala the day before we were going to buy our tickets home.

"Give me one good reason not to go to Thailand," they said.

"Um... well, I guess I'm going to Thailand."

And so again I transition from a previous culture that I am just getting used to. Turkey and Georgia were so different than Africa, and much colder. Let's see what Thailand is all about.

We're Not in Kansas Anymore

The other day I had the most pleasant experience: I took a flight.

When I showed up at the airport everything was orderly, and there wasn't even a queue. The flight had a departure time, so I knew when I should get to the airport, and the airline agent had all of my ticket information for me when I arrived. She even offered to take my bag all the way to Johannesburg for me!

On board I surprised to learn that my seat, 20B, was just that: my seat! The whole thing! I didn't even have to have a baby on my lap. I was offered coffee en route, and didn't have to dehydrate myself because there was a lavatory on board. Ahh such luxury. There was no music, let alone blasting music, and nobody was walking the aisle prosthylatising (ironically I wasn't preying the entire time that we didn't have a head-on with oncoming traffic).

Namibia and South Africa has been much like this: Not Africa. The first signs of Not Africa were spotted as I got into Lusaka about three weeks ago. Working traffic lights, malls, fast food chains, and not only lane markings on the road but people following agreed-upon traffic laws.
The difference only became more pronounced as we ventured further in to Not Africa. Windhoek was a modern small city with glass skyscrapers, parks and other public works, and signs marking the notable tourist attractions. It even had the B1: a four-lane divided highway.

And Cape Town was as if Disneyland opened a South Africa Land inside California Adventure.
But I'm glad I'm ending my 27-month stint in Johannesburg, a small pocket of Real Africa still exists here. I'm staying in an inner-suburb neighbourhood called Yeoville, a highly mixed bohemian/rastafarian/working class community where I've only seen five white people in the last three days, including myself. There are street vendors hawking pirated DVDs, blasting music from shops, and bars and restaurants where local people go.

Though I am looking forward to my flight today to Istanbul. It's so long, I might even get a free meal!

The Trip - Part One

Phase One
Kampala to Dar es Salaam

I hadn't been looking forward to the bus trip from Kampala to Dar es Salaam but since it was at the very beginning of trip I figured excitement alone would get me through, but nothing can quite prepare a person for a 30-hour African bus ride. We left on time at 1:00pm, quite unique for Uganda and considering the double-whammy of riding Kampala Coach, with an estimated arrival of 5:00pm the next day. Delays at the Kenya border held us longer than expected (though we were flagged through with our $20 Mzungu coupons for the transit visa) which set us back. After a short bathroom stop in Nairobi at 2am we headed south to Tanzania. A few Mzungu coupons ($100 for a multiple-entry one-year visa which is the only one available to Americans) and a polite immigration smile later we were in Tanzania. Exhausted, our spirits drained, and that excitement I counted on so much to get me through quickly diminishing, we spotted two giraffe on the roadside which reconfirmed where we were in the world. And though it was cloudy around Moshi, we were able to catch a few glimpses of the glaciers of Mt. Kilimanjaro glistening in the morning equatorial sun.

Finally, after 30 hours on the road and about 1000km behind us, we reached the port city of Dar es Salaam, which means place of peace in Arabic. Up to then I had not traveled in predominately Muslim cultures. Uganda’s Muslim population is about 20% but it’s by no means a Muslim country. Coastal Tanzania, and Zanzibar in particular, has been heavily influenced by the Middle East and Islam for the past several hundred years. Rolling into our hotel (Simba Inn, $8.50 per person with breakfast) at 8pm the only thing we wanted was a cold beer and some food. The hotel: dry. The corner stores: dry. The deserted streets: didn’t want to venture into an unknown city at night.

Two blocks from the hotel was an Indian-run street BBQ, Mamboz. Spiced meats, chili and garlic sauces were a treat to our depraved Ugandan taste buds, but again the restaurant: dry. But we made it safely to the first point on our trip, saw wildlife and the largest mountain in Africa, and the next day we were headed to the Spice Islands.

