Why did I suddenly remember this?

Always Sunset - 2, a lovely if traditional Japanese move set in the late 1950s, that I saw on the plane back from Burkina Faso.

Spring, 1959… four months after the events of the first film. The Olympics in Tokyo has officially been announced, and Japan is about to take its first step into a period of high economic growth. Chagawa has been living with Junnosuke but is still unable to forget Hiromi, the love of his life who had left Third Street without a word. One day, Kawabuchi returns to take Junnosuke away. Chagawa is given permission to take care of Junnosuke on the condition that the child enjoys an ordinary standard of living. To prove himself to Kawabuchi and to show Hiromi that he has become a better man, Chagawa begins to write a literary piece to win the Akutagawa Prize, a dream that he had given up long ago.

Isn't that weird? One of the main characters in this ordinary working class neighborhood wants to win the Akutagawa Prize, and everybody knows what the prize is and wants him to win (they help him etc.). This is 40 years ago when Japan was very poor, though obviously wealthy compared with much of present day Africa. But hard to imagine any ordinary person in Lagos, Nairobi or any urban center in Africa knowing or caring about a literary prize. And even more bizarre, his story (of course he wins, what, did I spoil it for you?) sounds like the most trite, ordinary story (well, on the basis of them reading aloud the final closing line... and admittedly I'm going by the subtitles ;-). Why, even the most ordinary writer in Central African Republic could write a story like that! So we need a major donor to come up with prize money and publicity please!

What is going on at FAVL lately?

We're having an informational board meeting this Saturday, so I thought I may as well start a post that I'll edit as the week goes on.

• Our summer reading programs in Burkina Faso were by all accounts (a number of visitors, and staff on the ground reported so). We'll soon start evaluating the programs (through a second reading tes tin October, and collection of impressions for local schoolteachers, etc. The team in Burkina will finish our initial draft manual for how to run a summer reading camp. We distributed several hundred books to the 4th graders who were randomly selected to read books. The discussion groups (one third of the 4th graders) enabled us to stock each library with 25 high quality children's books.
• Andrew Martric and friend Lola (NYC residents and Andrew a student at Pratt) spent time in Chalula library in Mvumi, Tanzania, and helped the librarians and local committee improve library functionality. They wrote up a great plan for prioritizing future library work. FAVL director Kate Parry also visited the library. So Chalula got the "friends" treatment" that exemplifies what FAVL is about- a network of like-minded people willing to spend time (and money) helping with the daily realities of running a community library in an African village, not as an abstract or distant involvement, but as a real person-to-person gritty reality.
• FAVL director Kate Parry spent a lot of time networking in Vancouver, New York, Uganda, and Tanzania. She's shepherding Uganda Community libraries Association through it's early start-up phase.
• Ghana CESRUD-FAVL coordinator Lucas Aligire has made two visits to Jordan Nu library, and Peace Corps volunteer Meghan Coughlin has worked closely with FAVL to help establish a library in Niankorodougou, Burkina Faso. These are our early or likely models for what we are calling "FAVL supported libraries", where FAVL does not directly manage the libraries. So far the model seems to be working reasonably well. FAVl offers "boots on the ground" in the form of a coordinator who can occasionally visit the library, expert advice derived from almost a decade of experience, a tax-deductible and accountable way to encourage donations, and some visibility (ahem, that's you, dear blog reader).
• Photographer David Pace is returning from his third trip to Burkina Faso, and we are looking forward to collaborating with him on a Fall 2009 immersion experience in Burkina, where students would take courses on Francophone literature and French language, and also on photography and "book design", followed by a two month immersion in villages with FAVL libraries, where the students would volunteer but more importantly produce a couple of books for use in the local libraries. Montana State University student Chelsea Rangel piloted this kind of immersion very successfully in Spring 2007, resulting in three books that have now been distributed to the libraries.

There's more, but I'll save that for tomorrow!

Thanks for the donations, by the way! Happy end of world literacy day

[In French] Here's a nice interview from Africultures with Léonora Miano, whose new book, Afropean Soul et autres nouvelles, just appeared Flammarion, coll. "Étonnants Classiques", 2008.

