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Rebecca Haile’s Held at a Distance: My Rediscovery of Ethiopia is the first hand account of a woman’s journey back to Ethiopia as an adult after leaving at the age of eleven. Haile’s father, a leading academic in Addis Ababa, was shot while “resisting arrest” after a military coup in 1974, and escaped with his family to America where he settled in central Minnesota.
Once grown and married, Rebecca felt compelled to visit Ethiopia again, and was able to visit relatives who still live there. One particularly memorable relative is Rebecca’s uncle, a man who still lives in Ethiopia and is deeply committed to helping Ethiopia prosper. He is a successful businessman, having done many different things during his career, and is a true visionary.
He believes that jobs, not handouts, are the solution for Ethiopia, and he sets up each of his construction projects so that it can employ the maximum number of people in the community. He has been in charge of the construction of many roads and bridges in Ethiopia, and dreams of being part of the construction of reservoirs and irrigation systems in Ethiopia that would allow farmers to water their fields even during the dry season.
Rebecca talks lovingly about the house that her father built in Addis the year before they came to America. The family was very well-off in Ethiopia, and Rebecca held that memory of prosperity close to her heart during her difficult early years in America.
I appreciated the insight into Ethiopian culture from the viewpoint of someone who grew up there, but now has an American perspective as well, having lived so long in America. Another highlight of the book for me was the ideas that Rebecca’s uncle had for making life better for the average Ethiopian. You can read another review of this book here.
Other notable Ethiopians
Meseret Defar
Dinaw Mengestu
