Day 12 - Touching the Void

Today was a quiet one, with 40 laps walked and a visit from my dad's girlfriend-type-person (it hurts my head to try and figure out if they're together or not, so I just accept that she's around, and that she cares), who is one of the sweetest people you will ever meet. Thanks to her I managed to get outside in the sunshine for ten minutes for the third day running. I can't describe how good that feels when you have been deprived of it.

 

I also got a call from my ex's dad, who has just got back from doing Kokoda and had promised to call and let me know how it went. Hard to believe that he called me before he left, which was on my... second, I think, night here, and here I remain, waiting for surgery, when he has spent the time somewhat more productively completing such a challenging walk. Not to mention the fact it's a walk I would have liked to have done. Never say never, but probably not high on the list of "things I am quite likely to do in the near future"!

 

I got a visit from the surgeon quite late in the day. I think it was around 6:30pm, and it was brief, and not especially informative. The fact they haven't bothered moving me into the public hospital overnight and that I will get breakfast tells me that it is unlikely that they will operate tomorrow, but, again, never say never! That said, I'll believe it when I see it...

 

The bulk of the day was spent thoroughly absorbed by a book that a friend had lent me. I read it cover to cover, and although I am hesitant to stand up and declare that it has inspired me, it has kind of made me think that it might be possible to do more with myself. Physically, I mean. 

The book was Touching the Void, and was written by Joe Simpson, a mountaineer who broke his leg on a climb in Peru during a descent. His climbing partner Simon tried his utmost to get him down, but eventually Joe got into a situation he couldn't physically get out of, and Simon then had make the incredibly difficult decision to cut the rope from which Joe hung, knowing he would probably die. Joe falls down the cliff, into a crevasse, survives, decides to have a crack at getting out, then crawls about nine miles back to camp over the course of a few days with a shattered leg.

There were a few things that struck me about it.

One was Joe's determination to keep going, which resonated with me. Perhaps I'm delusional, but I like to think I'm a pretty determined person (when my courage is not failing me), and tend to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Some may call that pig-headed or stubborn, but I call it life. I quite simply don't find the alternative - which is to rot away, sitting on my mum's couch - to be at all acceptable. And don't get me wrong, I'm not comparing my life to the near-death experience of a mountaineer with a busted knee crawling on his hands and knees for miles on end, but I admired his determination, and that he (or "the voice") did not allow himself to entertain the alternative for long.

Another was that it took place in Peru. I jokingly say that I left my heart in Peru, but it's kind of true. Peru is where I climbed my last big mountain (by my standards! Obviously not by the standards of mountaineers or even of more ambitious, casual hikers), and where, in the days afterwards, I was hospitalised with a previously-undiagnosed heart condition. I had no idea that fateful day what an impact it would have on my life, and what a huge readjustment it would take to quell the sometimes-crippling, daily fear; and to silence or at least quieten the voices that tell me you can't. My heart is in the outdoors, and I guess Peru marked the end of a time that I could do whatever physical activities I chose in a carefree way.

Finally, in his acknowlegements, Simpson mentions his parents - "Lastly, and most important, I wish to thank my parents for encouraging me to write the book, helping me get my mind and body back to normal, and patiently accepting my decision to continue climbing." The mountains I climb ain't got nothin' on Simpson's, but he has quite accurately described the support I have received from family and friends alike, and the patience with which they have humoured my outdoorsy whims. Some of them - and I'm sure they know who they are - have played a huge, consistent role in supporting me, whilst others have let their own fears about what might happen take over. But I can't expect everyone to be at peace with my decisions, especially those who care about me and have a vested interest in my survival; after all, I live in this body every day, and think about it every day, so I'm obviously better-placed to make those choices and to deal with those fears.

I admire the courage of mountaineers like Simpson. He writes in such a matter-of-fact way, which can not possibly describe the level of fitness or skill that these guys must have had, and I am in awe of him, and others like him... even if they don't have a near-death experience!

(Abridged version: read the book!)

Anyway, that's enough reflection.

I'll leave you with a Pyjama Selfie, because if I do go in for surgery tomorrow then I will be sporting a sexy hospital gown, and ain't nothin' gonna incite me to post a picture of THAT for the world to see!

The flavour of the day is giraffes. I guess I'm just a woman with altitude today. Ha. Haha. Hahaha SO FUNNY!!! (get it? Giraffes are tall. I'm tall. Mountains were climbed...)

Pyjama selfie:

Woman with altitude (and FYI, I used to have a T-shirt with this printed on it!):

If tomorrow turns out to be The Day then wish me luck! I'm trying not to think about it. Don't wanna have to psych myself up all over again. Last time was soooo messy. I'm hoping that this time it'll be all like, BAM, GAME ON.

Night!

Book Review - Long Walk to Freedom, by Nelson Mandela

This book has been on my mum's bookshelf for almost as long as I can recall. I think, in the beginning, I had a natural aversion to it on account of the fact that she had recommended it to me. Same reason as I hated Nirvana and the Foo Fighters and Metallica - because my brother liked them.

I know. I'm a dolt.

But I'm a loveable dolt! Right??? *looks hopeful*

Two vaguely interesting although minor segues - one, two of my closest friends Al and Emma have both read this book. As in, this copy. As in, they spend maybe 10 hours per year in my mum's house and they still read it before I did. Al beat it to me by a good ten years, perhaps even closer to fifteen (although it can't be fifteen because I didn't meet him until 1998).

Two, I had the opportunity to meet Nelson Mandela, thanks to Al... and I turned it down because I didn't really want to race to the station and catch a train into town and THEN find wherever it was this youth conference was being held, on time, all on my own (bear in mind that this was in a time before Google Maps and iPhones) - I think it was Etihad Stadium, previously known as Docklands Stadium, the Telstra Dome and Colonial Stadium, depending on who sponsored it that week . As it turns out, I would have been grossly underdressed to meet a leader of such global significance (I was wearing more casual clothing than the girl in burgandy shirt below), plus, at the time I knew he was a pretty awesome dude but that was about it because at seventeen I just had NO clue what the fuss was about... so my scardey-bone winning out probably wasn't such a terrible thing. Imagine an awkward moment where Dr Mandela asks me a really deep question and I blink at him like a goldfish, and that is how it would have gone.

This is a picture from the Day I Could Have Met Nelson Mandela But Didn't. Al is the well-dressed young man in the centre, and the guy over his shoulder to the left is another friend I have long since lost contact with, but who my money is still on to make a mark on the world somehow. I think I was also his first kiss during a highschool game of spin the bottle! The lady to the left of him was my Year 7 tute teacher, as well as my humanities teacher, and she was an odd one. Normally she was lovely, but don't even consider crossing her because she could just turn on you and get reeeeeeally nasty. As in, her eyes would send daggers of ice into your heart. I wonder what became of her, and what she was actually like outside of the classroom...

