{"id":5943,"date":"2026-02-07T19:29:19","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T19:29:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/?post_type=product&p=5943"},"modified":"2026-02-07T23:00:58","modified_gmt":"2026-02-07T23:00:58","slug":"penguin-the-boy-who-harnessed-the-wind-young-readers-edition","status":"publish","type":"product","link":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/product\/penguin-the-boy-who-harnessed-the-wind-young-readers-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"PENGUIN The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind: Young Readers Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n

\"<\/h3>\n
\n
\n

<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n
\n

\"<\/p>\n

<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n
\n

\"<\/p>\n

<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Product description<\/h2>\n
\n
\n

Review<\/h3>\n
“[An] inspiring story of curiosity and ingenuity.” \u2015 Publishers Weekly<\/span><\/p>\n

“This book will appeal to adults eager to impart an uplifting Third World human-interest story, but it is also sure to resonate with children who will simply love the curiosity, resilience and resourcefulness of this doughty African youth.” \u2015 Wall Street Journal<\/span><\/p>\n

“A powerful, gorgeously illustrated children’s picture book.” \u2015 The Boston Globe<\/span><\/p>\n

“This is a dynamic portrait of a young person whose connection to the land, concern for his community, and drive to solve problems offer an inspiring model.” \u2015 School Library Journal<\/span><\/p>\n

“Zunon illustrates handsomely, with contrasting cut-paper-collage details and broad, sere landscapes painted in visibly textured oils.” \u2015 Kirkus<\/span><\/p>\n

“This picture book in accessible free verse will draw kids who love to construct their own engineering gadgets.” \u2015 Booklist<\/span><\/p>\n

Cooperative Children\u2019s Book Center\u2019s 2013 Best-of-the-year list. \u2015 CCBC<\/span><\/div>\n

About the Author<\/h3>\n
William Kamkwamba recently graduated from Dartmouth College. The original version of his memoir The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind<\/span> was a New York Times<\/span> Bestseller and a Publishers Weekly<\/span> Best Book of the Year. He divides his time between Malawi and San Francisco, California.<\/p>\n

Bryan\u00a0Mealer\u00a0is the author of Muck City<\/span> and the New York Times<\/span> bestseller The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind<\/span>, which he wrote with William Kamkwamba. Since publication, the book has received many honors and has been translated into over a dozen languages.\u00a0Mealer\u00a0is also the author of All Things Must Fight to Live<\/span>, which chronicled his years covering the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo for Harper’s<\/span> and the Associated Press. His forthcoming book, The Kings of Big Spring<\/span>, a multi-generational saga about his family in West Texas, will be published by Flatiron Books in early 2018. He and his family live in Austin.<\/div>\n

\n

Excerpt. \u00a9 Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.<\/h3>\n
\n

PROLOGUE<\/p>\n

The machine was ready. After so many months of preparation, the work was finally complete: The motor and blades were bolted and secured, the chain was taut and heavy with grease, and the tower stood steady on its legs. The muscles in my back and arms had grown as hard as green fruit from all the pulling and lifting. And although I\u2019d barely slept the night before, I\u2019d never felt so awake. My invention was complete. It appeared exactly as I\u2019d seen it in my dreams.<\/p>\n

News of my work had spread far and wide, and now people began to arrive. The traders in the market had watched it rise from a distance and they\u2019d closed up their shops, while the truck drivers left their vehicles on the road. They\u2019d crossed the valley toward my home, and now they gathered under the machine, looking up in wonder. I recognized their faces. These same men had teased me from the beginning, and still they whispered, even laughed.<\/p>\n

Let them, <\/span>I thought. It was time.<\/p>\n

I pulled myself onto the tower\u2019s first rung and began to climb. The soft wood groaned under my weight as I reached the top, where I stood level with my creation. Its steel bones were welded and bent, and its plastic arms were blackened from fire.<\/p>\n

I admired its other pieces: the bottle-cap washers, rusted tractor parts, and the old bicycle frame. Each one told its own story of discovery. Each piece had been lost and then found in a time of fear and hunger and pain. Together now, we were all being reborn.<\/p>\n

In one hand I clutched a small reed that held a tiny lightbulb. I now connected it to a pair of wires that dangled from the machine, then prepared for the final step. Down below, the crowd cackled like hens.<\/p>\n