Question: Une opposition symbolique forte entre ombre et lumière parcourt votre trilogie romanesque composée de L'Intérieur de la nuit, Les Aubes écarlates et Contours du jour qui vient, ainsi que votre dernier roman, Tels des astres éteints : quelles sont selon vous les ombres qui menacent l'humanité aujourd'hui ? Où trouver de quoi vaincre les ténèbres ?

L'ombre qui nous menace et qui se décline sous diverses formes est notre incapacité à considérer l'humanité comme une et indivisible. Nous refusons de nous reconnaître les uns dans les autres. D'où les nationalismes, le terrorisme, les fondamentalismes, tous ces processus fascisants que nous ne cessons de légitimer. Je n'ai pas la réponse, pour vaincre les ténèbres. Ce dont je suis certaine, c'est que le Mal n'existe que pour être combattu. Refuser de se soumettre peut être un bon début.

Not Africa, but a reminder of the past

Hard to believe that this is the way things were... From Wikipedia:

On September 14, 2007, The United States Postal Service honored the 60th anniversary ruling of Mendez v. Westminster with a 41-cent commemorative stamp. On November 15, 2007, the United States Postal Service presented the Mendez v. Westminster stamp to the Mendez family at a press conference at the Rose Center Theater in Westminster, California.

Mendez v. Westminster School District, 64 F.Supp. 544 (C.D. Cal. 1946), aff'd, 161 F.2d 774 (9th Cir. 1947) (en banc), was a 1947 federal court case that challenged racial segregation in Orange County, California schools.

The Ninth Circuit ruled only on the narrow grounds that, although California law provided for segregation of students, it only did so for "children of Chinese, Japanese or Mongolian parentage". And because "California law does not include the segregation of school children because of their Mexican blood," therefore it was unlawful to segregate the Mexican children.

Presumably, a similar lawsuit filed by "Chinese, Japanese or Mongolian" children in segregated schools would have had the opposite result. This was remedied in California later that same year, on June 14, 1947, when California Governor Earl Warren signed a law repealing the remaining school segregation statutes in the California Education Code.

Follow-up on literacy and HIV/AIDS

Earlier I reproduced mystery novelist Henning Mankell's comment about how important literacy is for stemming the tide of HIV/AIDS. In case you thought anti-retrovirals were taking care of that problem... in case you thought it was an invisible problem, read pediatric nurse SDG's posting about Sammy K.

Ready to read and review?

Did you get your African novel for World Literacy Day like I asked you? Did you make your donation? If yes, you're ready to rock with your book review contribution.... But, where to put the damn review? How about the excellent compilation by tupakamoja... available here.

International Literacy Day is coming up....

It is September 8.
To celebrate, why not read an African novel that you check out from your local public library (you do have a card, don't you?) and make a small donation to FAVL?

Say it louder, baby!

Swedish mystery novelist Henning Mankell is a fierce African-oriented anti-illiteracy activist (AOAILLA), OMG just like me!

Let me now talk about illiteracy. It is a disgrace for the whole world that we in the year 2008 have yet to eradicate illiteracy on our planet. Still millions of children are forced to enter life without knowing how to read and write. The fact that we deny so many children these elementary tools means that we render them defenseless on so many issues related to AIDS. How can we expect a young person who lacks the ability to understand written information, who is unable to grasp the essence of vital knowledge, to protect her- or himself from becoming infected? Of course people talk, of course there is radio. There are also theatrical groups who travel the country to inform people. But the fact remains that we live in a world where the ability to read is necessary to acquire information.

Read more ...

A friend recommends...

The excellent graphic novel Aya from Ivory Coast. Here's an interview from Bookslut (?) with the author, Marguerite Abouet.

Holly's blog from Luboto library in Zambia

The Luboto library is part of Fountains fo Hope, an organization that helps street kids. Holly has been volunteering at the library as a Consulting Librarian under the Nasser Sharify Fellow for International Librarianship program. She is studying at Pratt Institute's School of Information and Library Science, and working as a librarian trainee at Brooklyn Public Library. The blog is excellent, featuring Holly's recollections of conversations with readers and youth who come to the library as a respite from the streets.