Anyway, back to the book.

It certainly WAS a long walk to freedom! But not in the same way that you felt you suffered through every single step and every single day that Brad Pitt spent in his Seven Years in Tibet (mind you, I was fifteen when I saw it so I may get more value out of it now). No, this was an informative and enlightening journey; and, as I find happens when I read any sort of book that lays down the history of a region, I felt like I understand the world a little better. It really is true that to move forward you have to acknowledge- but not dwell on - what came before.

The only thing I will say against it is that it is the only true (auto)biography I have read (the closest I have come is Three Cups of Tea, which is a really interesting book about Dr Greg Mortimer's experience building schools where girls are welcome, in the Pakistani foothills of the Himalayas), and that so far I don't find (auto)biographies to really be my style. Obviously that's not the fault of the author - it's just a matter of preference on my part. Some, like Three Cups of Tea, are written as though they are a story and that makes it a more enjoyable read for me. It is probably testament to the fact that Three Cups of Tea was a story told by the Dr Greg to the author, who then documented his journey. Long Walk to Freedom, on the other hand, was actually written by Dr Mandela, with only fact-checking and re-writing of confiscated sections completed or co-written by others.

As a novel (which I had mistakenly thought it was) it is a little bit heavy on the detail, but it's not a novel at all (well done, Vanessa. Well done.) - it's a work of non-fiction; an historical document, if you will. It chronicles every single name of every single person involved in any vague way with the fight for freedom in South Africa, and on what dates they particpated in that fight. Because of that saturation of information I can only recall literally a handful of names used (note: I began writing this six weeks ago and have since forgotten all but two names). But because  it is an autobiography it therefore makes sense to document the minutae of Dr Mandela's (and the African National Congress') struggle for freedom and for non-racial democracy in South Africa.

It begins with his childhood on his father's "farm" in the country, and his gradual move to the city for education. He completes highschool and obtains a law degree, all whilst being a major player in the ANC - initially in its youth arm and then then later in the main body of the organisation. Later still, as the fight intensifies, he founds an armed arm (heh. Sorry about that) of the organisation in response to the white government's refusal to cease violence against blacks, coloureds and Indians. (That's something else I learnt - that the three groups were treated separately, and that there was a hierarchy amongst them in terms of how the white government viewed them.) The book also describes the lengthy trial against himself and other freedom fighters, and what follows is quite a large portion of the book taking place on Roben Island, where Mandela was incarcerated for the majority of his 27 years in prison.

I never really understood the significance of Mandela being freed, or the circumstances under which he was locked up, until I read this. I knew it was a great step forward for the world when he was released, but I didn't know why. Some would call him a trouble-maker, and there is no question at all that he was a law-breaker and a revolutionary, but only because he existed in a climate that made it all but impossible to live freely in a lawful fashion. Being criminalised was an obvious outcome of not being allowed some quite basic freedoms.

I would definitely recommend a read. It willl take you quite a while to get through, but it is compelling enough to help you cope with the length. At the very least it should help you appreciate some very basic freedoms that we take for granted.

Lastly, it also raised some interesting questions in my mind about accepting the status quo in today's age, at least in the Western world (watch out, my mind's about to wander off-topic!). The freedoms we fight for seem so very trivial when you consider the marginalisation or unfair laws that various ethnic groups suffer in different parts of the world - even when they represent the majority of the population. These people's heads would probably explode if they ever heard about the CFMEU's latest EBA, and that under that agreement you can be paid around $1100 per 36-hour week for driving a 12-tonne truck (which just requires the appropriate licence), and $750 per week living away from home alowance. Sure, our cost of living is greater, but surely it's not twenty to forty times greater than the majority of African nations. Our expectations, on the other hand, probably are twenty to forty times higher, and that's the stuff mainstream society fights for here (freedom to own a flatscreen TV! Freedom for every family to own two cars! Freedom to not be made to do your homework! Freedom to be handed money by the government for breeding (accidentally or otherwise), and then the freedom to complain about not being paid enough to not work while you bring the kid up! (heh. Sorry. Capitalist rant over. Although this is an interesting read - barstool economics)), not real, basic freedoms.

With the focus in the West so heavily on individual entitlement and freedom to do whatever one jolly well pleases with no consequence and no thought of others (precious little petals that we are), surely it's only a matter of time until life as we know it collapses into a smoking heap of rubble. The lack of genuine freedom has a similarly chaotic effect - Long Walk to Freedom demonstrated that very clearly - but after the point where basic, actual freedoms are fought for and (hopefully) obtained it becomes a philosphical argument. Why should some little punk with his underwear sticking out the top of his pants, in the space of half an hour, be free to graffitti public property, evade train fares and listen to his iPod so loudly that everyone within a 20m radius can hear it, too? And if his freedom encroaches on my freedom to be proud of where I live, not be visually assaulted by his underwear (or worse, his bum crack) and enjoy a reasonable level of serenity, then why can't I be free to drag him by the ear to the local cop shop? It's my country, too, and I'm not so keen for jerks like that to exist.

And on it goes.

I think that that we in the West should take a moment to think about which freedoms are important and which are not. Society became regulated for a reason, and even the most basic structures in society have some form of regulation. Even a hive of bees has rules and structure and process.

So what freedoms would you give up? And what does freedom mean to you? And how far would you go to fight for it?

PS - I turned 30 last week, and I think it really shows in this cranky old lady rant. I'm enjoying this 30 business!

Book Review: Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte

This is one from my 101 Things list - to re-read Wuthering Heights and attempt to enjoy it. And nobody is more surprised than myself to discover that it was nowhere near as tedious as I found it on the first two reads!

I know, shocking, isn't it.

Don't get me wrong - Heathcliff and Cathy are still two fairly abhorrent human beings. They're rude and sneaky and inconsiderate and downright mean... but I think they really do love each other, and this book is touted as one of the greatest love stories in literature, and I'm beginning to understand why. You see, contrary to what we are fed by movies and poets and musicians and authors, love ain't always pretty. It's messy and it can hurt and there aren't always rainbows and puppy dogs abound as you skip down the road holding hands. The oft-quoted Corinthians got it wrong: Love isn't always patient or kind. It can be jealous and boastful and proud and rude and demanding. It can be irritable; and it can keep tally of grievances; and it doesn't always rejoice when the truth wins out. Heathcliff and Cathy demonstrate that quite soundly, I feel!