\u201cQuiet, everyone,\u201d someone said. \u201cLet\u2019s see how crazy this boy really is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just then a strong gust of wind whistled through the rungs and pushed me into the tower. Reaching over, I unlocked the machine\u2019s spinning wheel and watched it begin to turn. Slowly at first, then faster and faster, until the whole tower rocked back and forth. My knees turned to jelly, but I held on.<\/p>\n

I pleaded in silence: Don\u2019t let me down.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then I gripped the reed and wires and waited for the miracle of electricity. Finally, it came, a tiny flicker in my palm, and then a magnificent glow. The crowd gasped, and the children pushed for a better look.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s true!\u201d someone said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes,\u201d said another. \u201cThe boy has done it. He has made electric wind!\u201d<\/p>\n

CHAPTER ONE<\/p>\n

My name is William Kamkwamba, and to understand the story I\u2019m about to tell, you must first understand the country that raised me. Malawi is a tiny nation in southeastern Africa. On a map, it appears like a flatworm burrowing its way through Zambia, Mozambique, and Tanzania, looking for a little room. Malawi is often called \u201cThe Warm Heart of Africa,\u201d which says nothing about its location, but everything about the people who call it home. The Kamkwambas hail from the center of the country, from a tiny village called Masitala, located on the outskirts of the town of Wimbe.<\/p>\n

You might be wondering what an African village looks like. Well, ours consists of about ten houses, each one made of mud bricks and painted white. For most of my life, our roofs were made from long grasses that we picked near the swamps, or dambos<\/span> in our Chichewa language. The grasses kept us cool in the hot months, but during the cold nights of winter, the frost crept into our bones and we slept under an extra pile of blankets.<\/p>\n

Every house in Masitala belongs to my large extended family of aunts and uncles and cousins. In our house, there was me, my mother and father, and my six sisters, along with some goats and guinea fowl, and a few chickens.<\/p>\n

When people hear I\u2019m the only boy among six girls, they often say, \u201cEh,<\/span> bambo<\/span>\u201d\u2015which is like saying \u201cHey, man\u201d\u2015\u201cso sorry for you!\u201d And it\u2019s true. The downside to having only sisters is that I often got bullied in school since I had no older brothers to protect me. And my sisters were always messing with my things\u2015especially my tools and inventions\u2015giving me no privacy.<\/p>\n

Whenever I asked my parents, \u201cWhy do we have so many girls in the first place?\u201d I always got the same answer: \u201cBecause the baby store was all out of boys.\u201d But as you\u2019ll see in this story, my sisters are actually pretty great. And when you live on a farm, you need all of the help you can get.<\/p>\n

My family grew maize, which is another word for white corn. In our language, we lovingly referred to it as chimanga<\/span>. And growing chimanga<\/span> required all hands. Every planting season, my sisters and I would wake up before dawn to hoe the weeds, dig our careful rows, then push the seeds gently into the soft soil. When it came time to harvest, we were busy again.<\/p>\n

Most families in Malawi are farmers. We live our entire lives out in the countryside, far away from cities, where we can tend our fields and raise our animals. Where we live, there are no computers or video games, very few televisions, and for most of my life, we didn\u2019t have electricity\u2015just oil lamps that spewed smoke and coated our lungs with soot.<\/p>\n

Farmers here have always been poor, and not many can afford an education. Seeing a doctor is also difficult, since most of us don\u2019t own cars. From the time we\u2019re born, we\u2019re given a life with very few options. Because of this poverty and lack of knowledge, Malawians found help wherever we could.<\/p>\n

Many of us turned to magic\u2015which is how my story begins.<\/p>\n

You see, before I discovered the miracles of science, I believed that magic ruled the world. Not magician magic, like pulling rabbits out of hats or sawing ladies in half, the sort of thing you see on television. It was an invisible kind of magic, one that surrounded us like the air we breathe.<\/p>\n

In Malawi, magic came in many forms\u2015the most common being the witch doctor whom we called sing\u2019anga<\/span>. The wizards were mysterious people. Some appeared in public, usually in the market on Sundays, sitting on blankets spread with bones, spices, and powders that claimed to cure everything from dandruff to cancer. Poor people walked many miles to visit these men, since they didn\u2019t have money for real doctors. This led to problems, especially if a person was truly sick.<\/p>\n