A FAVL friend writes...

I came across information suggesting the Howard University library in D.C. has some expertise in the area of French-language literature related to Africa. So I contacted them asking for information about relevant books that my son might try to find for his library project. I heard back from Mr. Mohamed Mekkawi, Director of Libraries for Howard University. I’ve pasted below the relevant information he sent me. Your organization may be familiar with these resources and with Mr. Mekkawi, but if any of it is new information and useful to FAVL, that would be gratifying.

Lisons tous, Vol 1. http://www.afrilivres.com/spip.php?article197

Lison tous, Vol 2. http://www.afrilivres.com/spip.php?article160

You'll also find a whole list of African French language books with illustrations--good material for beginners in this language. http://www.afrilivres..com/spip.php?mot1047

I also suggest browsing my website "French Connection" for additional materials, esp under the rubric "Franchphonie": http://www.howard.edu/library/Assist/Guides/FrenchConnection..htm#FRANCOPHONY

Mekkawi, Mohamed, M.A.

Director of Libraries, Howard University

Why not search "fairytale novel nigeria"?

An interesting Nigerian-American author pops up!

Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu was born in the United States to two Igbo (Nigerian) immigrant parents. She holds a PhD in English and is a professor at Chicago State University. ....

Her first novel, Zahrah the Windseeker (published in 2005 by Houghton Mifflin and an illustrated version was published in Nigeria in 2008 by Kachifo Ltd.), takes place in a highly technological world based on Nigerian myths and culture.

Zahrah the Windseeker was shortlisted for the Parallax Award and Kindred Award in 2006, a finalist for the 2005 Golden Duck and GardenState Teen Choice awards and nominated for a Locus Award (Best First Novel) 2005.

Her second novel, The Shadow Speaker (Hyperion Books, 2007) has characters from and takes place in the countries of Niger and Nigeria. The Shadow Speaker was a Booksense Pick for Winter 2007/08 and a finalist for the Essence Magazine Literary Award and the Andre Norton Award. It is also an NAACP Image Award nominee, a Tiptree Honor Book and a Locus Magazine Recommended Book. Nnedi is the winner of the 2007/08 Macmillan Writer's Prize for Africa. Her winning unpublished children's book, Long Juju Man, a story about a girl's encounters with an irritating crafty ghost, will be published by Macmillan UK in 2008.

Read more at her website

Airing dirty laundry....

Hey, I know I am not supposed to do this... will discourage donors, right? The libraries are always perfect and children are smiling and everyone has a favorite book that they read fifty times. "In your face!" as my son is now fond of saying. It's true for some, but the reality is that developing a reading culture and a widespread support for reading is hard even in very literate societies (our neighboring county of Salinas in the United States almost closed all its public libraries!). So in the spirit of letting blog readers know how things really work, and what we at FAVL spend our time doing, here's a"slightly redacted" version of an email I sent to our Ghanaian partner NGO, CESRUD.

Hi Rex,

Sorry to be so late in sending you back some comments from my visit in July. It was nice to meet you for dinner and I hope the next time we can have more time to chat!

I understand that you are having a librarian meeting tomorrow, so there is one thing that I feel important to mention and that I hope you can engage the librarians, particularly X and Y (Z I do not know enough about, but she seemed very enthusiastic). I have the feeling that over the past several years a number of volunteers have come through the libraries, and done storytimes, art sessions, origami (paper folding) and other activities. But somehow the librarians do not seem to incorporate these activities into their own work. They seem to see them as something that volunteers do, but not the librarian. But the point of the volunteers is to be training the librarians by example, and especially training them by example in "taking initiative". The goal of a librarian, and the measure of their effectiveness, is not whether they can preserve the library exactly as they found it, but rather if they can make it better.

To give you a specific example that disappointed me. Outside one library was a piece of paper with the "rules and regulations" The paper was poorly taped to the wall, very unattractive. Part was typed, part was hand-written. Some of the rules were repeated. It looked like little thought had gone into preparing an attractive sign, or a sign that tried to help the library patron understand the rules. One of the rules was to please reshelve the books. When I asked X about the sign, he said that a volunteer had helped them make a better sign of the rules and regulations and simplified it. And indeed there was a nice-looking sign in the interior of the library. That sign, however, said that when looking at a book the patron *should not* reshelf it. (I it may have been the reverse). The point is the signs contradicted each other, but X seemingly had never bothered to fix this very basic thing.

