Kosciuszko, the Man behind the Mountain

Kosciuszko: The incredible life of the man behind the mountain by Anthony Sharwood
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Kozzie, who was he?
I had an opportunity to meet Anthony Sharwood at a presentation of his book in AIPA (Australian Institute of Polish Affairs) and these were his opening words.
It was really a pleasure to meet a person so fascinated by personality of Thaddeus Kosciuszko, Polish national hero.

Thaddeus Kosciuszko - CLICK - born in 1746 in Eastern part of Poland, currently it is Belarus.
Started military training in Poland but not seeing a chance for a meaningful career (Poland was just partially partitioned by neighbouring countries) he migrated to America and joined the American army as an engineer. His skills were appreciated by the highest American commanders - G. Washington, T. Jefferson.
In 1784 he returned to Poland which was then in the final stage of breakdown.
In 1794 he organised and commanded an uprising, last attempt to preserve Poland but failed, Poland was erased from the map of Europe, he was put into a Russian prison.
Luckily for him, after the death of Russian Empress - Catherine the Great, he was released from prison by her son and successor and migrated to USA.
He spend 2 years there and tried to use money earned in USA for the liberation of slaves.
In 1798 he returned to Europe - France - in hope to get some support for regaining independence in Poland.
He met Napoleon and was very disappointed.
Next 15 years he lobbied around Europe for Polish independence.
Congress in Vienna dispelled his dreams - a puppet Kingdom of Poland was created within the Russian Empire.
Last 3 years of his life he spent in Switzerland.

Anthony Sharwood followed Kosciuszko's route, visited all places visited by his hero, read lots of books and articles about T. Kosciuszko.
Half of a book is a very vivid report of his travels and findings.
The other half of a book is related the mountain - Mt Kosciuszko - the highest mountain in Australia. Discovered and named in 1840 by Polish explorer - P. E Strzelecki - CLICK
First point - deterioration of the climate and its effect on the local flora.
Additional element - wild brumbies destroying the vegetation.
Second point - the name.
For some time there are calls to give the name it's original - Aboriginal - name -- Kunama Namagdi which means.... Mountains and Snow???
Why question marks?
Because in my opinion it is not a name of a specific mountain but the name of the area wich was visited by Aboriginal tribes in Autumn - Bogong Moth season.
Mt Kosciuszko as such is not a very distinctive mountain, it does not have any caves, rocks or sites of Aboriginal ceremonies so I suggest to change the name of Snowy Mountains and leave T. Kosciuszko in well deserved peace.
But...
Anthony Sharwood few times asks a perverse question - how Kosciuszko would react to...
- vandalisation of his monument opposite The White House...

- attempts to change the name of Mt Kosciuszko.
In his opinion.... he would not mind.
I agree.

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Pharaoh

Pharaoh by Jackie French
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Nice introduction into Egypt prehistory combined with view of surrounding civilisation.

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The Personal Librarian

The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Story of Belle da Costa Greene - born in an Afro-American family, completed high school and library courses. After 2 years work as a librarian at the Princetown University Library she got a job of librarian of multimillionaire J.P. Morgan.
Here she demonstrated her exceptional abilities as expert on ancient books and manuscripts and also as a very skillful financial negotiator.
The book presents important aspects of Belle's private life - obsession on hiding her "black" heritage, extraordinary relation with her boss and emotions and disappointment in the only love of her life.
Exciting life, great story.

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Quiet time before Easter

Good Friday, 
This should be a quiet time...

Early afternoon - BAAANG!!!

Something banged near our house. I head towards the door, and see someone already ringing the bell.

I open it - a friendly guy from our Parish.

"Excuse me, but I pulled my car into your driveway to turn around and... I hit the garage door."

I walk out to the front of the house - he really did...

I go to check the back door - impressive!!!

 

How come?
What happened?

Simple - his car hit the front door, the door hit the car inside, the car jumped forward...

Excuse me -  our visitor interrupts - we're rushing to church now. After the service, I'll come and explain the situation. We'll cover all costs.

He is right – give God what is divine, what's human may wait a while.

I called the insurance company – to my surprise, they were working (Good Friday is a public holiday).

They recorded an accident report – I added that the matter was critical because my wife has difficulty climbing stairs, so the garage was her only way out of the house.

20 minutes later, a repairman called and said he'd be at our place shortly.

He was – very nice – Czech by birth.

He took a sledgehammer to the front garage door and straightened it enough for me to pull the car out onto the street.

Saturday 7:20 a.m. – two repairmen arrived.

They removed the old door and installed a temporary one. They'll finish this up next week when the shops reopen.

The temporary door, from inside the garage, looks like this...

By the way... that wood smells so good.

Time to go shopping.

Our car was parked outside all night, I walked up, and what did I see?
The windshield was covered completely in shit.

Oh yeah, the news mentioned that the toilet on the spaceship had a problem and... they fixed it.

I wasn't sure whether to wash the window or notify the space agency to secure the ShNA samples.
However, I decided that in the current political climate, it was better to keep a low profile - I washed it, did some shopping, blessed my Easter basket, and I hope to see Easter Sunday.

I wish all the visitors of this blog a joyful and peaceful Easter.

Kind of

Kind of, Sort of, Maybe, But Probably Not by Imbi Neeme
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Generally I feel that reading this book was a waste of time.
All the characters were remote to me and I was either bored or disgusted with their way of entertaining themselves.
I felt some sympathy to the main characters - Phoebe, Suzy , but for me descriptions of their feelings and actions was very, very simplistic and naive.

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The Friends

My Friends by Fredrik Backman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Full respect to the author, he managed to make me vulnerable, to shed a tear, to feel spasm in my heart.
It lasted for half of a book, then cracks appeared.
I looked closer on the other face of a lovely FOUR - stealing, making mess, throwing shopping trolley in an abyss. And an overwhelming contempt for security guards.
Could F. Backman write a book about friendship among security guards?

The last third of the book was annoying, I just wanted to finish it and the author employed every possible trick to make it longer.

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The Deal

The Deal by Alex Miller
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

It looks to me like a very self-centred story of a not fullfilled artist.
Well written but very alien to me.


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Gulliver's Wife

Gulliver's Wife by Lauren Chater
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I am rather disappointed with this book.
I could not find a STORY in it.
L. Gulliver returns home after his visit to LilliputLand and does not connect with his family - end of story.
Actually I looked to the source - Gulliver Travels by J Swift...
"During my short stay in England, I gained much by showing my cattle to various distinguished people and commoners. Before I undertook my second trip, I sold them for six hundred pounds. I stayed only two months with my wife and children.... I left my wife 1,500 pounds and settled her in a comfortable home in Redriff. My son, John, attended elementary school, and my daughter, Elizabeth (who is now married and has children), learned sewing."

I highly appreciate author's skill and effort in presenting conditions in which London midwifes in XVIII century lived and operated.
I appreciate author's skill in presenting environment in which London midwifes in XVIII century lived and operated but in first place I got a feeling that she connected her story to a very popular book just to gain readership and haven't tried to pass to the reader the atmosphere of the original.

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The Great Man

The Great Man by Al Morgan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read a Polish translation of the book, while reading I got memories from many years ago when I heard it as a radio play.
My memories were good and resulted in a positive rating - based on cold reasoning my rating would be lower..
The story - a very popular radio presenter dies, radio bosses are planning to deliver a new one. The book shows how cold and ruthless process it is.
Story is told from the position of a candidate to replace the star who died.
He investigates the career of his predecessor and learns many bad things about him and it looks that if he follows this career path, he will be the same.
On one hand I was bored a bit with the details of dependencies in radio business, on the other hand I liked author's writing style.

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