Take diarrhea, for example. Diarrhea is a common ailment in the countryside that comes from drinking dirty water, and if left untreated, it can lead to dehydration. Every year, too many children die from something that\u2019s easily cured by a regimen of fluids and simple antibiotics. But without money or faith in modern medicine, the villager takes his chances with the sing\u2019anga<\/span>\u2019s crude diagnosis:<\/p>\n

\u201cOh, I know what\u2019s wrong,\u201d the wizard says. \u201cYou have a snail.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA snail?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m almost positive. We must remove it at once!\u201d<\/p>\n

The wizard goes into his bag of roots, powders, and bones, and pulls out a lightbulb.<\/p>\n

\u201cLift up your shirt,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Without plugging the bulb into anything, he moves it slowly across the person\u2019s stomach, as if to illuminate something only he can detect.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere it is! Can you see the snail moving?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh yes, I think I can see it. Yes, there it is!\u201d<\/p>\n

The wizard returns to his bag for some magic potion, which he splashes across the belly.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll better?\u201d he asks.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, I think the snail is gone. I don\u2019t feel it moving.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGood. That will be three thousand kwacha.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a little extra money, the sing\u2019anga<\/span> can cast curses on your enemies\u2015to deliver floods to their fields, hyenas to their chicken house, or terror and tragedy into their homes. This is what happened to me when I was six years old\u2015or at least I thought it did.<\/p>\n

I was playing in front of my house when a group of boys walked past carrying a giant sack. They worked for a nearby farmer tending his cows. That morning, as they were moving the herd from one pasture to another, they discovered the sack lying on the road. Looking inside, they saw that it was filled with bubble gum. Can you imagine such a treasure? I can\u2019t begin to tell you how much I loved bubble gum!<\/p>\n

Now, as they walked past, one of them spotted me playing in a puddle.<\/p>\n

\u201cShould we give some to this boy?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t move or say a word. A bit of mud dripped from my hair.<\/p>\n

\u201cEh<\/span>, why not,\u201d his friend said. \u201cHe looks kind of pathetic.\u201d<\/p>\n

The boy reached into his bag and produced a rainbow of gumballs\u2015one of every color\u2015and dropped them into my hands. By the time the boys disappeared, I\u2019d shoved every one into my mouth. The sweet juices dribbled down my chin and stained my shirt.<\/p>\n

Little did I know, but the bubble gum belonged to a local trader, who stopped by our house the next day. He told my father how the bag had dropped from his bicycle as he was leaving the market. By the time he circled back to look for it, the bag was gone. The people in the next village told him about the herd of boys. Now he wanted revenge.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve gone to see the sing\u2019anga<\/span>,\u201d he told my father. \u201cAnd whoever ate that bubble gum will be sorry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Suddenly I was terrified. I\u2019d heard what the sing\u2019anga<\/span> could do to a person. In addition to delivering death and disease, the wizards controlled armies of witches who could kidnap me during the night and shrink me into a worm! I\u2019d even heard about them turning children into stones, leaving them to suffer an eternity in silence.<\/p>\n

Already, I could feel the sing\u2019anga<\/span> watching me, plotting his evil. With my heart racing, I ran into the forest behind my house to try to escape, but it was no use. I felt the strange warmth of his magic eye shining through the trees. He had me. At any moment, I would emerge from the forest as a beetle, or a trembling mouse to be eaten by the hawks. Knowing my time was short, I hurried home to where my father was plucking a pile of maize and tumbled into his lap.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was me!\u201d I shouted, tears running down my cheeks. \u201cI ate the stolen gum. I don\u2019t want to die, Papa. Please don\u2019t let them take me.\u201d<\/p>\n

My father looked at me for a second and shook his head. \u201cIt was you, eh<\/span>?\u201d he said, then kind of smiled.<\/p>\n

Didn\u2019t he realize I was in trouble?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWell,\u201d he said, and his knees popped as he rose from his chair. My father was a big man. \u201cDon\u2019t worry, William. I\u2019ll find the trader and explain. I\u2019m sure we can work something out.\u201d<\/p>\n

That afternoon, my father walked five miles to the trader\u2019s house and told him what had happened. And even though I\u2019d only eaten a few of the gumballs, he paid the man for the entire bag, which was nearly all the money we possessed. That evening after supper, my life having been saved, I asked my father if he truly believed I was in trouble. He became very serious.<\/p>\n