Phase Two
Zanzibar

Zanzibar has captivated my imagination for several years, mostly because it’s fun to say (and who doesn’t think two ‘z’s in a word is cool?), but also the unique history, white sand beaches, and general exotic allure of the place. Giddy isn’t a strong enough way to describe myself as I was on the ferry making the 90-minute crossing ($35 each way). A triangle-sailed wooden dhow gently passed through our wake and we were in Stone Town.

Stone Town was the seat of the sultanate that ruled the archipelago and at a time also coastal Tanzania. The old town is a UNESCO world heritage site with twisting alleys and a maze of paths. It reminded me of Venice or the French Quarter, though the architecture was distinctly Middle Eastern.

Four types of people are on Zanzibar: the Muslims (97% are Muslim from quite liberal – one guy went and bought us beer – to very conservative with women completely covered), the Rastafarians, the tourists, and finally residents who aren’t any of the others. Fisherman Solomon was one of the latter. A ruddy sun-burnt Arab-African man in his early 40s in a varying degree of sobriety, Solomon always popped out of nowhere to help us out. He started walking with us as we stepped off the ferry as a self-appointed tour guide, showing us to several different guest houses until we found one with available beds. He rambled and muttered as he navigated us through the Stone Town labyrinth, explaining different activities he could arrange and telling off other touts who approached us.

The fish market in Stone Town is at a plaza on the water where fishermen set up stands each night and grill the day’s catch kebab-style. You can get fresh-squeezed cane or fruit juices (yup, finding a beer was a larger challenge than imagined), a spicy potato-falafel soup, and a Zanzibar pizza. We met up with Solomon again that night – he found us and was drunker than earlier in the day – and he explained everything and grilled it all up for us: tuna, kingfish, lobster masala, shrimp, coconut falafel.

The next morning it was beach time. We headed to the sleepy village of Bwejuu on a dalla-dalla, the local open-backed trucks (about one hour, 2500 TSh), and crashed at a Rastafarian beach bungalow called Mustapha’s Place ($30 per night for the room with breakfast, so $7.50 each). The beach was incredible. It’s been described as powdered sugar, but I’m going to go for powdered milk; it’s less appetizing perhaps but more accurate in the consistency of the sand and the way it turns to a fine mud (or thick cream) when it mixes with the incoming crystal turquoise water. The air was sultry, and the warm waters of the Indian Ocean offered no reprieve. It was like walking from a humid bathroom directly into a warm bath.

After three days in a warm, lazy paradise where the day’s typical dilemma was choosing between the fish curry or crab penne, we were ready to continue back to Stone Town and Dar es Salaam for the trip inland.

Phase Three
Dar es Salaam to Mbeya

The day was against us from the beginning. The goal was simple: leave Stone Town at 7am and be at the train station in Dar for the 1:50pm departure; almost seven hours for a trip that should take no longer than three. But this is Africa.

We rolled out of bed at 6am, forwent breakfast, and lumbered with our backpacks to the ferry dock to catch our boat. It was a grey and drizzly morning which accurately reflected our moods. At the dock they wouldn’t let us board because our boat wasn’t loading, so we asked around and found out that our 7am boat was in fact leaving at 11:30. I assume we were duped into buying bad tickets, but had to get off the island so reluctantly forked over another $35 and bought tickets from a different company that had a 9:30 departure. The skies grew greyer and the drizzle turned to rain.

Normally the crossing to the mainland is 90 minutes, but because of the rain and rough waters it took about 120 minutes, we left a half-hour late, and a lot of people on the boat got sick. We finally reached Dar at noon, plenty of time for an 8km taxi ride to the train station. But because of the rains the main road had flooded, adding to the already backed up traffic from road construction. Our taxi driver knew a few shortcuts and put general road rules in the back seat and we made it to the station at one, my nerves on edge from lack of a contingency plan, and the rest of the gang tired and hungry.