I mention that because small things like that are a sign that there are bigger problems with motivation and interest. When I asked X what books he enjoyed and liked reading, it seemed like he had not been reading any of the books in the library! A librarian's first duty is to know the books in the collection and be reading himself or herself, so that he or she can help the readers.

I think we (you, myself, and Lucas) need to be more forceful with our management and raise expectations of what the librarian should be doing. In Burkina we have increasingly been letting the librarians know that their salary increases are dependent on performance. We issue warning letters to librarians who are absent when a coordinator or other staff member comes to visit. Librarians are told they must inform the coordinator of late opening, early closure or absence. if the coordinator comes by and the library is closed, a warning letter will be issued. Libraries are not to be opened and managed by a younger brother or a friend.

So I wanted to let you know it is something I was concerned about, and I look forward to continuing to work with you and CESRUD on this matter. Lucas is very important in the role of overseeing the librarian work. He needs to set good expectations and example for the librarians. I feel it is important to have an open discussion- our work at the libraries is about improving things and making sure everyone feels like they are part of the team.

I think we have a good relationship, so I know you won't interpret this as criticism but rather as what I see as the area we need to work on to improve. Anything I can do to help, that is what I am here for!

All the best,

Michael

Bible reading as reading

Cribbed from the scholars (the link is gated so no point posting):

Book review of
The road to clarity: Seventh-Day Adventism in Madagascar – By Eva Keller Basingstoke: Palgrave 2005.
by
Michael Lambek London School of Economics and Political Science/University of Toronto
in
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute Vol 13(3) Pages 774-775 2007

The road to clarity is itself a model of clarity. With lucid writing and direct argument, Keller draws us to a small number of Seventh-Day Adventists in the remote town of Maroantsetra and surrounding villages of northeastern Madagascar. Established in the United States by 1860, Adventism has been only modestly successful in Madagascar (slightly under 1 per cent of the population in the district are members; this is higher than the national average and lower than neighbouring countries) but reasonably effective. In particular, the church's ability to manage the regular circulation of their quarterly Bible Study Guide with its daily lessons printed in Malagasy suggests a remarkable level of organization that is beyond the scope of Keller's study. It is the written publications that account for the success of Adventism in this part of Madagascar. They enjoin people to read and study the Bible, offering daily topics and questions with associated verses from the Old and New Testaments. Keller offers a compelling description of the intellectual pleasure gained from reading, studying, and conversing together. Interpretation is collective and democratic; Keller describes the method as Socratic and makes an interesting comparison with science. It is the process of study rather than any specific results which the Adventists enjoy, as well as the sense of potency that promises them the complete clarity of divine vision in the afterlife.

One could see this as a purely intellectualist account but insofar as one accepts Keller's observation that 'Bible study is not a means to an end, but an exciting and attractive activity in and of itself' (p. 242), so one must also acknowledge (at least from an Aristotelian perspective) the ethical dimension. Indeed, a chief strength of this book is Keller's strong rebuttal of the various utilitarian arguments so frequently made to explain conversion. Keller shows that Adventism is not practised in order to wriggle out of obligations to kin and take the short cut to middle-class life, and she shows the strong and selfless commitments that continue to be made to relatives across the denominational boundary.

Photos from Jordan Nu library

Earlier I had posted about Marilyn Deer, a very generous and committed donor who helped establish a library in Jordan Nu, Ghana. The establishment of the library was tough, and then Marilyn realized that the battle had only just begun! Managing and ensuring quality service are even harder. So we have been exploring how to leverage our respective strengths... Marilyn's long-term commitment and incredible energy, and our presence on the ground (though a little far away!). Our library coordinator, Lucas Amikiya, visited Jordan Nu with Marilyn in June. (Along for the ride was Amanda Young, a Watson scholar traveling the world looking at community libraries, but that is another posting.) We're now talking about setting up a more regular system of visiting the library and doing inspection, training and encouragement for a week. It is expensive, but has to be done, we all agree. What is the proper frequency, is the problem. Once a month would be ideal, but costs far to much! These are the issues that a network of "friends of African village libraries" confronts every day. So I was struggling with the tradeoffs, and then got to Marilyn's email where she had sent me photos of the library... here they are- fantastic! A real jewel, and the little we spend on polishing this gem will be well worth it! Bravo Jordan Nu!!!!!