\u201cOh yes, we were just in time,\u201d he said, then started laughing so hard his chair began to squeak. \u201cWilliam, who knows what was in store for you?<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

My fear of wizards and magic only grew worse whenever Grandpa told stories. If you saw my grandpa, you might think he was a kind of wizard himself. He was so old that he couldn\u2019t remember the year he\u2019d been born. So cracked and wrinkled that his hands and feet looked as if they were chiseled from stone. And his clothes! Grandpa insisted on wearing the same tattered coat and trousers every day. Whenever he emerged from the forest, puffing on his hand-rolled cigar, you\u2019d think one of the trees had grown legs and started walking.<\/p>\n

It was Grandpa who told me the greatest story about magic I\u2019d ever heard. Long ago, before the giant maize and tobacco farms came along and cleared away our great forests, when a person could lose track of the sun inside the trees, the land was rich with antelope, zebra, and wildebeest\u2015also lions, hippos, and leopards. Grandpa was a famous hunter, so good with his bow and arrow that it became his duty to protect his village and provide its meat.<\/p>\n

One day while Grandpa was out hunting, he came across a man who\u2019d been killed by a poisonous pit viper. He alerted the nearest village, and soon after, they returned with their witch doctor.<\/p>\n

The sing\u2019anga<\/span> took one look at the dead man, then reached into his bag and tossed some medicines into the trees. Seconds later, the earth began to move as hundreds of vipers slithered out of the shadows and gathered around the corpse, hypnotized by the spell. The wizard then stood on the dead man\u2019s chest and drank a cup of potion, which seemed to flow through his feet and into the lifeless body. Then, to Grandpa\u2019s amazement, the dead man\u2019s fingers began to move and he sat up. Together, he and the wizard inspected the fangs of each snake, looking for the one that had bitten him.<\/p>\n

\u201cBelieve it,\u201d Grandpa told me. \u201cI saw this with my own eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n

I certainly believed it, along with every other story about witches and things unexplained. Whenever I went down the dark trails alone, my imagination spun wild.<\/p>\n

What scared me most were the Gule Wamkulu,<\/span> the magical dancers that lived in the murky shadows of the forest. They sometimes appeared in the daylight, performing in tribal ceremonies when we Chewa boys became men. They were not real people, we were told, but spirits of our dead ancestors sent to roam the earth. Their appearance was ghastly: Each had the face and skin of animals and some walked on stilts to appear taller. Once, I saw one scurry backward up a pole like a spider. And when they danced, it was as if one thousand men were inside their bodies, each moving in the opposite direction.<\/p>\n

When the Gule Wamkulu<\/span> weren\u2019t performing, they traveled the forests and dambos<\/span> looking for young boys to take back to the graveyards. What happened to you there, I never wanted to know. Whenever I saw one, even at a ceremony, I dropped everything and ran. Once, when I was very young, a magic dancer suddenly appeared in our courtyard. His head was wrapped in a flour sack, but underneath was the long nose of an elephant and a gaping hole for a mouth. My mother and father were in the fields, so my sisters and I ran for the bush, where we watched the dancer snatch our favorite chicken.<\/p>\n

Unlike the Gule Wamkulu<\/span> or sing\u2019anga<\/span> in the market, most witches and wizards never revealed their identity. In the places where they practiced their magic, mystery abounded like strange weather. In the nearby town of Ntchisi, men with bald heads, standing as tall as trees, walked the roads at night. Ghost trucks traveled back and forth, approaching fast with their headlights flashing and engines revving loud. Yet when the lights finally passed, there was no truck attached. In one of the neighboring villages, I heard about a man who\u2019d been shrunk so small by a wizard that his wife kept him in a Coke bottle.<\/p>\n

In addition to casting spells for curses, the sing\u2019anga<\/span> often battled one another. At night, they piled aboard their planes and prowled the skies, looking for children to kidnap as soldiers. The witch planes could be anything: a wooden bowl, a broom, a simple hat. And each was capable of traveling great distances\u2015Malawi to New York, for example\u2015in a single minute. Children were used as guinea pigs and sent to test the powers of rival wizards. Other nights, they\u2019d visit camps of other witch children for games of mystical soccer, where the balls were human heads stolen from people as they slept.<\/p>\n

Lying in bed at night, I would become so frightened thinking about these things that I\u2019d cry out for my father.<\/p>\n