My best guess is that the last time I read the book - about six or seven years (which feels like a lifetime) ago, I was much more idealistic and naive. I don't think I'd ever really had my heart broken, or had to compromise in a relationship (or had a serious argument in one, come to that), or been badly betrayed, or even reached the age where relationships become permanent fixtures that are unable to be compromised just by telling a boy that you like him. So to me, back then, it was just a tedious tale of two cranky people who would love each other to the ends of the earth but who could never actually be together. I did understand unrequited love in a relatively juvenile way (or perhaps unrequited lust, or obsession, or something to the effect), but it had not yet occurred to me that loving someone could be that messy, and that the object of your affection could be anything but flawless in their conduct towards you and towards the world.

My other feeling is that between all the children named for their forebears, both Christian and surnames; and the fact that Cathy Jnr marries not one, but two of her cousins (not concurrently, but still, kinda icky!); and that one of the cousins is the son of Heathcliff, so that Heathcliff and Cathy Snr's progeny get it on, I have, in the past, been horribly confused by who was who. This time, however, I kept my finger firmly in the family tree page and continued to refer to it throughout the story.

For those who haven't read it, what follows is a rough plot synopsis.

Cathy and her brother Hindley Earnshaw are brought up at Wuthering Heights with Heathcliff, a stray that her father adopts and brings into the family. Hindley is always jealous of him and takes every opportunity to spite him, but Heathcliff and Cathy get along like a house on fire. Hindley goes off to university and meets a woman who he marries and returns to Wuthering Heights. He becomes master when Mr Earnshaw dies and forces Heathcliff into being a servent.

Nearby at Thrushcross Grange are the Lintons, Edgar and Isabella. Cathy grows closer to them when she is bitten by their dog and has to spend time staying with them recouperating. When she returns home she behaves as though she is better than Heathcliff. As time goes by she becomes closer and closer to Edgar until he proposes to her. She is overheard by Heathcliff when she confides in Nelly the housemaid (who narrates most of the story within a narration by the existing tennant of Thrushcross Grange), and tells Nelly that she doesn't love Edgar but that she can't lower herself to marrying Heathcliff, even though he has her heart. Heathcliff runs out before hearing that she does in fact love him, and that she only plans to marry Edgar so that she can help support Heathcliff and improve his existing situation of manservant. Heathcliff disappears after that and in the end is nowhere to be found for a few years.

Edgar and Cathy eventually marry after a couple of years, and several months later Heathcliff returns, much refined and much more wealthy. Heathcliff establishes himself at Wuthering Heights and sets about ruining Hindley, encouraging him to gamble and taking his fortune, piece by piece. He also influences Hindley's son Hareton and teaches him to be bitter and hateful and to neglect his studies and become worthless and unloveable. All of this is to gain vengeance for Hindley's poor treatment of Heathcliff growing up.

Cathy becomes ill following an argument with Edgar about Heathcliff being in her life, and her health spirals. Meanwhile, Heathcliff elopes with Edgar's sister Isabella more or less to be spiteful. After the elopement Heathcliff finds out exactly how critically ill Cathy is and rushes to her bedside. In between her feverish ramblings they declare their undying love for one another, and then Cathy dies, but not before she give birth to Cathy Jnr.

Meanwhile, Isabella is also pregnant with Heathcliff's child, and runs away following a physical domestic dispute. She gives birth to Linton and brings him up alone.

Fast forward serveal years - when Linton is thirteen Isabella dies and he returns to live with his uncle Edgar; but Heathcliff finds out that Linton has come home and forces him to move in with him.

Linton is a sickly and petulant child, and Cathy Jnr feels quite sorry for him so spends quite a bit of time with him, reading and pandering to his whims so forth. By the time they are teenagers there is a bit of a flame there but Cathy doesn't seem 100% into it. Linton is more or less dying, as is Edgar, and one day Heathcliff lures Cathy Jnr into his house and refuses to let her leave until she and Linton marry. This is in a bid to combine the estates of the two people he hated most - Hindley, for making his life a misery, and Edgar, for marrying Cathy Snr - and thus seek his vengence.

So they marry, and it doesn't last long because Linton dies. I think Edgard dies first, though. And then Heathcliff dies! Creepy ol' fella seems to live (die) happily ever after, because he pays the sexton at the local church to prise open Cathy Snr's coffin lid on the side that he will be be buried, and to do the same to his coffin, so they can... hold hands?? Share worms?? Who knows. Weird cat, that one. Anyway, he's happy when he dies and everyone who's left living (Cathy Jnr and Hareton, I think, plus servants) are just as happy that he's six feet under. Huzzah!

(Yeah. Plagiarise that, uni students. I know you've done it before. I've seen what your search terms are, which server you come from and how long you loiter for. Statcounter knows evvvvvvverything... so cite me, biatches! I'm totes a reliable source!)

So there you have it. Two people who love one another, despite their (multiple, hideous) flaws, and who, though unable to be together in this lifetime, are determined to be together in the next. So I guess Corinthians isn't entirely wrong. Because Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. They both died knowing they were loved by the other, and that was enough for them.

Book Review: Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, by Ben H. Winters

First up, I need to tell you that my review is probably not going to be entirely objective as I'm a little bit over the whole parody or mashed-up classics genre. I was amused by it at first; Pride and Prejudice and Zombies tickled my funny bone, and Jane Slayre was also quite good. There have also been excellent mash-ups in other mediums, such as Wicked, the musical that re-writes the story of the famous Wizard of Oz character, the Wicked Witch of the West (East??), and I'm also a big fan of Robin Hood: Men in Tights (27 viewings and counting!).  But by the time I made it to Sense and Sensibilty and Sea Monsters I had reached the point of saturation.

In the second place, I was never all that fond of Sense and Sensibility to begin with. It always seemed a little bit meh to me. So I'm probably not the best person to be writing this review, but because I committed to it I shall subject the interwebs to it anyway! Also, I really don't know what I expected to happen, given this set of circumstances. I suppose I was setting myself up for failure.

*pauses*

...Gosh, I'm bored already! And I just remembered that I started writing this once before, and was so uninspired by it that I stopped writing. Writing is supposed to be fun for me, not a chore. I could just link this to Wiki and walk away, but I'm going to take the higher road. It hurrrrrts :(

Okay, so basically the entire thing takes place in the same time period as the original, but something called The Alteration has occurred. The Alteration means that aquatic life have it in for human beings, so living close to the coast is considered to be quite dangerous, what with attacks from giant squid and the like. The whole thing has a bit of a nautical theme going on.

Upstanding citizen Colonel Brandon now has tentacles coming out of his face that quiver when he becomes emotional or impassioned (cue a whole lot of phallic jokes), and carefree cad Willoughby is now a treasure hunter and gets about wearing wetsuit and flippers with a pet chimpanzee by his side (yeah, I don't really get it either). He attracts the attention of the Dashwood sisters when he rescues one of them when she falls into a creek and is attacked by a (presumably freshwater) octopus. Same as in the original, she falls in love with him and he allows her to, even though he is betrothed to another AND has a bit of a Past. Told you he was a cad. A rogue, even!

