Habari!

Miss Florence Epp is my name, and though just 28 and a woman, I have seen much of the world on the soles of my worn out boots (which currently do need new laces). My father was a great doctor of the 1890’s, you see, and his gifts and talents were far reaching to others: helping colonize parts of western Africa and serving as a doctor and storyteller for many.

His greatest gift, to me that is, I believe stems from his great love and fascination for the people of Africa. Observing and absorbing everything he could, he and I became like sponges to this culture and its magnificent backdrop. No doubt out of place we were, me with no mother, and hair as blond as can be; it was a strange and yet wonderfully unorthodox way of growing up as a girl.  When I was six my father said to me “Were going to live on the other side of the world, what do you think about that?”  And to him I replied in the only way I knew how, “Will we have to walk upside down?”

Indeed, his answer should have been “yes,” for it was as if we were learning how to “walk” all over again; moving from our English comforts to scorching hot weather, a multitude of different languages, others’ lack of clothing, and peculiar food. However on that note my father used to say I would eat anything, and try anything, and well, I guess I still do. He loved to tell the story of how when we first arrived to Johannesburg, I was handed a plate of fried grasshoppers and before his hand could reach the plate, I had devoured them. He said, “Do you even know what you ate, my dear?” and without a moment passing, I licked my fingers and said, “They tasted like crunchy bugs!” I laugh as I write this but I really think it was at that moment he felt confident in his decision to move us to a different continent. He knew I was ready to try anything, fear nothing, and take whatever challenge came my way. And I did.

This place, this strange new magical world I discovered when I was just six, twenty-two years later I do call Makazi (home), and the people, I grew to know them as Nuzuri Rafiki ( good friends). Now my boots in their travels have found their way here to 2009, and I must admit, finding myself here seems as though I am walking upside down all over again.  There are such advances in science and a delight of wonderful inventions, and well… truly unusual fashions. Perhaps if our paths cross you can share your stories with me, and I with you, as I am in need not only of new laces, but of some Nuzuri Rafiki’s, too.