Completed: Reason for Hope: A Spiritual Journey

It took me a while to finish this book, because I kept it at work and only read it during my breaks. (Though now I've started a 600-page Longfellow compilation at work - who knows HOW long that's going to take!).

There's a few reflections on this book that I'd like to share (and you're here reading, and therefore get to read them!).

I have a great respect, more so than before, for Jane Goodall after reading this book. I also find that I have a great appreciation for many of her opinions on belief. She thinks that most of the religious differences are details, and that the faith, the spirituality, the belief and the wonder are the important parts. She is open to everyone who lives their life with integrity, regardless of the religious nuances:

"And what about those, and there are many, who do not believe in a God - those who are athiests? It does not make any difference, I thought. A life lived in the service of humanity, a love of and respect for all living things - those attributes are the essence of saintlike behavior." (p202)

She has had the experience of being faced with a situation that cannot be explained apart from by faith. It is something I've never had, though perhaps not looking at things through a spiritual lens makes the perception different. She had two children - her son, and a friend's daughter - come to her independently and say that they knew her husband had passed away, and had dreamed of him the night he passed. Sometimes children dream or feel things much differently than adults, and so I don't find this surprising. But it's something I always wished for, for some reason. Maybe I would believe more or more fully if something that couldn't be explained would happen to me. As a teenager, it was always a cure for alopecia - give me all my hair and I'll believe. Now as an adult I don't wait for such divine interventions. But it was fascinating to read about Jane's.

She has had times when she despaired, when the evil of the world overwhelmed her. She worried at one time if she "had been justified in bringing a child into such a hopelessly wicked place" (p186-7). And I felt astonished - I had never found it written so perfectly - the biggest reason why I'm scared to ever have a child. We haven't decided if we want to have a child, but if we did, I fear so much the world that we'd be bringing him or her into. But then I think of G and J, and how wonderful and kind they are, and I know it's possible to raise good kids. I felt a connection to Jane for having felt something I have felt so keenly.

I think that is the reason for her ever-enduring appeal - almost anyone can connect to her and feel a closeness to her. I read her spiritual memoir - a book I would ordinarily not even pick up. But at the other end of that book, Jane really makes me want to be a better person. That's why she's been so successful with her foundation and her conservation efforts, I think - because people connect to her. Including me.

Title: Reason for Hope: A Spiritual Journey
Authors: Jane Goodall with Phillip Berman
Published: 1999
Pages: 282

Total books blogged: 9
Total pages: 3180

Word of the Week: Copra

In my Imperial Royal Canadian Atlas, I kept coming across ‘copra’ as a major product of a lot of the countries mentioned. I wrote it down with the note “Copra – W of the W” and neglected to look it up. So now I did.

My first assumption was that copra had something to do with copper production – an important metal, and surely mined in various parts of the world.

Wrong-o. Copra is defined by Wikipedia as: “…the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut. Coconut oil is extracted from it and has made copra an important agricultural commodity for many coconut-producing countries. It also yields coconut cake, which is mainly used as feed for livestock.”

This makes me think of two things.

The first – does anyone remember being in middle school and doing your first research projects, and going to the library in order to look up precious summaries of important information like definitions in Encyclopedia Brittanica or World Book? Even hopping on the computer and using Encarta? I feel like it was forever ago.

Second – I read another blog, called 100 Days of Real Food. It’s very helpful in my quest to eat less processed food (my timbit moment Friday aside – I was sick and allowed to eat junk). The lady who writes it uses coconut oil and olive oil, mainly, as she maintains that they are less processed than other oils. And it sounds like, in modern times, it really is less processed and refined. In fact, it is produced in a similar fashion to olive oil – by crushing. Even the by-product of copra production, termed copra ‘cake’, does not go to waste, so double bonus!

I have yet to buy and use coconut oil. But maybe I should give it a try!

Completed: Imperial Royal Canadian World Atlas

I know, it's been too long. I've thought of many things that I could have blogged about lately in regards to my reading. But I've been busy. I have two jobs - a nine-to-five and a part-time research gig. Apart from that, I spent the better part of two weeks' worth of free time completing my annual scrapbook for D. I've made him a scrapbook for each year we've been together, and given it to him for Christmas. This year I didn't get it done for Christmas, and barely got it done for his birthday. And I've just had a bunch of outings with friends - a perfectly good reason to not get around to blogging!

All the while, though, I've been reading before I go to bed - at least 15 minutes or so, but often more. It has taken me some time to finish the Atlas, because after the first few introductory chapters on Canada, it became a more monotone laundry list of the world's countries, along with their population size, industries, natural resources, highest peaks, biggest cities, and features of note. Despite it sometimes being a bit of a tedious read, it was also very illuminating.

I've been interested in history and archaeology my whole life. But often the world is divided up into digestible bites when studying history - World War I, World War II, Vietnam, Cold War, etc. I found this atlas incredible because it fell outside of these normal time periods, and also covered the whole globe, not just areas of interest in the midst of a war or something. It mentioned every (political) part of the planet, and what it was like in 1935. Here are some of the more interesting tidbits that I came across:

• There were only three independent states in Africa: Egypt, Liberia, and Abyssinia (Ethiopia)
• They thought that the Arctic would become an 'air crossroads' of the world, with jets flying across the north pole area
• World War I was not yet World War I, as there had been no World War II (it's just something you don't think about until you come across it) - it was the Great War or the World War
• In the 1931 Canadian census, there was only 1 telephone per 10 people in Canada
• In 1935, women still could not vote in Quebec
• In the title of the British sovereign (George V, at the time), the term "Emperor of India" was still used, as it was not yet self-governing. Pakistan did not yet exist
• Newfoundland was not yet part of Canada
• Terms such as 'savages', 'half-castes', and 'pure races' were still used, though of course we abhor such terms today
• Vatican City had only been around as a political entity for 6 years

I think the biggest realization that this book brought me to is that the world in 1935 was really still divvied up between the various European colonial powers. I didn't realize how many colonies still existed at that time (because again, when you study history in school, you don't normally study the parts of the world not directly involved in whatever war or event you're studying). Africa, south/southeast Asia, the Pacific, the Caribbean, were almost entirely colonial to some degree or another. Germany, however, had no colonies - they had all been taken away after World War I (and so you see many "British/French such-and-such, formerly German such-and-such"s throughout). 

I'm very glad to have read this historical, geographical snapshot from 1935. It makes me all the more excited to read more of my older books (next up: a high-school poetry book from 1924).

One line in this book was ominous, and foretold of what was to come not long after this book was published. I thought I would finish this entry with that, as it is the line that has stayed with me the most since reading it: "Germany... Government: Republic (since November, 1918); official name, Deutches Reich; Since March, 1933 - Dictatorship". It just puts a pit in your stomach to know what that dictatorship was going to do in the decade following this book's publication. The world did not yet know the horror of the Holocaust. Anne Frank was six years old.

Title: Imperial Royal Canadian World Atlas "An Atlas for Canadians"
Editors: Fred James, Lloyd Edwin Smith, and Frederick K. Branom
Published: 1935
Pages: 216

Total books blogged: 8
Total pages: 2898