Africa Books - Page 5

Rainbow's End: A Memoir of Childhood, War and an African Farm

Lauren St John

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Subjects -> Biographies & Memoirs -> Memoirs
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Subjects -> Biographies & Memoirs -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 12 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

This is a story about a paradise lost. . . . About an African dream that began with a murder . . .

In 1978, in the final, bloodiest phase of the Rhodesian civil war, eleven-year-old Lauren St John moves with her family to Rainbow's End, a wild, beautiful farm and game reserve set on the banks of a slowflowing river. The house has been the scene of a horrific attack by guerrillas, and when Lauren's family settles there, a chain of events is set in motion that will change her life irrevocably.

Rainbow's End captures the overwhelming beauty and extraordinary danger of life in the African bush. Lauren's childhood reads like a girl's own adventure story. At the height of the war, Lauren rides through the wilderness on her horse, Morning Star, encountering lions, crocodiles, snakes, vicious ostriches, and mad cows. Many of the animals are pets, including Miss Piggy and Bacon and an elegant giraffe named Jenny. The constant threat of ruthless guerrillas prowling the land underscores everything, making each day more dangerous, vivid, and prized than the last.

After Independence, Lauren comes to the bitter realization that she'd been on the wrong side of the civil war. While she and her family believed that they were fighting for democracy over Communism, others saw the war as black against white. And when Robert Mugabe comes into power, he oversees the torture and persecution of thousands of members of an opposing tribe and goes on to become one of Africa's legendary dictators. The ending of this beautiful memoir is a fist to the stomach as Lauren realizes that she can be British or American, but she cannot be African. She can love it -- be willing to die for it -- but she cannot claim Africa because she is white.

African Friends and Money Matters: Observations from Africa (Publications in Ethnography, Vol. 37)

David E. Maranz

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Subjects -> Business & Investing -> Economics -> General AAS
Subjects -> Business & Investing -> Popular Economics -> General
Subjects -> Business & Investing -> Popular Economics -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

African Friends and Money Matters grew out of frustrations that Westerners experience when they travel and work in Africa. Africans have just as many frustrations relating to the Westerners in their midst. Each uses and manages money and other resources in very different ways, and these differences create many misunderstandings and frictions.

The author deals with everyday life in Africa. He first introduces the very different goals of African and Western economic systems and then presents ninety observations of African behaviors related to money matters. Explanatory comments are given that show how each one works out in real life. He illustrates his and others' experiences with anecdotes from across the continent. Drawings by two African artists add further clarity to the text as they capture Africans and Westerners in authentic situations. The result is that the reader is able to make sense of customs that at first seem incomprehensible.

This book will be of interest to Westerners living, working, or traveling in sub-Saharan Africa: business, government, diplomatic, and NGO personnel, religious workers, journalists, development sociologists, and tourists. The audience also includes professors and students in African studies. Africans will also be interested for what it reveals about Western culture and many of the significant ways Westerners react to Africa.

Table of Contents

Use of Resources
Friendship
The Role of Solidarity
Society and People of Means
Loans and Debts
Business Matters
Toward a Conclusion
References

Ethiopia & Eritrea (Country Guide)

Matt Phillips

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Lonely Planet Ethiopia and Eritrea 5 out of 5 stars.
5 of 5 people found this review helpful.

I travelled hree weeks in Ethiopia from 27.12.2006-12.1.2007 time. I visited Addis Ababa, Wollea, Debre Zeit, Dire Dawa, Lake Langano, Awasa and Harar. I used this book as a base for my travel plan and it never failed me. I read the book allways forehand at night before we entered a next place. It saved my son for a trouble becaus of framed Addis Abeba hustler information. He went to one of those ethnic conert the book was warning about and everything hapened exactly as told in the guide book. I got him out of that concert immediately and he saved 1000 bir.

Hotel information was very accurate, except the prices had come up 10 %.

Now I am back in Finland and I am very thankful for the writers. The arranged me a safe trip to one of the worlds poorest and most dangerous countries.

rgards

heikki turunen

Editorial Review:

Awe-inspiring, beautiful and sometimes heartbreaking, Ethiopia and Eritrea are not like anywhere you've been before. A realm of rock-hewn churches, buzzing bazaars and untouched wilderness, the Horn of Africa is truly unique. See the mist rising off the mountains, hear the gurgle of children's laughter in the narrow streets of Harar, or catch a glimpse of a wolf prowling under the thorn trees.