The TAZARA Line (Tanzania Zambia Railroad) was built by the Chinese in the 1970s to link landlocked Zambia and interior Tanzania with the port at Dar es Salaam. I don’t think it has been updated since.

We met our friends and fellow ex-Peace Corps Volunteers Steve and Katherine at the station who had picked up the tickets (one worry off of my plate), and from there the skies cleared and the day became enjoyable again. Our six-bed-berth, second-class cabin (24,000 TSh per person to Mbeya) was large enough to accommodate all of us and our backpacks comfortably, and the saloon car was only a car away. Staff were friendly and helpful and the food was good and cheap (3500 TSh for meals, and 2000 TSh for cold beer), a few steps up from what I had prepared myself for. The train also goes through the Selous Game Reserve, one of the largest protected areas in Africa, and skirts two national parks. From the dinning car we spotted springbok, warthogs, monkeys, a herd of zebra, four giraffes, and a dead elephant (hit by the train?).

The TAZARA line is also known for its breakdowns. I asked a few friends who had lived in Tanzania about the train before we left Kampala and the general response was: “That’s the last option people use to get anywhere.” To me I just heard: “Adventure.” The train stopped 12 hours from Dar at 2am because of a derailment ahead. I had taken some Benadryl so I slept through most of it, but in the morning when we still weren’t moving I went out to explore. The third-class passengers were mostly on the station platform or milling around the train. Some people had set up coal stoves and were selling breakfast. Everyone was taking it in stride and I never heard anyone complain.

By noon we were finally on our way, weaving through valleys and finally onto a plateau that would take us straight into Mbeya, the regional hub of south-western Tanzania. 860km and 32 hours later (about 16 mph) we trundled into the station at midnight. Some missionaries also traveling on the train had called ahead and arranged for us to be picked up and taken to a church-run hostel. Without their help we would have been stranded with no idea where to go. Seeing a bunch of white people with luggage packed into the back of a pickup in the middle of Africa was quite the contrast to the ordinary scene!

Phase Four
Mbeya and Lake Malawi

Our destination was the small lake-side village of Chilumba in northern Malawi. Based on transport experiences in Uganda I was prepared for a long day of crowded buses, crying babies, and hectic taxi parks, but the transport went surprising smoothly. We left Mbeya without much difficulty at 10am on a coaster to the border (6500 TSh, two full hours). After exchanging the last of our colonial shillings for the bright new colonial kwacha we decided to hoof the one kilometer to the border post. A local Malawian teen, Joe, walked with us, keeping us company on the way.

Starting with Joe on that one kilometer walk I started to sense an altogether different vibe from Malawi. Even the immigration officer was more jovial than the stern-faced down-to-business officers of Kenya and Tanzania. “Oh, welcome to Malawi,” he said as he asked about where we were from. We questioned him about local foods we needed to try. “You must have nsima, I love it very much.”

Indeed, the tourism slogan for Malawi is “The warm heart of Africa.”

The MV Ilala was built by a Scottish shipbuilder in the early 1970s and has been plying the waters of Lake Malawi, the second-longest lake in the world, since. It’s a combination freighter and passenger ship, with room for over 400 people on three decks. From the northern port of Chilumba it slowly steams its way southern end of the lake to Monkey Bay in three days, stopping at lake-side villages along the way. It is the only transport to the touristy Malawian island of Likoma, and even calls at a port in Mozambique. What better way to experience Malawi than a three-day cruise on a local boat?

Transportation in Africa is the same everywhere you go. The modes may be different, the buses called something different, but bus, train, or boat, boda-boda or piki-piki, matatu or matola, pick-up or baakie, they all share the same characteristics. They are usually overcrowded, but always have room for one more. Chickens or other livestock come along for the ride, and you can buy most goods through the window from vendors. The Ilala was no different. In fact, we considered starting a cock-fighting ring on the lower deck to pass the time.

