Global: A Traveler's Tales

by Jeanne D'Brant

The uniformed soldier raised his gun in her direction, bayonet fixed….. so begin the journeys of a budding anthropologist on a mission to document the vanishing cultures of a different world. Young, blonde, American, she sets out on public transportation to cross Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and beyond, across the Dasht-i-Kavir, the edge of the Registan, and the Tenezrouft. This is the story of women; of the dark-eyed desert daughter filling her water jars at the Euphrates, of the veiled women of Afghanistan following silently behind their husband, and the sister wives under the burqa, subject to public assault by sons whose descendants became the Taliban. Nomad women blaze brightly in their spangled red dresses and jewelry, their faces speaking of Genghis Khan and lost empires. This is also a tale of the regal ranis of India, with their painted foreheads and hennaed feet. The alpha females of international fight school at JFK airport get to decide which candidates will gain their wings to an open world. It is a love story of Afghanistan, and the ancient Silk Road citadel of Herat, where bells ring, echoing off the mountains, while white horses with red tasseled manes pull silken carriages along the broad avenues. It seems that everyone sleeps out under the heavens in Qandahar, where the natural rhythms of the earth settle like a mantle under a vast and starry sky. There are the stories of men, the rugged overlanders accompanying a single woman through the perils of misogyny, attempted rape, and a sandstorms raining scorpions like hailstones from hell. It’s a tale of Pushtun warriors happily extending Islamic hospitality to foreigners and gentle Afghani merchants with storerooms stacked floor-to-ceiling with hashish. There are the dastardly attractive journalists and photographers, and darkly handsome Afghan males roaming the bazaars, regal in their robes. Could a western woman entertain a casual dalliance and walk away? Airline pilots hot rod across African skies, free of the interference of control towers as an epic romance sweeps her away under an October moon. Crossing the Sahara to fly the Hajj, the great Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, the flight crew is the first plane in to rescue thousands stranded in Nigeria. As the moon waxes full and time is running out, the Hajjis greet the aircraft’s arrival as a seething mass of humanity, intent on hijack. Global is a sweeping account of a unique time in history and herstory, told in the distinctive voice of a trained social scientist whose adventures vividly chronicle coming of age in the remote corners of the world.

196 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 29, 2021

Reviews

[Kim]

I loved this book so interesting really kept my attention, it was inspiring to hear about a women who is adventurous and took so many chances to follow her dreams of traveling through the middle east on her own a very brave female. It was a easy and compelling read. I look forward to more of her writings