How do you quickly come up with a blog entry? Search "gruesome novel Nigeria" in Google

Why search for that and see what you can find? It's more likely to get a hit than "Fairytale novel Nigeria"? (Well, no it isn't really; see tomorrow's post.) It did work: the first link led me to a nice review of a novel and writer I had not previously heard of, at Qantara.de, an interesting website in its own right.

Abdulrazak Gurnah – "Pilgrim's Way"

As Foreign as a Drop of Oil in Water

In his novel Pilgrim's Way, Abdulrazak Gurnah, two-time Booker Prize nominee and native of Zanzibar, writes about migrants and their foreignness. The book is an angry postcolonial "coming to terms" with society. Review by Jan Valk
Abdulrazak Gurnah
There are different forms of foreignness. There is the foreignness of the newcomer – of one who has yet to familiarize himself with a new environment. And then there is the foreignness of a drop of oil in a pail of water. This is more than a temporary state. It is the true existential form of foreignness: something insoluble.

[in French] Viviane offers some commentary on the summer reading camps

Le lendemain matin je me suis rendu à Sara avec Leslie. A 8 heures nous étions à Sara. A notre arrivée, l’animation avait déjà commencée. L’animateur principal de Sara qui est Ismaila, Dounko, Lucie et l’assistant du camp étaient avec les enfants sous le hangar de la bibliothèque, chantaient, tapaient les mains et dansaient à tour de rôle. L’ambiance était vraiment bon- enfant ! Apres cette animation, ce fut les jeux de ludo et de carte en groupe. Pendant que les enfants jouaient, je m’entretenais avec Dounko et Ismaila. Ceux-ci m’ont fait savoir que la première semaine du camp était décevant du fait du niveau très bas des élèves ; pendant les séances de lecture, lorsque un enfant lisait par exemple un paragraphe, à chaque mot, l’enfant marquait un point ; la lecture était donc totalement entrecoupée. Mais après une semaine, les animateurs leur ont appris à lire et c’est ce que nous avons constate au cour de l’activité qui a suivit les jeux, c'est-à-dire la lecture. Ismaila et Dounko interrogeaient les enfants à lire à tour de rôle. Lorsque un enfant finissait de lire et que les animateurs constataient qu’il à fait du progrès dans la lecture comparativement aux jours précédents, tout le monde l’applaudissait. Apres la lecture ce fut le coloriage des masques confectionnés la veille, puis les dessins libre. Les enfants sont de bons dessinateurs (confer images en photos et vidéo). Apres la pause, ce fut les discussions en deux groupes ; le premier groupe dirige par Dounko discutait de la vie chez le tuteur, et celui du groupe dirigé par Ismaila discutait sur l’importance de la lecture. Les enfants répondaient aux questions des animateurs et écoutaient attentivement les conseils de ceux-ci après les discussions. Apres toutes ces activités, les enfants se sont régalés en mangeant un bon plat de riz à la sauce d’arachide et au poisson fume. Apres le déjeuner sous le hangar, ils ont rejoints la bibliothèque ou les animateurs leur ont donnes des livres a lire a la maison ; ceci pour favoriser leur apprentissage a la lecture.

Thumbprints... because there are no sushi restaurants yet

On the sushi, see Tyler Cowen in Marginal Revolution, read towards the bottom of the entry.

Niankorodougou library plows on

Reading is like a field... you cultivate it and the reading grows. Gosh that simile didn't work at all. Any suggestions?

Here's indomitable Meghan Coughlin's latest blog entry...