And then there are the people that make the experience unique and personal. Tall and lanky Maria, the twenty-something that runs the dinning hall with a touch of sass that garners respect. Francis, our one-eyed bartender who never forgot how much he owed you if he couldn’t make change. Or Justice, the ticketing manager in Chilumba who didn’t skip a beat when Cooper, the snack-shop operator, brought us a cold beer as we talked about cabin particulars: “For me I drink Coke.” No ambiguity there.

The boat didn’t show up until 1am (the scheduled said 5pm – another one of those African transport constants). It was a warm night so we crashed on the beach with the other locals waiting for the boat, the talkative Herold assuring us he’d keep us safe from the drunk and rowdy teenagers goofing off nearby.

As the Ilala is small, there are only about eight cabins, and once we were on board we learned they were all booked. The alternative was to rent foam mattresses and sleep outside on the upper deck, not an unpleasant experience on a warm tropical night.

Three days after we left the northern end of the second longest lake in the world at the dawdling pace of 7 knots, we reached the southern port of Chipoka. Twelve hours behind schedule, but well rested from this great African experience.

Three More Weeks

After two years my final month is quickly running down. I have 22 days left in Uganda and with Peace Corps (my last day being September 22). After such a long application process, the planning and anxiety, and dealing with a roller coaster of emotions over two years, the reality that it will all be over in three weeks hasn't hit yet. The moment I fear most will probably be a week or two after I return home, and I say, "Well this was fun, I'm ready to go back now."

What will I miss most?

I am going to miss moments like right now. It was a beautiful day and a glorious sunset, with the giant yellow ball melting behind the mountains and taking the colors of the day with it. Twilight emerges, as does a sliver of the moon. I wear shorts because it's still eighty degrees, and sit outside to enjoy the sweet air.

I return back to my village after being gone for several days, and am greeted by some store-owner friends by a friendly wave, and a "You are lost!"

And last week was the perfect summary: after building a mud cookstove at my counterpart's house, we were treated to a delicious home-cooked lunch by his family (potatoes, rice, beans, and veggie sauce), before spending the rest of the afternoon on the river by my house with a few beers.

So, what's next?

First I'll be traveling for 3 months (through southern Africa, then to Turkey and Georgia, and finally southeast Asia - if you have any recommendations, or free places for me to stay, let me know!). Get through the holidays and submit applications for grad school (for a masters of Public Policy/Administration), then ease back into life. I'm looking forward to using my free time to network with some organizations in the Portland area, take a class or two at community college, and also get a part-time job. Again, if anyone wants to hire me, I'll happily send you my resume.

The last three weeks I've spent with the newest group of volunteers, who arrived in country on August 4. This is the group replacing me and my group, and I've had the opportunity to be a live-in trainer at their pre-service training. It has been fun to see how high-energy and high-maintenance they are, and to be around their optimism. Their questions are pertinent to them but have become benign to me as I realize just how accustomed to life here I have become. It makes me realize just how far I've come since the day I landed two years ago.

Underworld

One of my favourite authors I discovered since I've been here is Don DeLillo. He writes a lot about American pop-culture, society, and suburbia, not necessarily critically but in an ironic and humorous way, and I get a kick out of it. I just finished his novel "Underworld" about the Cold War, and the following passage captures his writing style and unique take on American culture:

Rick was still in the breezeway, running a shammy over the chrome-work. This was something, basically, he could do forever. He could look at himself in a strip of chrome, warp-eyed and hydrocephalic, and reel some of the power of the automobile, the horsepower, the decibel rumble of dual exhausts, the pedal tension of Ford-O-Matic drive. The sneaky thing about his car was that, yes, you drove it sensibly to the dentist and occasionally carpooled with the Andersons and took Eric to the science fair, but beneath the routine family applications was the crouched power of the machine, top down, eating up the landscape.

One of Erica's favorite words in the language was breezeway. It spoke of ease and breeze and being contemporary and having something others did not. Another word she liked was cripser. The Kelvinator had a nice crisper and she like to tell the men that such-and-such was in the cripser. Not the refrigerator, the crisper. The carrots are in the crisper, Rick. There were people out there on the Old Farm Road, where the front porches sag badly and the grass goes unmowed and the Duck River Baptists worship in a squat building that sits in the weeds on the way to the dump, who don't know what a crisper was, who had ice boxes instead of refrigerators, or who had refrigerators that lacked crispers, or who had crispers in their refrigerators but didn't know what they were for or what they were called, who put tubs of butter in the crisper instead of lettuce, or eggs instead of carrots.