At some point the whole cast is removed to Submarine Station Beta (one presumes this = London) to liven things up a bit. Submarine Station Beta is where the upper classes go for their holidays and it also doubles as a locale for scientific experimentation on the marine life that are continually attempting to murder humans. It is a giant glass dome at the bottom of the sea and they even have circus-style performances where they show the citizens how well they have "tamed" the beasts of the deep. Every now and then it goes horribly wrong.

Long story short, the marine life figure out how to get into the dome - they chip away at the glass until it cracks - and everyone is forced to return to the surface. Cue epic voyage with pirates, and Colonel Brandon being a hero.

It's quite... meh. There are quite a few similarities to the original, for instance, one of the daughters being unable to marry the man she loves because of class divisions; the Dashwoods are still kicked out of their home by their half brother and his new wife; and Colonel Brandon still has a ward who was wronged by Willoughby (although this involved seducing her and then burying her up to the neck in sand and left to find her own way out). But I find it a lot easier to transport my imagination to the world of vampires (Jane Slayre) and zombies (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) than to a world of sea monsters. There were also quite a few plot devices that I feel were not well enough exploited. If you find it in a bargain bin, then sure. If you're a bit desperate at the airport then go for it. But if, like me, you're not a big fan of the original, I probably wouldn't bother.

Book Review - The Rings of Saturn, by W.G. Sebald

The Rings of Saturn is another one of those novels that has been sitting on my shelf ever since enrolling in a particular class at university and then transferring out of it. I have picked it up a number of times, opened it at a random page to get a feel for the style of writing and then put it down again having found it to be too dry.

As it turns out, it's not the sort of book that you can just pick up and open it at a random page and be grabbed by it because that just wouldn't make sense.

The Rings of Saturn is a meandering memo of the author's walking tour through East Anglia (I **think** that's the correct name for the coastal country in the south east of England). Normally one wouldn't consider notes on a walk to be worthy of an entire novel, but the author takes the time to research local history of each place he visits and relays that to us. I presume it is a work of non-fiction, but I haven't bothered verifying the "facts" found in the novel. I would say that many of them are anecdotal and based on local knowledge provided by people he met along the way, so much would not be tracable. But fiction or non-fiction, it makes for quite an interesting read!

Within the text are stories about the large manor houses he visits on his walking tour; abandoned military outposts; towns that have moved as a result of coastal erosion; quirky and occasionally historically important characters who once lived in the towns; certain buildings (such as public baths), the reason for their being (popularity with high society) and the subsequent degredation of the town as times changed; the rise and fall of natural forests and planted gardens; sericulture (silk production) in China and then Europe; and even the childhood of Joseph Conrad, author of Heart of  Darkness, rates a mention because of his roundabout connection to the area.

The chapters are manageably short and seperate enough to be able to put the book down, but interesting enough to want to keep going for another bite-sized story. I would rate it as a good book to read on the train, or if you don't have a great deal of time to read large slabs of text. The only thing that fails it is its lack of paragraphs - once you dive into a chapter, there are very few breaks. This is one of the better unread books that were sitting around my room, and one that I will quite likely read again.

Book Review - Possession, by A.S. Byatt

This Booker Prize-winner has been sitting on my shelf since third or perhaps fourth year uni, when I enrolled in a particular English subject, bought the books and then was forced to change subjects when one of my Science lectures moved. So a few of the books on my 101 Things list are from that subject, including Homer's Odyssey (I never know if I spell that correctly) and Sebald's (???) Rings of Saturn.

I think the fact that Gwyneth Paltrow was on the cover, apparently in the throes of passion, really turned me off. I'm not a big fan of ol' Gwyneth, and I'm not entirely sure why... but I do think she's dumb for calling her kids Apple and Moses... ot maybe it's that pathetic, helpless expression she gets that really irks me. Anyway, apparently I DO judge a book by its cover!

Wiki always explains it better, but the book starts off with Roland, an English literary scholar finding an apparently previously-unseen draft of what appears to be a love letter inside a copy of a book that had once belonged to the (fictional) 19th-century poet, Randolph Henry Ash, who wrote said book. Roland realises what a significant find this letter is, because the poet had been happily married for many years and something like this could completely alter the interpretation of the poet's works. He decides to keep his find as close to his chest as possible until he has chased down the mystery, and, when he discovers who the letter was written to (a fellow-poet, Christabelle LaMotte), is forced to appeal to Maude, a LaMotte scholar, to aid him in his quest to find out what really happened between LaMotte and Ash.

Perhaps predictably, things very slowly heat up between Roland and Maude as they trace the progression of the relationship between Ash and LaMotte. It took me quite a while to get into the large slabs of poetry, but once some context was provided to what was going on in their lives and I felt sure of a reward, I found myself drawn into the poetry, trying to decipher it. By the time the Ash/LaMotte affair was full-blown I was utterly hooked, and the novel ends with a delightfully geeky showdown in what is essentially an unlikely collection of scholars taking the law into their own hands in order to protect Ash's grave from American collectors, determined to obtain some Ash relics at any cost.

It'll take you a while to get through, but I highly recommend Possession, preferably to be read in winter, snuggled up in bed.

Book Review – Murder at Mansfield Park, by Lynn Shepherd

I didn't really get off to a great start with this book. I put it down after one chapter – not because it was appalling, but because I was having trouble remembering the Who’s Who of Mansfield Park’s Bertram family. So I picked up and read the original to refresh my memory, and, as it turns out, that was the worst thing I possibly could have done. You see, M@MP is not tied quite so neatly into the original story (as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and Jane Slayre, are); rather than all the characters being more or less who they originally were, there are quite a few changes made to the lineup, viz.:

Fanny Price – sweet, shy, innocent, somewhat insipid foundling who is taken in by her Aunt Norris and promptly palmed off to the Bertram family (her other aunt); in the re-write she becomes an absolute bitch of an heiress and wanders about the place crushing the spirits of others and behaving somewhat inappropriately with men for an engaged woman, which makes it not entirely surprising that she is murdered.

Mary Crawford – shallow, cheeky, classless, and, perhaps unfairly, painted as all manner of bad things because she is Fanny’s unwitting competitor in love for Edmund Bertram and tries to set Fanny up with her brother; in the re-write she becomes everything that Fanny was originally but with perhaps a stronger character.

Edmund Bertram – gentlemanly, thoughtful, a little too thoroughly good and probably a little naïve youngest son of the Bertram empire and the apple of Fanny Price’s eye; in the re-write he is cast as somewhat more pathetic and ineffective as a man as he is jilted by Fanny Price and murder is attempted upon him.

You get the idea.

