South Africa - where systemic racism is a recent history

It was a great opportunity to read this book right before my big trip to South Africa, especially because I was going to spend a week in Johannesburg visiting one of IDEX (International Development Exchange) partners in this city called Positive Women's Network (PWN). PWN works with HIV/AIDS women in several townships around Johannesburg that were mentioned in this book.

I love how this story really provides a typical example of how screwed up apartheid was in South Africa and how it deeply impacted people there in ways that have confused their identity for the rest of their lives.

Once in South Africa, I realized how privilege it is right now to still meet people who have first-hand experience in what apartheid was like, as they activism against apartheid remains strong and vibrant. The book does do a good job of introducing what apartheid experience was for a family and the complexities of the insensitive system.

I hope everyone gets a chance to experience South Africa, as it reminds us what humanity has been capable to do and the need to learn these lessons for the next generation.

The story of an apartheid child

Now for our next book for March we'll be reading When She was White: The True Story of a Family divided by Race by Judith Stone.

Here's a summary of the book:

The Sandra Laing case made international news as an example of South Africa's apartheid at its nuttiest, when, in 1966, the nine-year-old Laing, who was significantly darker than her white-skinned parents, was reclassified as Coloured and expelled from the white school she was attending. At 11, she was classified white again, and at 26, through her own efforts, became Coloured again. Laing had a hard life, especially after she ran away from home at 14 with the first of a succession of married black men.

Although an anti-apartheid poster child outside of South Africa, Laing's memory so often fails her that Stone's book becomes an exercise in recovered memory, coupled with a reliance upon the remote expertise of various "lawyers, historians, geneticists, sociologists, psychologists, and some of the South-African journalists who'd covered her story over the years." Stone is at her most successful in eliciting recollections of misery and family strife. She fills in the blanks with "official documents, government records, newspaper archives, and interviews" with Laing's friends, family and other community members. But Laing is, unfortunately, too frail a vessel upon which to hang all this, along with digressive minilectures on genetics, history, anthropology and economics.

We'll be meeting near the Bernal Heights area on Sunday March 22, 2009. After this book club event, there will be a break for the month of April and we'll return to our next event in May.

*Get your book with a 15% discount at BookSmith in the Haight district when you say you're a WOW book club member*

Knowing a Woman's Perspective in the Darfur Conflict

We had an incredible although quite ironic time meeting up at our local teahouse to discuss Halima's story of survival from her childhood in Darfur to her exile in England.

Halima gave us a more insightful look into what Darfur's lifestyle was like before the infamous conflict that we hear about today in the news. Being a member of Zaghawa tribe, we learn about her daily life with her family and the rare encouragement of her father to support her education, recognizing her potential. We can feel the ethnic tensions more predominantly when she goes to school and when she starts getting trained to become a doctor.

Although Halima has us accompany her in the most excruciatingly painful experiences (ie female circumsicion and gang rape), it brings us closer to what has been the experiences of many women from Darfur.

One would have thought that leaving Darfur would have made her life easier and again, Halima gives us another aspect to her story, her immigration story of adjusting to a new country and becoming a new type of minority.

A Memoir of Survival in Sudan

Our next WOW book for our February discussion is Tears of the Desert: A Memoir of Survival in Darfur by Halima Bashir with the support of Damien Lewis, a journalist.

Here's a summary of the book:

Writing with BBC correspondent Damien Lewis, Halima Bashir, a physician and refugee living in London, offers a vivid personal portrait of life in the Darfur region of Sudan before the catastrophe. Doted on by her father, who bucked tradition to give his daughter an education, and feisty grandmother, who bequeathed a fierce independence, Bashir grew up in the vibrant culture of a close-knit Darfur village.

She anticipated a bright future after medical school, but tensions between Sudan's Arab-dominated Islamist dictatorship and black African communities like her Zaghawa tribe finally exploded into conflict.

Please join us for a great discussion on Sunday February 22 at 2pm at The Secret Garden Tea House (Inner Sunset neighborhood).

Please let me know by Monday February 9, if you'll be able to attend this book club discussion to make reservations at the Tea House.

Note: If you're interested in watching a Darfur-related movie after the book club, Katherine and Justine will be hosting a movie night around 4pm (specific time will be determined) at Katherine's house, near the Tea House.

*Remember: you get a 15% discount at BookSmith, when you purchase your book and say you're a WOW Book Club member* - Support your local bookstore!

The Double Meaning of Athena's Life

It was a great reunion to talk about Athena and how we learned about her life through different people's perspective.

We saw Athena as a person like anyone else, with flaws and insecurities, and looking for what her life's mission is. Through the stories of others who knew her, we see that she has made a difference already, without being aware of it.

We are all curious about certain parts of her life that we never get to learn about, such as her love life and the mystery of this boyfriend from Scotland Yards. If anything, what Athena has taught us is whether we do have the courage to be who we are, no matter how against this might be to the status quo. Are we brave enough to follow our own destiny.

A Spiritual Beginning for 2009

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!

We're starting our book club in 2009 with a more light, spiritual-oriented book: The Witch of Portobello by Paulo Coehlo.

Here's a book summary:

Best-selling fabulist Coelho continues to transform his trademark combination of mysticism and storytelling into spellbinding examinations of the human soul. In this deceptively simple novel, a bereaved lover attempts to chronicle, dissect, and comprehend the often-twisted path followed by Athena, otherwise known as the Witch of Portobello Road.

An orphaned Romanian gypsy, adopted as an infant by adoring Lebanese parents, Athena recognized and struggled with the power of her magical gifts at an early age. Spurred on by truths and passions inaccessible to most of her contemporaries, she traipsed around Europe and the Middle East in search of acceptance, enlightenment, and a truer path. Developing a cultlike following, she became the object of a modern-day witch hunt that seemingly culminated in tragedy.

Please join us on Sunday January 11 at 2pm at a local coffeeshop (Cup & Cake Cafe in Inner Richmond) in San Francisco for an inspiritional discussion!

Remember: you get a 15% discount at BookSmith, when you purchase your book and say you're a WOW Book Club member* - Support your local bookstore!

Getting to know Julia Alvarez

Hi everyone!

If you would like to listen to a great presentation of Julia Alvarez on her book "Saving the World" I recommend listening to a program that Julia Alvarez did for New York Pulic Library, found at http://www.nypl.org/research/chss/pep/pepdesc.cfm?id=2674

Also, the owner of our partner bookstore, BookSmith, interviewed Julia Alvarez last year last year as part of their LitMinds literary innovators interviews and shared us this link to enjoy reading the interview...http://litminds.org/blog/2007/08/julia_alvarez_talks_about_stor.html

Happy Reading and Listening!