THE BEST COVERAGE- the only guidebook to comprehensively cover Ethiopia and Eritrea and explain how to cross between them via Djibouti

READ UP- all the details you need to travel the Historical Circuit, including ancient cities in northern Ethiopia

BRING OUT THE ADVENTURER- climb a rope, use toeholds or walk a ledge to reach churches and hill-top monasteries

EAT AND DRINK- know your injera from your kitfo, and why the third cup of coffee is the most important

TRAVEL SAFELY- we keep you worded up on the scams, health issues and no-go areas

The Masked Rider: Cycling in West Africa

Neil Peart

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Subjects -> Health, Mind & Body -> Exercise & Fitness -> General
Subjects -> Health, Mind & Body -> Exercise & Fitness -> General AAS
Subjects -> Health, Mind & Body -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 119 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Breathtaking. 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Breathtaking. Artful. Thoughtful. Funny. Sad. Shocking.

Neil's craft with theme and prose is as precise and thrilling as his drumming. I enjoyed The Masked Rider more than all of this other books, and I enjoyed them a lot. Neil muses how masks in Africa, and in all societies and people (himself included) reveal as much as they conceal.

As usual, his insights into his own character and those of his companions are humorous and without self-indulgent narcissism. The ending is cathartic, and his concluding thoughts after the trip aren't what one would expect. Written before the crippling losses of his wife and daughter, I relished the innocence of the `old Neil', with his boundless hope and shaking-his-fist-at-the-sky verve. You will remember a sweet little girl that changes a bad day he had with two words, and the way he greets his wife when the journey is over.

Ashea, Neil, Ashea.

Editorial Review:

Dysentery, drunken soldiers, and corrupt officials provide the background for Neil Peart's physical and spiritual cycling journey through West Africa. The prolific drummer for the rock band Rush travels through African villages, both large and small, and relates his story through photographs, journal entries, and tales of adventure, while simultaneously addressing issues such as differences in culture, psychology, and labels. Literary and artistic sidekicks such as Aristotle, Dante, and Van Gogh join Peart and his cycling companions, reminding the reader that this is not just another travel book—it is a story of both external and introspective discovery and adventure.

Into Africa: The Epic Adventures of Stanley and Livingston

Martin Dugard

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Subjects -> Travel -> Africa -> General
Subjects -> Travel -> Africa -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 31 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

In 1866, Britain's foremost explorer, David Livingstone, went in search of the source of the Nile. He was not seen again for nearly six years. This was not the first long term expedition Livingstone had undertaken, but it was rare for him not to send regular reports back to London. To all intents and purposes he had disappeared into the African jungle. The British government made no efforts to try and trace Livingstone, believing it an impossible task. Five years after his disappearance, however, the quest was taken up by an American newspaper, the "New York Herald". The "Herald"'s ambitious, eccentric (and circulation hungry) publisher, James Gordon Bennett, sent his top reporter, one Henry Stanley, to track Livingstone down. So began Stanley's African odyssey which was to culminate ten months later with the famous phrase "Dr Livingstone, I presume". History has portrayed Stanley as a great adventurer, the intrepid explorer who braved the African wilderness to find the ailing Livingstone. This account tells a slightly different story. Dugard argues that Stanley was at a loss in Africa, had little experience of travel and was out of his depth in this strange and foreign land, having to rely entirely on his guides. He was petrified by this wild land and often struck down by tropical illness. The man who led him to Livingstone, the man who deserves the credit which Stanley has since been lauded with, was his guide, Sidi Mubarak Bombay. But Stanley's journey was an emotional as well as a physical one. Arriving in Africa he was frightened by the scale and strangeness of this new land, ignorant of the local culture, and belligerent in his belief in colonial supremacy. But slowly as his journey progressed he awoke to the beauty of Africa, the grandeur of her landscape and the vivid diversity of her wildlife. Here is a true adventure story, set against the most dramatic of backdrops and featuring two of history's most enduring heroes.

We All Went on Safari (Travel the World)

Laurie Krebs

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Great book, beautiful illustrations 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

This is a favorite for my 2 year old. Counting is represented 3 ways on each page spread - in the text, a visual number in the same location on each page, and by the number of animals on each page. Great picture book for counting, nice text for reading.

The back of the book offers a bit of material that we read over as well - descriptions of the Masai people, and their way of life, a map of Tanzania, and visuals + descriptions for all of the animals.

swahili for toddlers 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

we love this book. after reading it once, i'd learned to count to ten in swahili. now, after a couple more readings, my 2 and 3 year old are counting in swahili, too.

Editorial Review:

Join Arusha, Mosi, Tumpe and their Maasai friends as they set out on a counting journey through the grasslands of Tanzania. Along the way, the children encounter all sorts of animals including elephants, lions and monkeys, while counting from one to ten in both English and Swahili. The lively, rhyming text is accompanied by an illustrated guide to counting in Swahili, a map, notes about each of the animals, and interesting facts about Tanzania and the Maasai people.