The book was confusing to begin with, and then kind of slow to take off (I always abhorred the time wasted on the Lover’s Vows rubbish in the original, so this is no different. I am aware it is a plot device designed to highlight the strengths and flaws of each character, but it doesn't make it any less tedious). Once the mystery got rolling I enjoyed it though, because it really was just about impossible to figure out whodunnit when everyone had a reason and an opportunity. I also liked the character of the inspector but found it to be  generally a little ham-handed.

Just now I Googled the book to jog my memory on the characters, and was a little surprised to find that several bloggers had commented on how much they hated the original Mansfield Park, or, at least, the original Fanny Price. I suppose that is because, when compared to such go-getters as Elizabeth Bennett, Miss Price very much falls short in intelligence, spirit and courage.

My personal belief is that although most star an obviously likeable level-headed or intelligent character, not a single Austen book goes by without one or two of the sisterhood letting the team down somehow (usually involving naivety, stupidity, selfishness or bitchiness), and it is simply a question of whether they can achieve it in a convincingly endearing manner. For example, I had a strong, negative reaction to Emma because the heroine consistently behaves like twat (that’s the technical literary term for it, btw!), even though the first line of the book tells us how clever she is. Ahh, irony.

In summary, if you hated Mansfield Park then you’re in with a shot for liking Murder at Mansfield Park, simply because Fanny Price is offed. I didn’t find it to be particularly well-written or especially compelling, but if you can make it through the first half without losing interest then the murder investigation in second half will reward you. Sort of.

Book review: Memo For a Saner World, by Bob Brown

I bought this book within about six months of starting work as a baby environmental officer in the construction industry. I was young and idealistic and felt like it was something I should be reading to maintain my integrity, you know, whilst I was being paid by the devil to watch trees being knocked down.

I put it down after about two chapters because I was bored out of my brain. Perhaps it was a sign of my shifting idealism; or the fact I didn't identify with it; or maybe those first two chapters just weren't all that engaging.

Fast forward five years, and I picked it up again as part of my commitment to read my unread books before buying new ones, as part of my 101 Things challenge.

It wasn't so bad upon the second attempt (mind you, I didn't go out of my way to re-read those first two chapters; I just flipped it open at the page where I had dog-eared the corner to mark my place, and re-commenced reading), but it really did run hot and cold for me.

Background info for non-Australians: Bob Brown is an Australian Greens senator - the first one, I believe -  who has fought passionately for the environment, particularly in Tasmania. He has led the Ausrtalian Greens party since their founding in 1992 and has been instrumental in banning logging in the Tarkine valley (and in having it declared as the Tarkine Wilderness Area) and also led the fight to stop the damming of the Franklin River. His politics are a hybrid of environmentalism and socialism. In more recent years he seems to have appointed himself the champion of human rights in Australian politics (mainly immigration and gay rights); and, as I write this, it occurs to me that this may actually be where he loses some of his would-be Greens voters. That he doesn't sacrifice his ideals to gain popularity is admirable, but as you will see in my write-up of the book, it may also be his downfall.

The book chronicles Bob's adventures in environmental protection. Each chapter is about a different campaign, and it is quite interesting to read about them. Some sections are well-written and fire up your anger at the disregard the government has for our precious and irreplaceable forests (if you know what project I'm doing at work at present you may find that statement grossly hypocritical, but my project **does** have a positive environmental outcome, unlike straight-out old growth cable logging). And some chapters had the opposite effect and fired up my anger at Mr Brown himself for being so ignorant and tunnel-visioned.

I will give you an example of the latter: One chapter chronicles the issue of an area of tidal mudflats in South (North? It's been a couple of months since I finished the book and can't recall...) Korea that is crucial to global bird migration. Basically, areas such as this act as a buffer between freshwater rivers and the ocean, and quite often filter what comes out of the river and soak up the grogans, which creates a rich (and stinky!) haven for nature to frolic about in. The tides then come in and pick up the worst of it and wash it out to sea.

Anyway, the long and the short of it is that the North/South Korean environment wanted to build a sea wall around this mudflat (and probably have, by now) so that, instead of it being flooded by the tides each day and washed clean, it could be reclaimed as farmland. This was bad for two reasons: one, the grogans that came out of the river would settle there permanently and, over time, become hyper-concentrated intead of being washed out to sea; and two, the land would no longer be available to birds for migration.

So yep, this definitely seems like something that is pretty critical to fight against. And this chapter, as with all the chapters, is quite well written and presents some interesting information (albeit sometimes too much information - he came across, in some cases, desperate to show his achievements to the minutest, most mundane detail).

But do you want to know where he lost me? It was the part where he blamed the construction company as well as the government that approved the project, and my temper flared. For a moment I was annoyed at myself for having my "contractor's" hat so firmly on my head, but then I realised that my reaction was fairly well justified.

As an environmental and community liaison manager for a construction company, I cop public abuse all the time for the stupid decisions that the government makes. Generally, though, once a project has settled in and you've had a chance to chat to the locals and bring them cupcakes (yes, I really do that), they come to realise that we're just being paid to build it, and that my job is actually the last chance to protect the environment at  the end of a long chain of bureaucratic stuff-ups that allow sometimes questionable projects to go ahead. Fatalistic? Perhaps. Realistic? Definitely.

What Bob neglected to mention was that construction companies need to construct things in order to make money in order to employ people, and, as a socialist, he should understand that jobs are important. You know, unless you're okay with people sitting about, sponging off Centrelink... which some chapters kind of hint that he might be, but that's another story!

That he was having a go at the construction company was annoying in itself, but then he proceded to suggest that his followers do something that would really and truly have very little to no impact - he proposed that we all boycott Hyundai (the car manufacturer) by not buying their cars in order to hurt the construction company that had already won the tender and was half way through constructing the project.

Stay with me here.

Hyundai are the sister-company of Hyundai Construction, and were, in fact, originally the same company. They are now run separarely by two brothers.

Hyundai Construction were the company building the sea wall.

So what he was telling us to do was to not buy the cars manufactured by a company which is affiliated with the construction company inasmuch as that the two CEOs probably sit down to Christmas dinner together (or whatever festival they celebrate in Korea), but which does not share a common cash flow.

To me, that's like telling me not to buy SPC tinned fruit because Ardmona (both are owned by Coca-Cola Amatil now, unfortunately. On my list of things to do when I'm a bajillionaire is to buy back previously Australian-owned brands and products) are discharging post-production water containing certain chemicals into stormwater that are within the allowable legal limits, but which may, at some point in time, combined with the right conditions and a high level of exposure, be carcinogenic. (To be clear, I don't think they **are**, I'm just using this as an example!)