In the month of July, we enrolled 30 new library members (18 students and 22 adults), had 139 books borrowed, and 753 library visits, more than 20 a day. That’s also more than two times the number of visits we had in June, and as I have said before all of these numbers will only go up with the end of vacation and the rainy season.

What is the What

If you are looking for a novel set in Africa that is actually closer to a true story, then I definitely recommend Eggers book published last year. I am going to lead several discussions about the current political situation in Sudan for some San Mateo County libraries (under the San Mateo County Reads program) and am looking forward to sharing impressions about the book. My first impression, which I had before I even read What is the What, was that Cormac McCarthy's The Road was actually a sly way to make people think about the experiences of the Sudanese and Rwandans... however horrific the slog was in The Road (grim I thought as I unbearably kept reading it) the real-life slog of people out of the atrocious violence in Sudan and Rwanda was every bit its equal. And unlike The Road's glimmer of a happy ending, for most people in Kakuma, Congo, and elsewhere the was no happy ending and they continue to live grim lives. So if that doesn't get you interested in reading the book what will?

Chris Abani in Voices in Wartime

A nice short video featuring a couple poems set during the Biafra civil war. Abani has a new novel called Song for Night.

FAVL director Leslie Gray visits some of the summer reading camps

Arriving in Sara to see the reading camps, the first thing I noticed was children jumping and singing, not reading. It dawned on me that this experience for the kids was much more than academic, it was social and fun, just like summer camp in the United States. The children were singing, doing art projects, theater, calisthenics, and spending a lot of time reading and discussing books. They got two nutritious meals a day, and a t-shirt, which is a big thing in Burkina Faso. The levels of ability to read were quite different, but I was told that many of the children had progressed quite significantly from the first day of camp. At the end of each day, children would take home a book that they would then read at night.

What an incredible opportunity this has been for village children. Certainly this is the only camp that they will ever attend. In Bereba after the camp ended, many of the children were very sad. The camps have been so popular that parents have approached the librarians and said that they want more of them and would pay for them. Several of the camp teachers noticed changes in the kids. First, their reading improved. Second, they became much more vocal in giving opinions and third, they became very attached to the libraries. In fact, the children frequent the library much more than they did before. Overall, these have been an enormous success. We have to try to do this again next year!

Not out of Africa, but an interesting read nevertheless

On the plane back from Burkina read Appointment in Samarra, published in 1934, by John O'Hara. Interesting technique employed, of not ever quite knowing what the novel is about, and then even at the end not really sure. There are multiple plots, and different characters take center stage at different points. You think the novel is about one person, and then that person never appears again. The sociological commentary on the well-to-do just as the Depression hits is very interesting.

Long-term effects of literary education on book-reading frequency

Long-term effects of literary education on book-reading frequency: An analysis of Dutch student cohorts 1975–1998
Marc Verboord
Department for the Study of the Arts and Culture, Erasmus University, The Netherlands

Poetics
Volume 33, Issues 5-6, October-December 2005, Pages 320-342

Abstract
We investigated the influence of literary education models on the book-reading frequency of students later in life, and how this influence can be explained. In total, 85 mother-tongue teachers in secondary education in the Netherlands were retrospectively questioned about their literary instruction in a random year between 1975 and 1998. Almost 700 former students of these teachers, spread over examination years and levels, were tracked down and interviewed about their current reading frequency. Multilevel analyses showed that the more student-centered the model of literary education is, the higher the later book-reading frequency. As the model gets more teacher-centered, the less students tend to read as adults. These effects do not vary over various student cohorts. Neither do changes in literary education over time explain differences in book-reading frequency between cohorts. Implications of these results are discussed.

More from FAVL - East Africa

Kate writes, apparently from the bus terminal in Dodoma on her way to visit Chalula library in Tanzania:

Dear Friends,

It’s been a busy summer (dry season in Uganda), and I have only been able to get to Kitengesa three times. But they were three wonderful weekends. On the first, the library was holding a Children’s Day. Cheldren from Lwannunda Primary School—the school next door to our own house—were there, playing games and reading books, and at the end Lucy, the librarian in charge, asked me to read them a story. It’s a lovely story, How Hare Stole Ghost’s Drum by Julius Ocwinyo. Julius is a friend of mine, and he told me that he learned the story while in primary school in Northern Uganda, in his own language, Lango. And here was I reading this story, in English, to Luganda-speakig children! It’s a great instance of the kind of interlingual activity the library makes possible.

