Guardian Unlimited reviewer Rory Maclean had this to say after reading Tim Butcher’s new travel account, Blood River: A Journey to Africa’s Broken Heart:

In its final pages, Butcher writes of his extraordinary journey, I “touched the heart of Africa and found it broken”. We can weep for this betrayed, failed land, but please don’t go there.

The DRC is definitely one of the world’s most screwed-up places, but you should definitely go there. I just wouldn’t recommend motorbiking across the country, solo, with “a penknife and a packet of baby-wipes as his only protection,” as Butcher did.

[Found via this blog post]

Update: Rory, the reviewer, responded to Fred.

Related Posts:

• “Blood River,” continued (January, 2008)
• Goma Security Alerts (December, 2007)
• Video from the Mugunga Camps (January, 2008)
• Neal Lesh: OpenMRS, Information Systems for Medicine in the Developing World (November, 2007)
• N’Dombolo (September, 2007)

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