He came in from the breezeway.

"The carrots are in the crisper, Rick."

He liked to nibble on a raw carrot after he'd waxed and buffed the car.

He stood looking at the strontium white loaf that sat on a bed of lettuce inside a cake pan in the middle of the table.

"Wuff is it?"

"It's my Jell-O chicken mousse."

"Hey great," he said.

Sometimes she called it her Jell-O chicken mousse and sometimes she called it her chicken mousse Jell-O. This was one of a thousand convenient things about Jell-O. The word went anywhere, front or back or in the middle. It was a push-button word, the way so many things were push-button now, the way the whole world opened behind a button that you pushed.

(From "Underworld," by Don DeLillo, pages 516-517)

Cattle Ground Homecoming

I am told that the better you get to know me, the more exact you know where I'm from. With strangers it's simply Portland, whereas my good friends eventually learn that I'm really from Battle Ground (not even Oregon).



I'm going home in about three months and starting to think about what life back home will be like. It will take a lot of energy to reintegrate into my former cow town, and after two weeks there I'll be ready to get moving on to someplace more interesting and exciting.



But then I realized it won't be that much different from Kampala. The Safeway, Albertsons, and Fred Meyer rival the shopping experiences at Shoprite, Nakumatt, and Uchumi. Both cities have a bowling alley, and although Battle Ground's Indian population is nonexistent, we have a delicious family-owned Chinese restaurant much like the one Nakasero.

Shopping for clothes and random accouterments will be easier than in Kampala's chaotic Owino Market, as the Goodwill opened shop in Battle Ground about five years ago. There isn't a place to pick up the latest bootleg DVDs (but I hear everyone is online now with smartphones and fibreoptics so that shouldn't be a problem). And the latest Hollywood blockbusters are offered at the Battle Ground Cinemas, although I'll miss the graininess and poor audio quality of the films at the Garden City theater.



Perhaps I'll feel right at home back in good 'ol Battle Ground after all. Though I don't think the police will like me driving on the left-hand side of the road (or, more accurately, weaving in and out of traffic). They'll have to get used to that one.



Happy 4th of July.

The Description of Service

One of our main responsibilities by the time we leave is to put together a Description of Service (DOS), an overview of everything we have done in the last two years fit onto about one page. This is also the only documentation that you get from Peace Corps that proves that you were a volunteer, and it's your only official record of your work. For the rest of your life. So it's kind of a big thing.

I've been hard at work on my DOS but writing about what I've done is difficult for two reasons: First, I'm tempted to use jargon and buzz-words, so I'll write something like, "Sensitized youths and vulnerable children on children's rights issues," when I really just yelled at a few straggling kids to get to school. Second, after I completed my first draft it really didn't look like I did a whole lot. Maybe it's perspective.

Also, most of what happens here is impossible to sum up in one sentence and falls outside of typical "work." For example, I can say that I trained 25 farmers in food security, or that I organized a workshop to train 25 farmers on improved agriculture (without specifics those statement could mean anything), but I can't say that I yelled at some kids to go to class. One of those happens once or twice, the other happens nearly every day. Which has more impact?

Here are some excerpts from one draft of my DOS:

- Read 54 novels of varying length, both fiction and non-fiction.
- Studied for 3 months for the GRE, learning over 100 new vocabulary words.
- Improved haggling skills, obtaining a price reduction of an average of 50% for all transactions.
- Suffered through less than 8 bouts of gastro-intestinal issues obtained from poorly prepared food and contaminated drinking water, among others.
- Managed to not get malaria.
- Maintained a relatively healthy diet and mastered cooking 3-pot meals on 1 burner.

