[.ca] The Scent of Eucalyptus: A Missionary Childhood in Ethiopia (ISBN 0864923740)

Contrasting The Zanzibar Chest with The Scent of Eucalyptus:
If you were born in Africa of foreign parents or spent most of your childhood years in Africa, you owe it to yourself to read these two books. Whether your experiences were positive and you have returned to Africa as an adult, or whether you need catharsis from emotional wounds Africa is so adept at administering, these authors will provide contrasting mirrors in which to search for your reflection. The Zanzibar Chest describes a Reuters war correspondent's life-experiences (mostly Africa), including the meandering description of a colonial officer's death, as described in a diary left to Hartley in his deceased father's carved Zanzibar chest. The Scent of Eucalyptus uses the foreign gum tree, widely planted in Africa, to symbolize a missionary child's nostalgic return, as an adult, to Ethiopia; the last part of the book is spent attempting to debunk the widespread academic view that missionaries were inept, short-sighted religious fanatics that spread cultural disarray in Africa and like places. Both books have much insight to offer those who would understand the world-views of Europeans raised in an African setting and who then spend a lifetime striving to amalgamate the various cultures that make up their characters. Given the first person singular that dominates these non-fiction efforts, a certain amount of narcissism is to be expected. Both books suffer from a lack of focus, since neither have a readily discernable central plot. They jump between present and past, between what the authors perceive is their African story and the story of others around them. Anyone who has suffered culture shock or it's lifelong after-tremors can relate to this sense of what I call "socio-cultural netherness". The experiences these authors relate explore the trauma of self-imposed (in Hartley's case) or childhood (Coleman) African experiences that flash back uninvited for all of us Africans of foreign blood, long after they are relegated to suppressed memory. Sitting at my desk I can relive a decades-old Angolan war scene in crimson detail yet forget what was said at my last annual job evaluation. This lack of plot in both books, therefore, is understandable to me personally but makes categorization of these books difficult. Having read these two books at the same time, I was struck by the contrast in world views from authors with fairly similar childhood backgrounds. Both were born and raised in Africa, fluently spoke, at one time, at least one African language, while growing up in strongly colonial (or neo-colonial) family settings. The privileged backgrounds of private schools and relative wealth contrast with the stress of social and emotional disconnect with everyone (including non-African raised parents) except those similarly lost. Both authors portray, in unusually gentle terms, their parents' failure to change Africa. Coleman's missionary family's calling to evangelize Ethiopia's ancient Christianity is portrayed as sincere by an author who himself appears to have rejected their brand of theism. He even goes to great lengths to deflect the cultural imperialism his academic colleagues in Canada attribute to the entire missionary effort of the past few centuries. Hartley, by contrast, minces no words describing his parents' failure to protect Africa from itself, first as British colonial servants and then as post-colonial development workers in the service of "do-gooder" foreign organizations. But, for a war correspondent, his writing is almost sympathetic as he describes his father's failure as agriculturalist, husband and parent, contrasting these with physical and social sacrifices in remote regions that eventually lead the elder Hartley to "go native" by starting an ultimately failed parallel African family. Both the newly arrived Canadian missionaries and the long-established British expatriates are well-intentioned Europeans who, if they change Africa, do so in completely unintended ways. Africa, it is clear, changes those who come to change it. There the similarities end, however. Although Hartley is no saint, unapologetically describing his debaucheries while constantly living on the edge in Africa's hellholes, he appears more attuned to his own immortality than Coleman. During several occasions in which Hartley assumed his life was prematurely ended by violence, accident or disease, he finds comfort in the spiritual realm. He also searches for humanity buried in the inhumanity surrounding a war correspondent. Coleman, living the quiet, sheltered life common to most Westerners of the northern hemisphere, hints at agnosticism that does not require religion to get him through the drudgery of a predictable day-to-day. Coleman describes his surprisingly detailed African experience through the rose-tint of a returning, long-absent son. His rejection of an absorbed (if not genetic) Africaness, as implied by never having returned to live there as an adult, leads him to choose the sedentary, colorless life of a Canadian academic. No surprise, then, that he describes his childhood experiences and defends his missionary roots with seemingly little understanding of the broader impact his culture, his nation, and his family have had (intentionally or not) on Africa. Yet one can tell from his ramblings, inspired by a short visit to his childhood haunts, that Africa has never quite left him. In violent contrast, Hartley over-loads his writing with realism that describes, in mind-numbing detail, the atrocities Africans commit on each other as the world feigns disinterest while simultaneously devouring Hartley's gristly Reuters reports. Ethiopian, Rwandan, or Mozambican post-colonial traumas spill out in maggot-infested, visceral stench. If your African experience ended twenty years ago with picturesque village scenes and verdant boarding school rugby pitches, Coleman will help you catch up on what you have missed in the mean time. It may even temporarily cure your chronic nostalgia. These two books are worth the read, if for different reasons. Coleman's quiet childhood memories of an Africa that, even then, was crumbling, remind us of what we often forget from our own childhood. Hartley slams us back to earth, reminding us that Africa is far from the simplistic, idyllic land of our youth. Both versions are correct, both versions worth reliving.

A Thoughtful Exploration of MK Identity:
This thoughtful and beautifully written memoir by the son of SIM missionaries is much more than an autobiography, for it delves into the complexities of identity and self-understanding that are so much a part of the experience of many missionary children. After growing up in a small village and becoming fluent in Oromifa and Amharic, Daniel makes the transition involved in attending the mission boarding school in the capital city where his primary peers are now MKs like himself. During the tumultuous years of political upheaval following the overthrow of Haile Selassie in 1974, the rising hostility toward foreigners is directed on a number of occasions to Coleman and his pink skinned friends. The discovery that he will always be a "ferinjie," or foreigner, in the land of his birth is a shattering one that makes him determined to forge a new identity and to forsake his past when he returns to Canada at the age of seventeen. From that point on he tells people he is from "Wheatley, Ontario," his Dad's home town. The book begins when Coleman returns to the land of his birth after an absence of fourteen years. Now, as an academic, he reflects on how his identity, faith and outlook on cultures have been shaped by the formative experiences of his African past. The eucalyptus symbolizes for Coleman the complex interplay of cultures. This tree, native to Australia, was transplanted to Ethiopia as a quick-growing source of firewood and building materials. Though a foreign specimen, it thrived and replaced much of the native vegetation. Like the eucalyptus, missionaries seek to flourish by negotiating between the culture they bring with them and the culture to which they have come. Coleman has an appreciation for the many facets of this interplay and is critical of some of the stereotypes of missionaries perpetuated by media and social scientists. His final chapter, "Babies in the Colonial Washtub" is a brilliant exploration of this complexity. Coleman allows his readers to enter into his own struggle to affirm the same certainties about God that he imbibed from his family during his formative years. While not afraid to voice his doubts, he maintains a genuine admiration for his parents' and his Ethiopian friends' faith, sacrifice and commitment to their task. This book is a delight to read. The author's masterful use of the English language applied to a subject that evokes deep emotion is engaging from the first page onward. Readers who are particularly interested in issues relating to the well-being of missionary children will find this extended case self-study to be very insightful.