Once Upon a Time - in Africa

Publisher Marketing: I opened Donna's journal that had lain on a shelf, unopened, for over 43 years. I was immediately transported back to 1967 the year I met the young nursing student who would within six months become my wife and with whom I would spend the next two years in Tanzania, East Africa as CUSO (Canadian University Services Overseas) volunteers; our two-year honeymoon. With little experience in love and marriage and even less experience in our chosen professions, we ventured out with a guitar, an accordion, our newly minted college certificates (architecture technology and nursing) and a whole lot of energy ready to see and experience the world. Living first in a mud hut, then for a couple of weeks in a down-at-the heels brothel, and finally in a flat owned and furnished by Public Works, I recall the travails of learning to prepare meals with one pot, keeping dry goods free from weevils, creating a Christmas tree out of a cactus - with disastrous results for the cactus - creating a home that soon became known as a stop-off point for volunteers, missionaries and travellers of all backgrounds, facing the reality that I had to change some of my personal habits if I wanted to keep the love I had just found, and of interacting with the local police and learning very quickly what it means to be "a minority." Much of the story focuses on the daily challenges and small victories that each of us enjoyed working with situations totally outside anything we had experienced to date. With the purchase of an undependable piki-piki (motorcycle), overcrowded slow and decrepit local buses, and thumbs made for hitchhiking, the reefs, beaches, national parks, mountains and plains all offered adventure and undreamt of beauty. The story describes in detail our participation in a hunting safari that would be impossible to do today, and, of course, no stay in Tanzania would be complete without a climb of Mount Kilimanjaro. The final chapters of the book highlight reflections that we now see these two years, how they shaped our career choices, and formed the basis for raising our four children and our lives as a couple for these past 45 years. Contributor Bio:  Denham, Richard Richard Denham Richard Denham was born in the military town of Aldershot, the son of a sergeant in the British Army and now lives in Farnborough. Ever since studying the Romans at school, he has taken a keen interest in them, specifically Romans in Britain. As a boy growing up with swords, knights, tanks and all things military he also developed an interest in the legends of King Arthur. Being self taught and very demoralised by the romantic fairytales, he discovered to his delight that the "real world" was in fact much more interesting and linked to Roman Britain, proving yet again that the truth is both stranger and more fascinating than fiction. The inspiration for the Britannia series was the cold, impassive footnote Richard would constantly come across "Romans leave Britain." This would have been, for those who lived it, an apocalyptic time never known before; with the Romans having lived, fought, laughed, married and raised children on our island, "leaving" could never be as simple as that. He more or less decided then and there that he would write a series of books one day, shining a light onto this forgotten time. This might have remained an idea for "sometime in the future" until chance meeting with well-established author and historian M. J Trow made it all seem possible. From this meeting came a collaboration resulting in "The Wall." M J Trow A bestselling author of over sixty books, including forty novels, Mei Trow is nevertheless always looking for the next new idea. A military historian by training and consummate story-teller by inclination, he had never thought of writing about the Romans' last hurrah in Britain until he met Richard Denham and then it seemed an obvious subject for a blockbusting series. Using Richard Denham's exhaustive knowledge and his own wide-ranging grasp of history, Mei has brought his skill in bringing the past to life to the table in this collaboration. Reviewers have often mentioned how he makes historical characters seem as though the past is "now" and not a dusty "then" and he has made this as true for fourth century Britain as for Tudor or Victorian England (the Marlowe and the Lestrade series). As a history teacher for more years than he cares to remember, making the past live is his passion and nothing pleases him more than the many reviews that say "I wish he had been my History teacher!"