The other draft looks more like this:

Project Development and Organizational Support

• Advised 4 organizations on program design and management for small enterprise projects.
• Developed a comprehensive coffee cooperative plan which included over 1,000 farmers in 35 farmer groups and increased farmer incomes by 200%, and established a village microfinance scheme.
• Networked with 3 international organizations resulting in strong partnerships and access to over $150,000 of capital in the form of loans and grants.
• Increased farmer profits of pineapple by 500% by introducing a value-addition scheme.

Educational Support and Training Facilitation

• Developed a comprehensive curriculum for teaching business and entrepreneurship at a rural vocational school and taught 24 students in business and entrepreneurship through formal classroom teaching, assignments, and field work.
• Mentored staff, teachers, and community members in bookkeeping and recordkeeping skills.
• Conducted 3 trainings on building fuel-efficient stoves with community partners.
• Trained 25 villagers in improved organic agriculture techniques, including composting and crop rotation, resulting in a 250% increase of bean yields over traditional methods.

Community Health

• Led 3 trainings on constructing and using improved fuel-efficient cook stoves.
• Linked 12 communities with the local NGO HeWaSa (Health through Water and Sanitation) and lobbied local government to upgrade, fix, and improve water sources in 12 villages.
• Trained 25 farmers and 65 youths in 3 communities in nutrition and food security.

Specialized Training

• Life Skills training – Peace Corps Uganda (one week).
• Program Design, Management, and Monitoring and Evaluation training – Peace Corps Uganda (4 days).
• Sales and Marketing Workshop – USAID Uganda, Sustainable Tourism in the Albertine Rift (2 days).

Leadership in Peace Corps Uganda

• Chairman of the Volunteer Advisory Committee (18 months).
• Led pre-service training activities with new volunteers.
• Obtained a Peace Corps grant worth $5800 to facilitate a three-day farmer’s workshop.
• Participated in redeveloping the Economic Development program, including identifying and establishing new goals, objectives, and indicators for the program.
• Helped organize Peace Corps Uganda’s 50^th Anniversary Service Day celebration and managed 120 people engaged in 7 activities during the event.

Close of Service

Our Close of Service (COS) conference just wrapping up. A two-day affair at a rather swanky (in Ugandan terms) hotel on Lake Victoria, we covered the logistics of leaving as well as important stuff like resumes, interviews, and what to do for the rest of your life. It was also a good time of reflection of our past two years of service. My training class began with 41 people, and 31 have made it to the conference - pretty good. Also, I know my last date as a Peace Corps volunteer: SEPTEMBER 22.

To be honest, now that I have the date the shock of leaving has begun to set in. It took a year from when I submitted my application to when I left for training. There was so much hype before going, and preparations and trainings once I got here. Twenty-four months felt like it would never end. With the days slowly ticking by, the months flying by, before I know it, it is already June (Christmas feels like last week). And now it's over.

What does a post-Peace Corps life mean? I'm scared to go home and find out. I'm afraid that once I go home I'll never go abroad again. I'm worried that I'll get stuck in some menial job again to pay my bills and before I know it I'll be fat and old. I have nothing to do from when I get home until I leave for grad school (applications are pending!) - about 10 months. If anyone wants to hire me, please give me a call! I'm a great babysitter, and I know how to keep chickens.

Friendships and Relationships- I have met some of the best people in Uganda. As volunteers we are taken out of our comfortable known world and flug halfway across the globe and put with a group of complete strangers. It is these strangers, 150 in Uganda, with which you make your friends and support structure. Volunteers come from all walks of life with diverse histories, interests, and goals. Since I am forced to hang out with these other volunteer we develop friendships and bonds that, if we had remained in America, probably would never have happened.

These people are amazing. It opened my eyes to everyone out there. They have been remarkable, challenging me to improve myself and my capabilities. I thank my fellow volunteers for the amazing experience I have had; it would be incomplete without them.

And here's to the next 15 weeks. I have a lot of work to wrap up but still many goals I want to accomplish and friends to make. Mom and Dad, it's been a long time away, but I'll be home before you know it.

