A life less comfortable

A few years ago I read a book called "Reluctant Missionary" written by Edith Buxton.  She is the daughter of famous missionary C. T. Studd and married one of his best known recruits, Alfred Buxton.  The title of the book beckoned me into its dusty pages and I related to Buxton's reluctance and was inspired by her rising to the challenge of being a missionary in the jungles of Congo in the early 1900's.  "The sea journey took three weeks.  On the last morning I was awake early and on deck to catch my first look at Africa.  It was a brown line on the horizon of a dull grey sea.  To those who are susceptible to her magic, Africa can cast a spell which binds you to her for ever.  I still feel that magnetic pull whenever I set foot on her soil.  The age-old earth at your feet, baked by an unremitting sun, sends a thrill through me to this day."  She writes with eloquence and vulnerability.  "Long before we reached Nala I knew I did not fit. ...

Amidst discarded beer bottles and other refuse on a weedy plot of land lies a cemetery on a high point of Libreville over-looking downtown buildings, rambling neighborhoods and the grey-green estuary spilling out into the Atlantic ocean.  Recently Steve and I went there to take some photos for a man who is writing a book recounting the lives of the first protestant missionaries to Gabon.  The grave stones are scattered somewhat haphazardly in a sad state of neglect.  After driving towards downtown Libreville and taking a cratered road that wandered and wound around an adjacent neighborhood we found the mission called "Baraka" which translates to "blessing".  Behind the mission building lies the cemetery.  It was a sunny hot day with billowy white clouds drifting lazily across a brilliant blue sky, occasional breezes carried up from the sea stirred the sombre air as we walked reverently around the old headstones searching for specific names to photograph for the ...