That's also like the girl I recently sat next to at a wedding (who may or may not read this blog, but I think that when we discussed it she realised that I disagreed with her!) who doesn't drink milk because it's cruel that the cows are impregnated every year to keep them from producing milk (um, which I'm pretty sure more or less happens in nature anyway - bulls will be bulls!; and I also have the feeling that milk continues to be produced as long as you continue to milk the cow, kind of like human wet-nurses continue to produce breast milk as long as there is a baby drinking it, but I could very well be wrong about that second part), and then the calves are "surplus" which is also cruel (um, I'm pretty sure they raise some of the calves to then go on and be - wait for it - dairy cows, and the rest of them, rightly or wrongly, and obviously mainly the boy-calves, go to veal. They don't just kill them and put them in the bin like they do with surplus puppies, which IS gross and wrong).

How did a book review turn political and then into a rant about humane milk production? Because it shows me that, whilst Bob Brown has some awesome values and has fought some amazing fights to defend the environment, he also has absolutely no idea how the system works. There are two perspectives here - some say that, once you understand the system you are in danger of accepting and becoming the system. But I say that in order to beat the system you need to understand it. He, apparently, does not.

I would encourage you to read the book anyway. Besides the two or three chapters that angered me or made me make weird little whiny-grunty-frustrated-this-guy-is-a-morong noises, there is some really good stuff in it. It didn't clean my conscience for being employed by The Man despite my personal environmental beliefs, maybe because the person who read this book a couple of months ago is not the same person who bought the book five years ago. Hopefully it inspires you and educates you to do your bit for the environment, and that's always a good thing.

And as for me? Well, a little while after I bought (and put down) the book, I realised that I have more power to save trees doing what I do and being paid by the devil, so to speak, than protesting the project in front of the state library. And I do. I work with and educate the people who are effectively paid to do the damage, so that they understand the impact of the works. We save more trees than we are obliged to and minimise impact in whatever we do. And I have learnt that nobody wants to do the wrong thing by the environment; it's just that they either lack the knowledge or resources do things the right way, or their own agenda - to feed their family - keeps them in the business.

I think Bob Brown would be better off trying to make some sort of environmental education mandatory for all politicians than telling us to pull jobs away from the people at the bottom of the food chain. If you want to ban logging, you need to provide an alternative means for the people who have been logging for four generations to make a living. Memo For a Saner World was probably an attempt to educate us on what has passed; but we, as a global population, need to be educated on what we are doing now and why that matters for the future.

I will also close by relaying what I said in my first job interview, all those years ago, in response to the question "Why do you want to work in construction?" "I'm a tree-hugger. And whilst I want to work in Parks or Natural Resource Management, I feel like I need to see the other side of the fence first to completely understand what I'm doing." Pretty insightful for a wet-behind-the-ears university graduate, don't you think? :) Hopefully before Bob Brown writes more books (mind you, this one was published in 2004 so he probably has), he spends some time on the other side of the fence.

Segue: a little while ago I bought The Secret Life of Wombats by James Woodford (it was BEFORE my book-reading challenge began, and it was a GIFT for my fiance else anyway, it's just that I started to read it while I was waiting for the bus home from Taronga zoo (which reminds me, I have a draft post sitting there about that trip))... anyway, it's an absolutely fascinating book and one I would highly recommend to anyone who loves critters (Grant loves wombats, which is why I bought it for him). The reason I bring it up is that it is written in a similar style to Bob Brown's book, with each chapter being about something different. Some of them hit in a big way and others miss a little, but most are spot on. Bob's were less-uniformly spot on. I should probably read some of his more recent efforts before saying that, though!

Book Review: We of the Never Never, by Mrs Aeneas (Jeannie) Gunn

Well, I finally changed my settings so that I can post directly from email, but it’s freaking me out a little bit because I’m not sure how the formatting will go. I also had a bad dream last night that I posted something highly inappropriate, forgetting that I’d changed my “email to draft” setting to “email to publish”. Eep! So best I read these email posts verrrry carefully, and make sure I don’t email half-finished posts and ideas to myself, believing them to be sitting safely with all my other drafts, when really they’re out there in their incomplete (and possibly inappropriate) glory for all the world to see!!!

Finally! A book I feel more enthusiastic about, and as such I am going to make more than a half-arsed attempt at reviewing it, as per my previous two (one of which I kind of sort of didn’t read – check out the review for the Awakening. Also, not the one I originally picked up to be my next read. I had decided upon Murder at Mansfield Park, and in preparation for it, assuming it to be much like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies insofar as the storyline and characters would remain intact but that frequent zombie references would be thrown in (“braaaaaaaains” Yeah, y’all know who you are!), I did a little preparation by way of re-reading Mansfield Park.

What a fool I was!

Murder at Mansfield Park was, when I put it down about half a chapter in, absolutely NOTHING like the original and was so very confusing to me when read hot on the heels of Ms Austen’s creation. Mainly, the characters are all scrambled up and the family trees are all over the place. Thus far it seems a little ham-handed as the roles are more or less reversed, Fanny Price now being the wealthy heiress to be revered (with several character traits of Mary Crawford) rather than the sweet, impoverished cousin to be pitied. DON’T BE ME!!! RE-READING MANSFIELD PARK FIRST WILL SCREW WITH YOUR HEAD, VERY, VERY BADLY!

So I decided that the most sensible course of action would be to pick another couple of books of a completely different genre and clear my mind of the original roles the Mansfield Park characters play, before re-attempting to proceed with reading it. The first of these books was We of the Never Never, the second is The Ballad of Les Darcy (Peter Fitzsimons) and the third is Gone With the Wind (Margaret Mitchell). The latter two are still on the go (I have a “weekday” book and a “weekend” book; suffice it to say, the “weekday” book is always slim enough to fit into my laptop bag with minimal inconvenience, so I’ll give you one guess as to which of the two is my “weekend” one!), but We of the Never Never was read, enjoyed and finished in a couple of days.

I picked it up for a few dollars at a market, and the title caught my eye as I vaguely recalled that there had been a film adaptation of it and had always wanted to watch it (older-style film/TV adaptations of Australian texts such as On Our Selection and All The Rivers Run are a big favourites of mine).

We of the Never Never is based on a true story – it is more or less an autobiography over the course of one year (the year being 1902), written in the style of a novel rather than a diary with names changed. It was written by the new wife of a man who buys a share in Elsey cattle station in the Northern Territory (which in modern geographic terms was somewhere near Mataranka). Much to the dismay of the stockmen on the station and the horror of the ladies in Darwin, he opts to bring the “missus” out there with him, and that is how Jeannie Gunn came to be in the Never Never, in a place with no roads or bridges, and just a telegraph line running past their front “gate”, some forty miles from the homestead.

The book chronicles the ins and outs of station life, including musters; camps; dealings with the erratic behaviour of the domestic help (being a dodgy Chinese cook who is later replaced by a far superior Chinese cook, and several Aboriginal maids); death and illness; improving the homestead (which involved cutting and processing timber by hand); the people who visit the station as they pass through; and the privations caused by the isolation and the challenges brought by both the Wet and the Dry.

