Blue Clay People: Seasons on Africa's Fragile Edge - William Powers [epub]

"A haunting account of one man's determination and the struggles of a people living in a deeply troubled country."--*Booklist*

When William Powers went to Liberia as a fresh-faced aid worker in 1999, he was given the mandate to "fight poverty and save the rainforest." It wasn't long before Powers saw how many obstacles lay in the way, discovering first-hand how Liberia has become a "black hole in the international system"--poor, environmentally looted, scarred by violence, and barely governed. Blue Clay People is an absorbing blend of humor, compassion, and rigorous moral questioning, arguing convincingly that the fate of endangered places such as Liberia must matter to all of us.

**

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. When Powers, fresh out of a Ph.D. program in international relations, arrived in Liberia in 1999, sent by an international aid agency "to fight poverty and save the rainforest," he faced a daunting task. The second-poorest country in the world, Liberia had just begun to emerge from seven years of civil war and was "environmentally looted, violence scarred, and barely governed." Even major cities lacked electricity, running water and postal service; garbage lay uncollected in the streets, schoolteachers were barely literate and the economy worked largely on bribes. The government of Charles Taylor enriched itself through illicit trade in conflict diamonds, protected timber and weapons, while terrorist militias acted at whim. "It's all just so brutal," Powers confided to his girlfriend, almost ready to quit after his first year. Yet he stayed on, and this eloquent memoir shows why he found this troubled country so difficult to leave. He writes of stunning beaches and rivers, of majestic forests—home to the largest concentration of mammals in the world—threatened by rapacious logging companies, and of resilient people who teach him that it is possible to live happily with "enough." He sketches scenes of transcendent beauty and grotesque violence, and writes with disarming honesty about his struggle to maintain his ideals when the right course of action is far from clear: is it ethical to take an African lover, when the relationship will inevitably be based on financial support? Should he buy endangered zebra duiker meat from a poor family that desperately needs the money? Does his work do good, or inadvertent harm? In the end, he decides, it may not be possible to change the world, but we must continue to act as if we can.
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From Booklist

Powers left behind a caring girlfriend and the comforts of the U.S. to travel to Liberia in 1999 to take the position of Catholic Relief Services director at an international aid agency. The state of Liberia was founded in 1822 as a refuge for freed slaves from America, but conflicts with local peoples and recent bloody coups greatly destabilized the region and have made it one of the more dangerous countries in Africa. Powers hoped to help the Liberian people not by giving them handouts (such as the food his agency passed out) but by helping them sustain themselves. Powers certainly did more than many of his cynical colleagues have done--he visited many of the neglected villages and started an ambitious guinea pig-breeding project. Even as Powers began to become disillusioned with his fellow aid workers and some of the people he was trying to help, he persisted in his efforts and his optimism. His memoir is a haunting account of one man's determination and the struggles of people living in a deeply troubled country.