Egyptian Arabic Phrasebook

Siona Jenkins

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Subjects -> Reference -> Dictionaries & Thesauruses -> Foreign Language -> Arabic
Subjects -> Reference -> Foreign Languages -> Instruction -> Arabic
Subjects -> Reference -> Foreign Languages -> Instruction -> Phrasebooks - General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 12 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Lonely Planet Egyptian Arabic 4 out of 5 stars.
3 of 4 people found this review helpful.

This is a very well thought out and nicely organized book. Any student of Egyptian Arabic will like this phrasebook, and the illustrations inside of the book offer casual entertainment while the reader continues to learn Egyptian Arabic. I admit that I was disappointed to read that the author started to include sexual words and phrases, then backed out of doing it. It really would have been a lot of fun to learn how to say some of those things that were deleted from the final text.

Editorial Review:

Whether traversing the Nile or exploring Cairo's labyrinthine alley-ways, delve beneath the surface and discover the intriguing language and culture of Egypt. Confidently converse in Egyptian Arabic and ensure you don't miss out on the friendliness and humor for which Egyptians are famous. Enhance your travels throug this enticing country!

Our phrasebooks give you a comprehensive mix of practical and social words and phrases in more than 120 languages. Chat with the locals and discover their culture - a guaranteed way to enrich your travel experience.

South Africa (EYEWITNESS TRAVEL GUIDE)

DK Publishing

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

BEST TRAVEL GUIDE FOR SOUTH AFRICA 5 out of 5 stars.
10 of 12 people found this review helpful.

ANOTHER HIT FOR THE DK SERIES, THEY HAVE BECOME MY GO TO BOOK FOR TRAVEL THROUGHOUT THE WORLD. GREAT PHOTOS AND EASY TO UNDERSTAND. SUGGESTIONS FOR ALL PRICE RANGES.
THANKS

AFRICA DE SUR 4 out of 5 stars.
6 of 7 people found this review helpful.

I think these DK guides are fantastic, they not only make nice travel guides, but are good to have whether you plan to travel to that particular destination or not. Frankly, the reviewer who stated he returned this book and gave it one star is an idiot of the first order. South Africa is an amazing country with very distinct parts, this book does a fine job of breaking the country up and giving the history and the highlights of each region. If you have any interest in South Africa or just like travel guides, then pick this up you wont be disappointed. As for South Africa itself, lord let's hope they dont elect another neianderthal to run the country, but from what ive heard the ANC has nominated another corrupt pol to be the next president..for what is considered the most forward country in Africa..ill grant you that is not saying much, just look at Zimbabwe..South Africa seems to be going backward..how sad.

Editorial Review:

This guide to South Africa highlights information on game reserves, sports, wildlife and beaches. There is also a survival guide which shows you how to use local currency, public transport and telephones. Organized district by district with a systematic, thematic approach this book provides information on sights in each area and features in each major sight, to help you know what to look out for and how to make the most of your time.

South Africa (EYEWITNESS TRAVEL GUIDE)

DK Publishing

Amazon Price: $16.50 List Price: $25.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: DK Travel Amazon Marketplace: 45 new & used starting at $13.32

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Subjects -> Travel -> Africa -> South Africa -> General
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Subjects -> Travel -> Africa -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

BEST TRAVEL GUIDE FOR SOUTH AFRICA 5 out of 5 stars.
10 of 12 people found this review helpful.

ANOTHER HIT FOR THE DK SERIES, THEY HAVE BECOME MY GO TO BOOK FOR TRAVEL THROUGHOUT THE WORLD. GREAT PHOTOS AND EASY TO UNDERSTAND. SUGGESTIONS FOR ALL PRICE RANGES.
THANKS

AFRICA DE SUR 4 out of 5 stars.
6 of 7 people found this review helpful.

I think these DK guides are fantastic, they not only make nice travel guides, but are good to have whether you plan to travel to that particular destination or not. Frankly, the reviewer who stated he returned this book and gave it one star is an idiot of the first order. South Africa is an amazing country with very distinct parts, this book does a fine job of breaking the country up and giving the history and the highlights of each region. If you have any interest in South Africa or just like travel guides, then pick this up you wont be disappointed. As for South Africa itself, lord let's hope they dont elect another neianderthal to run the country, but from what ive heard the ANC has nominated another corrupt pol to be the next president..for what is considered the most forward country in Africa..ill grant you that is not saying much, just look at Zimbabwe..South Africa seems to be going backward..how sad.

Editorial Review:

This guide to South Africa highlights information on game reserves, sports, wildlife and beaches. There is also a survival guide which shows you how to use local currency, public transport and telephones. Organized district by district with a systematic, thematic approach this book provides information on sights in each area and features in each major sight, to help you know what to look out for and how to make the most of your time.