My most recent visit, on 19-20 July, was extra special because we were playing host that weekend to a mobile computer center! This center is a project of the Maendeleo foundation (www.maendeleo.org or www.progressafrica.org), which is directed by my friend Eric Morrow. It consists of a van, equipped with solar panels on the roof, a tent, and five cmputers. Eric set up the show outside the library and on the first day the Lwannunda Primary School children came to learn how to use the computers; the second day was devoted to adult members of the library. On the Saturday, Dan set a DVD going on one of our laptops inside the library to keep the children entertained while they were waiting; and later I got to read them another story. Altogether, Eric and his team served close to 100 people that weekend—and since it was the first time he had taken his mobile computer center out, it was quite a triumph.

The middle visit was devoted to a meeting of the Kitengesa Community Library Board (of which I am the secretary). Our main task at present is putting up our own computer center. A student volunteer organization based on the University of British Columbia raised CAN$10,000 towards this project, and we raised another $10,000 ourselves last year. Now the walls are up and work is to begin on the roof next week. The whole building is to consist of a book room, the same size as our present library, a slightly smaller computer room (to house 9-10 computers), and a community hall. The idea is to rent the latter out so as to generate an income for the library.

We need more money, though. We had to start the project early this year so as to secure the Canadian grant, and I thought what I’d raised would be enough to finish the building. But prices, especially of cement, have gone up tremendously, and what we have will only complete the roof. I’m trying to get another grant, and the Maendeleo Foundation will help with the computers, but any additional contribution will be warmly welcome, if only to cover our running costs (the latter are about $3000 a year, while as much as $10,000 more may be needed for the building project).

Meanwhile, I’ve been spending a lot of time working for the Uganda Community Libraries Association. We formed this association last year because we realized that thee are many other libraries in Uganda founded, like Kitengesa, on local initiatives and serving mainly rural populations. We have held two workshops for the association, and it is wonderful to see how excited the people working in these libraries are about meeting others in the same business—and, as we hoped it would, Kitengesa is proving an example and inspiration for all. So thanks to all of you, our donors, for making this all possible!

Kitengesa library scholars

Kate Parry is just returning from Uganda, and she sends along a snapshot of the Kitengesa library scholars. These are secondary school students who receive a small stipend that is used to pay their school fees, and in return they spend time in the library helping out where needed. A nice way to reward the "avid readers" who will someday turn into "literary giants"!

A new writer from Nigeria

FAVL Treasurer Deb Garvey pointed me to a short story in the June 23 New Yorker, which we missed while we were abroad, by Chimananda Ngozi Adichie. The story is called "The Headstrong Historian" and employs an interesting technique of going slow through the rhythms of pre-colonial village life and then suddenly accelerating through seventy-five years of colonial and independence life. I get the feeling from the story that there is a deeper structure, and that more than likely she is riffing off Chinua Achebe, but I'm an economist not a literary scholar, so I'll leave it to someone else to map the arcana and enlighten her readers.

Librarything on Africa

I've just stumbled across the book-lovers sharing site called LibraryThing, and one of their groups is Africa related. As good a place as any to meet people interested in African literature and Africa-related books.

A point of comparison....

When I think about what my ideal conversation would be like with a library reader in one of the African Village libraries that FAVL supports, below is what I have in mind. If you are in Africa and are friends with a super-reader like florality, or are one yourself, make a little video and send me the link!

The Book of Not

A sequel to Nervous Conditions, Tsitsi Dangaremga's first novel, The Book of Not definitely is no match for the first book, which was wonderfully crafted in prose and story. This novel unfortunately reflects the main character Tambudzai's "teenage" mentality... jumbled, unsure, mixed up, unable to make much sense, lots of hidden stuff, and very self-absorbed! Not really a good read, though the terrific opening scene- the beating of Babamukuru, gives the reader enough answer to "I wonder what happened..." to leave me satisfied for years.