If you’re not into Australiana like I am (I’m a bit of a junkie for any book about life in the outback, and the older it is the better, probably because they tell it like they saw it and are not frightened of voicing an opinion on just about anything, a characteristic that I admire. They are also generally written with a greater regard for grammar than their modern counterparts, which I appreciate!) this probably won’t float your boat. But the day-to-day lives of these pioneers, who went through hell and high water to shape our country has always captured my imagination and always will. It is written in a style that, whilst a little quaint in the vintage of the language, makes you feel like you’re part of the excitement. The author’s shrewd observations of human nature coupled with her (apparently rare, in that time) ability to poke fun at herself endears the reader to the author.

It’s also very interesting from an historical perspective. I suspect many a feminist would be up in arms at the way the Missus is spoken to, and about, by the people on the station, generally in terms of her (in)capabilities, so here comes my anti-feminist rant. I think it was okay that they didn’t want her there or poked fun at her or expected to have to look after her. Let’s face it – she was a city girl, thrown into the bush with zero preparation. She was hampered by long skirts and long hair (seriously, has anyone been to Darwin in summer, or any time of year for that matter? Try doing it in a heavy floor-length skirt, petticoats, long sleeved shirts, hats, gloves and boots!) and city expectations and had a lot to learn in a very short period of time.

I think that it’s okay that they didn’t want her there initially, because the respect the stockmen had for women meant that they knew she may have other (and probably mysterious!) needs that they weren’t accustomed to catering for (for starters, I’m sure, no more peeing on trees or taking shirts off at will), and that they knew they would have to curb their behaviour and language around her. I work in the construction industry and have on multiple occasions very clearly busted the boys talking about something filthy, because they will fall silent as I approach. And you know what? I’m okay with that. In fact, I really appreciate it. I don’t need to hear about their conquests or desires. Eeuw. The stockmen were also concerned that she would be the sort of missus to try and change the way the station was run, or the sort who would be “too good” to lend a hand, which were both quite legitimate fears. Luckily for them, she was neither of those things.

I think it’s okay that they poked fun at her, because she really did have some very odd (although unsurprising) ideas about life in the Never Never before they “Educated” her. She poked fun at herself, too. And she learnt a lot, with a sense of humour. It didn’t mean they thought she was stupid, it meant they acknowledged she was green.

And I think it’s okay that they perceived her to be a weak little thing that needed to be taken care of. She was a five-foot-nothing city girl (from Carlton) with no idea how to survive out there, and who wasn’t hardened to physical labour or tough conditions. If I were her, especially back then, I would love it if six men and a tribe of Aboriginals decided that they were my personal protectors and kept an eye on me.

Maybe I see it this way because I am quite often the only woman in an all-male working environment, and I encounter chivalry on a daily basis. I don’t think it’s sexist to hold open a door, or help me carry something, or be polite to me, or buy me a drink, or offer to see me home instead of letting me wander the streets alone at night. It’s manners, and consideration of others, like they had back in 1902, and it’s sad that it’s dying out. Perhaps it’s controversial to say, but I can nearly guarantee the divorce rate would be lower if men and women were both a bit more old-school. Jeannie Gunn’s marriage didn’t work out because Mr Gunn died of malarial dysentery shortly after 1902, not because they fought over the remote or he forgot to ask if she needed a hand cleaning the gutters. Maybe if more men took a leaf from this book, and more women swallowed their misplaced pride and accepted help when it is wanted or needed and not just when it is demanded, we’d be better off. I can’t say I blame the men, mind you, because they keep getting abused for trying to be considerate and then abused when they’re not. Poor bastards.

Heh heh, way to turn a book review into a rant on the shortcomings of modern society!

That is all.

Book Review - Heart of Darkness, by Joesph Conrad

Well, here comes yet another half-arsed book review, because I honestly didn't really enjoy it all that much. It wasn't a bad read but I just didn't really see the point of the story, and that is something that bothers me in a book. My next review - Murder at Mansfield Park - is bound to be a little more exciting.

I like the way the story was set up - it began with a bunch of sailors swapping stories on deck whilst they waited for the tide to rise in the River Thames so that they could go out to sea, and this one guy tells the story of the time he spent in Africa.

Basically, due to family connections (which I didn't quite understand the significance of, and so it was confusing to me when everyone within "the company" treated him with deference because of it, because it all seems a bit superficial. Perhaps if I'd studied the book, as I was supposed to, I would have understood the significance of that part of the plot, but as it is I have no idea), he got himself a job in Africa.

Basically, he had to skipper a paddle steamer up into the African Congo. I'm not entirely sure at what point his mission became resurrecting a scuppered paddle steamer from the bottom of the river and taking it upstream to rescue some high-up bloke in the company (who everyone secretly hated) who was quite ill, but that's what it became about. The ill man had been making headway for the Company, and poaching ivory and turning natives into slaves left, right and centre, as were all the whites in the story. SPOILER ALERT! The guy dies in the end before they can get him medical attention, and so the sailor brings the guy's sweetheart some paperwork and tells her big fat lies about his final days to make her happy.

My guess is that if I'd studied the book, there would have been an essay question assigned as the major assessment task that asked what "Heart of Darkness" meant. I suspect that had I been paying more attention to the detail, my answer would be something about the relationship between the literal darkness - i.e. the black people in the heart of the Congo being poorly used by the whites (note that this book was written early last century, so I don't have to use PC language) - and the darkness in the hearts of the while people (Belgians?) who were pillaging Africa and its people at that time. (note: I just Wiki'd it and I'm not far off the mark. Click here for a somewhat more enthused and grammatically correct synopsis of the plot)

It's quite a short read - I was put off reading it for quite some time as thought it was longer than it really was, because my volume was published along with a whole lot of background information on people who actually travelled in the Congo, and the journals of Conrad himself who did actually skipper a paddle boat in the Congo - so it's not a total waste of time to read, but I believe you need to pay more attention to it than I did. The fact that it is probably semi-autobiographical makes it far more interesting, and makes the fact it's more of a description of the relationships between the people there, and not particularly driven by plot per se, make more sense. It was written by an Australian ex-pat (who I believe was born in Russia, extradited to Germany and then died, leaving young Joseph to sail about the world... but I may well be mixing up my authors!), which I think shows in his writing style, which I quite liked. It's just that it was a very odd, slightly meandering and pointless story, and I like my stories to go somewhere.

That is all.

