I AM A GIRL FROM AFRICA

A moving account of a determined young woman’s journey from poverty to humanitarian activism.

Raised by a generous, wise grandmother in Zimbabwe, Nyamayaro came of age in a time of withering heat. “There is no cool or comfortable place to hide,” she writes on the first page of her memoir. “The leaves of the tree are long gone, and with it the shade, burned away by the punishing drought that has descended on our small village.” The ensuing famine meant widespread death, but she was kept from starvation by the ministrations of U.N. aid workers. She was determined to become an aid worker herself. In 2000, at the age of 25, she moved to London, where an Irishwoman she met in a hostel dubbed her “Girl from Africa.” Nyamayaro, who returned the favor by dubbing the woman “Tiny Nose,” didn’t mind the sobriquet: “The fact that I’m African is all that matters, and that is enough. I am after all Mwana Wehvu—a child of the African soil.” Scraping to survive, finally finding work as a janitor, she talked her way into a volunteer position at a humanitarian agency and began to take on projects of increasing importance—e.g., developing responses to the HIV/AIDS epidemic sweeping her native country and working to help the government of the nation of Georgia to maintain a health insurance program for impoverished communities. Leading a team to combat maternal mortality in childbirth, Nyamayaro became increasingly aware of the scarcity of resources as well as the pervasiveness of gender inequality. “Why is it that despite all the progress made by the women’s rights movement,” she asks, “no country or company or institution in the world can yet claim to have achieved gender equality?” Throughout this memorable account of her impressive life, the author recalls “the central, definitive African value and philosophy of ubuntu: that when we uplift others, we are ourselves uplifted.”

An inspiring narrative that will be especially valuable to young people seeking to work for humanitarian causes.