The Book List

Needless to say, I have a lot of free time on my hands. When I joined Peace Corps I had a rough goal of reading 100 books over two years - that's about a book a week. I'm in my 19th month here and last week finished book number 50, so I don't think I'll make the 100 mark. Without further blabbering, here is the list with my completely objective rating system (5 is the highest):

1. Swahili for the Broken Hearted, P. Moore 3 p. 341

2. Demian H. Hesse 3 p. 116

3. The Poe Shadow M. Pearle 1 p. 400

4. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius D. Eggers 4 p. 485

5. Jitterbug Perfume T. Robbins 5 p. 342

6. The Big Sleep R. Chandler 4 p. 139

7. The Rum Diary H. S. Thompson 3 p. 204

8. It S. King 3 ½ p. 1066

9. The Devil in the White City E. Larson 3 ½ p. 390

10. Guns, Germs, and Steel J. Diamond 4 p. 440

11. Motorcycle Diaries C. Guevara 2 ½ p. 165

12. Shadow of Kilimanjaro R. Ridgeway 2 p. 263

13. A Brave New World A. Huxley 4 p. 227

14. A Confederacy of Dunces J. K. Toole 4 p. 394

15. The Shock Doctrine N. Klein 3 ½ p. 589

16. State of Fear M. Crichton 3 p. 714

17. The Lost Continent B. Bryson 3 ½ p. 299

18. White Man’s Burden W. Easterly 3 ½ p. 382

19. Duma Key S. King 3 ½ p. 687

20. Life Expectancy D. Koonz 2 ½ p. 531

21. Three Cups of Tea G. Mortensen 3 ½ p. 331

22. The Men Who Stare at Goats J. Ronson 2 ½ p. 273

23. The Sicilian M. Puzo 2 ½ p. 408

24. Dead Aid D. Moyo 3 ½ p. 154

25. Perfume P. Susskind 3 ½ p. 263

26. White Noise D. DeLillo 4 p. 310

27. The Mission Song J. LeCarre 3 p. 390

28. King Leopold’s Ghost A. Hochschild 4 p. 318

29. The Trouble with Africa R. Calderisi 3 ½ p. 256

30. Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger 4 p. 214

31. I’m A Stranger Here Myself B. Bryson 3 p. 288

32. A Thousands Hills S. Kinzer 2 ½ p. 338

33. Democracy Kills H. Dempsey 2 ½ p. 356

34. Connected N. Christakis, et al. 3 p. 305

35. Outliers M. Gladwell 2 ½ p. 285

36. Middlesex J. Eugenides 2 ½ p. 523

37. The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind W. Kamkwamba 2 p. 273

38. The Zanzibar Chest A. Hartley 3 ½ p. 446

39. 1984 G. Orwell 4 p. 310

40. The Colorado Kid S. King 1 ½ p. 184

41. Pirate Latitudes M. Crichton 3 p. 387

42. Sex Lives of Cannibals J. M. Troost 3 p. 272

43. Cosmopolis D. DeLillo 2 ½ p. 207

44. Skinny Legs and All T. Robbins 4 p. 422

45. The Holcroft Covenant R. Ludlum 2 p. 492

46. The Lady in the Lake R. Chandler 3 p. 212

47. The End of Mr. Y S. Thomas 4 p. 502

48. Banished Children of Eve P. Quinn 3 ½ p. 598

49. A Good Man in Africa W. Boyd 4 p. 312

50. From Those Wonderful Folks who Brought you Pearl Harbor, J. D. Femina 2 p. 270

A Letter to a Friend

Dear Cabbage,
At first I didn't really like you (I'm more of a romaine or red-leaf kind of guy), but I'm glad we've been able to get to know each other over the past year. It's been fun spending my evenings with you, enjoying the occasional taco-night, or the throwback fried-veggies with Royco and rice.

I look forward to the time we have remaining, though the five months will go quickly. I will never forget you.

Forever yours,
Matt