Book Review - The Awakening, by Kate Chopin

Well. Didn't I stuff this one up! As a result of the fact that I counted a book that I actually have read in my list of books I needed to, I am now ahead of the game, which frees me up considerably to do some pre-work for my next book by reading Mansfield Park (the next book I plan to read is Murder at Mansfield Park, and I want to remind myself of the actual storyline and characters before I go reading a spoof of it. For those who are unfamiliar with it, it is much of the same ilk as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters and others - classic (usually) Victorian books re-written to make them cool for the kids of today by adding blood and guts and zombies. I love the trend. Some call it bastardisation of classic literature, but some people thought 10 Things I Hate About You was a bastardisation of Shakespeare. It wasn't. It was just a creative film adaptation.)

Aaaaanyway, the book I read was The Awakening, by Kate Chopin. I realised about three pages in that I'd read it before, flipped to the last page to confirm my suspicion, then closed the book. It's not that I don't want to read it again; it's that there are other books that I have a more pressing need to read. I'll get back to it one day. I think I **thought** I hadn't read it, because it was one of the books I bought for a uni subject that I never took (as several of the books for #65 are, including Homer's Odyssey), and I had read that particular book over summer before realising I wouldn't take the course, and so I have read it once but not studied it intently.

Apparently it was super-memorable!

My personal recollection of the book is that it is set in the South (of America) and there are a whole bunch of people with French names, so presumably they hang about in the French Quarter of New Orleans (and if I'd re-read it properly I'd be able to give you a definitive answer on that) when they're not swanning about at this resort island for the upper-middle class in the Caribbean.

PLOT: Wife neglected by absent husband and unfulfilled by the whole no life outside caring for the children and home thing; handsome, charming, attentive younger man on the resort island; hubby goes back to the mainland for business thus facilitating a flirtatious and slightly inappropriate (for the day) friendship between his wife and her would-be lover; shenanigans take place (although my recollection is that there aren't any actual shenanigans, but, rather, unfaithful thoughts and a fair bit of unrequited lust. I think she visits him alone in his home which was completely improper and scandalous for the day, and the young man kisses the married lady at which point she wigs out a bit when she realises what a mess she's gotten herself into, but I don't remember it being a full-blown affair); wife realises that she is completely unfulfilled by her life and is in an impossible situation and will never be happy but has no way out; wife... oh heck, I'll tell you and ruin the story - she drowns herself at the end.

The more I think about it, the more I recall it was a fairly light and fluffy summer read - think a Jodi Picoult novel for the complexity of relationships, crossed with a bit of Mills & Boon intrigue, and yet absolutely nothing like either of those!

I haz wikkid book reviewing skillz.

I wouldn't suggest you rush out and buy it, but if you ever see it lying about in a youth hostel or doctor's surgery then give it a go.

Book Review - Three Cups of Tea, by David Oliver Relin (with Greg Mortimer)

#65 on my list of 101 Things to do in 1001 days is to read all the unread books on my shelf... okay, shelves... before purchasing any more of them.

The first cab off the rank was Three Cups of Tea, by David Oliver Relin, first published by Viking Penguin in 2006.

It is a story about Greg Mortensen, an American trauma nurse-mountaineer (or perhaps that should be mountaineer-trauma nurse, given the latter only occurred to subsidise the former!) who failed to summit K2 (for all you un-adventurous lowlanders, K2 is the second-highest summit on Earth after Mount Everest, and has the reputation of being the more difficult of the two to climb. One in four die attempting to summit it, a fatality rate second only to Annapurna) in the early nineties, and who, on his way back down the mountain, exhausted and delirious, took a wrong turn and ended up in a remote Pakistani village.

His meeting of the villagers and their hospitality towards this infidel in his moment of need set him on a path to his new calling in life - correcting the vacuum of education and government support by building schools and other life-improving infrastructure (water pipes; sewing facilities for women; very basic first aid clinics in villages (training someone to administer antibiotics, electrolytes and to dress wounds) etc) in Pakistan, and later in Afghanistan.

After leaving Pakistan, Mortensen (or Dr Greg, as he later became known) couldn't shake the image of the Pakistani children doggedly holding school classes outside in the cold, using sticks to do their sums in the dirt. He had made a promise to the village elder that one day he would be back to help the children, and kept his word. He particularly saw the necessity of providing education for girls, which was completely lacking in this impoverished corner of a largely Muslim country.

Having had plans drawn up, he determined that a school could be built for just USD$12,000, but Mortensen struggled badly to raise funds. Everybody was interested in supporting high-profile charities to build schools for the Buddhist Nepalese children (probably because the profile was raised by Sir Edmund Hillary through his philanthropic work), and nobody was interested in helping the unknown entity that is the Muslim Pakistanis. He wrote over five hundred letters to various celebrities who could very well afford such a sum asking for assistance, and was ignored by all. Eventually, scientist Dr Jean Hoerni, a self-made millionaire from the computer industry and fellow lover of mountaineering, bankrolled the first school and eventually enabled the founding of the Central Asia Institute.

Following several false starts and setbacks, with the help of a handful of locals passionate about bettering their childrens' futures, and finding support in the oddest of places, Dr. Greg and the CAI built 55 schools over the following decade (more have been built since). During this process he had jihads declared on him by conservative regional Muslim leaders, and by the Taliban. More than one school was destroyed due to the fear (shared and perhaps incited by the conservative leaders) that Mortensen was attempting to Christian-ise their children (rather, his schools taught a general-purpose, secular curriculum), with especial concern over the fact that he wished to educate girls. Wiser leaders were able to see that by educating their children, particularly girls, they were empowering the next generation to live better lives, and as such the jihads were effectively overruled by high-level religious leaders and by the high courts of Pakistan.

Published in 2006 but not taking off until it was released in paperback a couple of years later, Three Cups of Tea spent 69 weeks on the New York Times Best Sellers List (non-fiction), and it is easy to see why it held the attention of a nation in the years following 9/11 and the capture of Saddam Hussein.

Mortensen's mission to give as many children of this new generation of Pakistanis and Afghans a non-extremist, secular education rather than the extremist Muslim education provided by Saudi-funded, Taliban-run schools is one man's way of ensuring that the next generation does not have the hatred for the Western world that this one does; that they do not resent the West for the destruction wreaked on their country and to their families during the War on Terror.

In case you were wondering, Mortensen did support the American occupation of Afghanistan, but was wise enough to see that there was no surer way to guarantee ongoing hatred for the West and to set ourselves up for future terrorist attacks than by not providing assistance where it was required, especially when the need was caused by the destructive forces of US (and local) military action, and therefore reinforcing the Taliban's anti-Western message. It helped me see that there is a massive difference between a conservative Muslim and an extreme one, and that there is as such much resentment in the region for the Taliban's extremist actions.

This is a well written, inspiring and interesting book, and gives you a rarely-seen insight into rural Pakistan and a different perspective on what the people of the region think of the Taliban. I did not see it as pro-Muslim mission or publication, but rather, a religion-neutral, pro-education, pro-opportunity, pro-humans one, and I recommend reading it.