Friday, March 14, 2008
Out of Africa
Peter Godwin's "When A Crocodile Eats The Sun" is a compelling book, the kind you read in a few days. Godwin was brought up in Zimbabwe and the book is about his return to look after his elderly parents as the country slides into chaos and random violence. He quotes from a conversation he had with the scientist Jared Diamond about why Africa is the way it is. Diamond points out that the Islamic movement from the north halted as soon as it hit the region of the tsetse fly. He also argues that Africa is handicapped by the fact that it has no indigenous pack animal. If the rhino wasn't an intractable, territorial beast he reckons the Zulus would have conquered Europe hundreds of years ago.
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I've spent quite a lot of time in Eritrea - a small, sparsely populated country on Africa's east coast.
ReplyDeleteThe Eritreans fought a very cleverly orchestrated, 30 year guerrilla war to expel their Ethiopian occupiers. Liberation seemed to mark a fresh beginning for the country. One in which its people could forge their own destinies. There was so much optimism.
I've watched these hopes and dreams turn bad. It's like the qualities that helped the Eritreans remain resolute during occupation, in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds and all kinds of inhumanity, are now working against them; as those in power are complicit in a willful act of collective self-sabotage.