Born a Sin in Africa
A personal story published in New Lines Magazine about my improbable friendship with a woman who was abducted as a little girl from my...
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Beth Duff-Brown
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Oct 28, 2023
History's Deadliest King
As I work on my book about one village in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, I like to weave in a bit of politics and history about...
Oct 3, 2020
Evariste Wins
I wrote a blog post earlier this year about these tenacious Catholic nuns in my old Peace Corps village in the Congo, Kamponde, who were...
Jun 7, 2020
Coronavirus in Congo and #BlackLivesMatter
This post started off as an update on the Coronavirus in Congo — and I will get to that — but it's hard to ignore the other pandemic in...
Feb 17, 2020
Two Chance Encounters
When I was in Kananga and interviewing some Congolese NGO workers who were treating some of the child soldiers from the Kasai uprising,...
Feb 6, 2020
Why Have There Been More Than 6,000 Measles Deaths in Congo? Where to Begin?
This is a longer version of a story I wrote for Stanford Medicine, when asked to give my perspective on why the measles outbreak in Congo...
Jan 3, 2020
Catholic Nuns Getting It Done
The two sisters who head up the competing Catholic orders in Kamponde are very different in their approaches — but the same in their...
Nov 24, 2019
Why She Couldn't Go
I hadn’t been in Kamponde more than 10 minutes when one of my students from long ago approached, welcomed me back with a double-fisted...
Nov 9, 2019
Addresses, Giggles, Old Friends and New
I'm getting back to Congo-related stuff after taking a break. I've been working on a post about the Kamwina Nsapu uprising and clashes...
Oct 15, 2019
The Sun Also Accelerates: Solar Power Dominates One Corner of Congo
I was among the hundreds of thousands of Northern California residents who were without power last week. I got off easy; power went out...
Oct 6, 2019
Kanyi & Kamulombo
Within minutes of arriving in Kamponde, there were a handful of people I immediately asked after. Among those were two of my former...
Oct 3, 2019
The Road to Kamponde
The quick update I gave to my Kickstarter Family
Sep 11, 2019
Morning Sickness
Day Four in Kinshasa. We have confirmation of our Congo Airways flight to Kananga on Friday. That is the city about 60 miles north of...
Sep 9, 2019
Hurry Up and Happily Wait
Day Two in Kinshasa and though we’re stuck here until Friday — we got bumped from the flight to Kananga in central Congo today — I’m...
Aug 22, 2019
Origami Microscopes
One of the handful of side projects I'll be working on when we get to Congo in two weeks (!!) is showing up at schools and helping...
Aug 15, 2019
The Kindness of Strangers
Nick and I will be headed to SFO airport in three weeks from today for our long-awaited journey to the Democratic Republic of the...
Jul 27, 2019
Five Weeks and Counting
Some of you have so kindly asked what you can send along with me to the village. As I've told those of you who have asked: Your initial...
Jul 27, 2019
It Took a Village: A Congo Journey
This is the original page for a Kickstarter project launched in 2016 to fund my trip and potential documentary about my nearly...
Jul 9, 2019
Pierre Mambele: The man behind the wheel of Congo’s news
Love this Reuters obituary for Pierre Mambele, a taxi driver in Kinshasa who worked for foreign journalists for decades. One of the many...
Jun 25, 2019
Congo Visas and Tickets in Hand
Third Time's a Charm? Thank you dear Kickstarter Family for your patience and understanding. Things have calmed enough in the DRC,...
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