| Twenty Chickens for a Saddle |
|
Falling in love with the country
where Robyn’s eccentric grandfather had served as pilot to Seretse
Khama, Botswana’s first beloved president, her parents at once set off
in his pioneering and unconventional footsteps. This is the story of
the family’s fifteen years in Botswana, during which Linda Scott
haphazardly and single-handedly homeschooled her three children – each
eccentric characters in their own right – while her husband, Keith, ran
a flying doctor practice and attempted, with erratic success, to adapt
his experience to the unique demands of a rural practice and the
growing burden of AIDS. A funny and
unsentimental account of a childhood where dissecting a snake was the
closest Robyn, Damien and Lulu came to a biology lesson, and children
from the cattle posts were their only classmates, Twenty Chickens for a Saddle
is also a unique insight into modern Botswana. Set against the backdrop
of one of Africa’s rare democratic success stories battling with one of
the continent’s worst AIDS crises, the book remains throughout an
uplifting, engaging and deeply affectionate portrayal of an
extraordinary place and family. |
When Robyn Scott was six years old her parents
abruptly exchanged the tranquil pastures of New Zealand for a converted
cowshed in the wilds of Botswana, where their three small children grew
up collecting snakes, canoeing with crocodiles and breaking in horses
in the veld.