A girl who spends a night in a mortar will wake up as a boy, so a Rwandan myth goes. It inspires many a little girl in Rwanda to sacrifice a night's sleep to try whether it works. Dutch Journalist
Femke van Zeijl has been travelling through Africa for years to write articles for Dutch and anglophone magazines and newspapers. In
A Night in a Mortar she describes the lives of ordinary people, thus portraying current affairs. Often her attention turns toward women. From their perspective, one that is often forgotten, she paints a picture of social relationships in Africa.
In her stories women never are portrayed as mainly victims. Even in Darfur she meets women who try to rebuild their lives and look towards the future. These women are not sitting around waiting for something terrible to happen, on the contrary: they fight back. Sometimes they take up arms (Burundi), they almost single handedly reconstruct their country ravaged by genocide (Rwanda) and more often than not they play a crucial role in the peace process (Democratic Republic of the Congo).
Rwandan girls trying to change into a boy have good reasons to do so. Women are often treated a second-class citizens and abuse and violence are part of their life. Femke van Zeijl does not avoid these serious issues, but manages to cover them in a smooth style. She has the giggles with a refugee in Darfur, discovers night life in Mozambique and takes a course of self defence for women in Eastern Congo.
For now this book is only available in Dutch - hoping for translations in English, French, German, Portuguese etc....
A girl who spends a night in a mortar will wake up as a boy, so a Rwandan myth goes. It inspires many a little girl in Rwanda to sacrifice a night's sleep to try whether it works. Dutch Journalist Femke van Zeijl has been travelling through Africa for years to write articles for Dutch and anglophone magazines and newspapers. In A Night in a Mortar she describes the lives of ordinary people, thus portraying current affairs. Often her attention turns toward women. From their perspective, one that is often forgotten, she paints a picture of social relationships in Africa.
