CHANDA'S SECRETS

By: Allan Stratton
Location: FIC STR
Genre: Africa

In two days I fly out to Africa, I am going to see cute baby orphaned elephants, I will see proud strutting giraffes, I will avoid the pincers of the hunting scorpions, I will listen to the soul of rythmic African beats, I will see the colour of vibrant fabric that wants to sing its story, I will drive in buses that  are like aged cats- onto their ninth life, I will eat the pulpous  flesh of  paw paw and I will sit and gaze upon the aged who delve into the secrets of life as they quitely chatter under the baobab tree.
More than that I will work in schools - run by the poor for the poor and help set up three libraries in a slum area that is bereft of books, and in those schools are Chanda. Chanda who holds her family together, Chanda who know the deeps secret about her mother, but cannot even for once mention it, Chanda who for the sake of her family risks her own oppertunity to flourish.Chanda who protects against the maurandering desires of a addicted pervert. Where I go, Chanda will be and despite all the beauty I see, all the senses in my body that are evoked, nothing will have a greater impact on me than the Chanda's I met.
Allan Stratton has done a wonderful job in writing this book, about courage, about facades and about Africa, I can see in his prose the place my feet will rest in a weeks time, and I can see the faces, the homes, the food, the anger, the pain of the people he writes about. Maybe Allan Stratton has been where I am going and have been many times before as well.