\u201cPapa!\u201d I\u2019d shout, summoning him to my door. \u201cI can\u2019t sleep. I\u2019m afraid.\u201d<\/p>\n

My father had no place for magic in his life. To me, this made him seem even stronger. As a devout Presbyterian, he believed that God\u2015not juju\u2015was his best protection.<\/p>\n

\u201cRespect the wizards,\u201d he would tell me, straightening my bedcovers. \u201cBut remember, William, with God on your side, they have no power against you.\u201d<\/p>\n

I trusted my father, but as I got older, I began to wonder how his explanation accounted for Chuck Norris, Terminator, and Rambo\u2015who arrived at the Wimbe trading center one summer and caused all kinds of ruckus.<\/p>\n

These men appeared in action movies that played in the local \u201cvideo show\u201d\u2015which was really just a mud hut with benches, a television, and a VCR. At night, wonderful and mysterious things happened there, but since I wasn\u2019t allowed out after dark, I never saw any of them. Instead, I had to hear stories the next morning from friends whose parents weren\u2019t so strict.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast night I watched the best of all movies,\u201d said my friend Peter. \u201cRambo jumped from the top of the mountain and was still firing his gun when he landed at the bottom. Everyone in front of him died and the entire mountain exploded.\u201d He pretended to clutch a machine gun and fire in all directions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen will they start showing these films during the day?\u201d I said. \u201cI never get to see anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

The night The<\/span> Terminator<\/span> came to the video show, it was simply shocking. When Peter found me the next morning, he was still in a state.<\/p>\n

\u201cWilliam, I just don\u2019t understand this movie. This man was shot left, right, and center, and yet he still managed to live. I\u2019m telling you, this Terminator must be the greatest wizard ever<\/span>.\u201d<\/p>\n

It sounded fantastic. \u201cDo you think the Americans have such magic?\u201d I asked. \u201cI don\u2019t believe it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is what I saw,\u201d Peter said. \u201cI\u2019m telling you it\u2019s true.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although years would pass before I saw any of these films, they began influencing our games at home. One was a shooting game that I played with my cousin Geoffrey, using toy guns we made from a mpoloni<\/span> bush. Finding a straight branch, we removed its core, like taking out the insides of a ballpoint pen, and used it as a ramrod to fire paper spitballs.<\/p>\n

I was the captain of one team, and Geoffrey was the captain of the other. Along with our cousins, we formed squads and hunted one another between the houses in our village.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou go left, and I\u2019ll go right!\u201d I instructed my soldiers one afternoon, then crawled on hands and knees through the red dirt. My poor mother was constantly scrubbing our clothes.<\/p>\n

Right away I spotted Geoffrey\u2019s trousers from around the corner of the house. Slowly, without spooking the chickens, I snuck up behind for an easy ambush.<\/p>\n

\u201cTonga!<\/span>\u201d I shouted, then jammed the ramrod, sending a shower of slime into his face.<\/p>\n

He clutched his heart and fell to the ground. \u201cEh, mayo ine<\/span>!\u201d he gasped. \u201cYou got me.\u201d<\/p>\n

We were a solid gang of three: me, Geoffrey, and our friend Gilbert. Gilbert\u2019s father was the chief of our whole Wimbe district, a man whom everyone called Chief Wimbe, even though his real name was Albert. When Geoffrey and I got bored with playing our games in the courtyard, we often headed to Gilbert\u2019s.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s see how many chickens we can count,\u201d I said, taking off down the path.<\/p>\n

Going over to Gilbert\u2019s house was always fun, since the chief\u2019s work was never finished. As usual, we found a long line of truck drivers, farmers, traders, and market women, all waiting to voice their concerns. As we suspected, many of them carried a chicken under their arm\u2015a gift for their chief.<\/p>\n

\u201cI counted ten,\u201d Geoffrey whispered.<\/p>\n

\u201cYah,<\/span>\u201d I said. \u201cMust be lots of problems today.\u201d<\/p>\n

The chief\u2019s messenger and bodyguard, Mister Ngwata, stood at the door in his short pants and army boots, dressed as a police officer. It was Mister Ngwata\u2019s job to protect the chief and filter all of his visitors. He was also the chicken collector.<\/p>\n

\u201cCome, come,\u201d he said, and motioned us inside.<\/p>\n

The chief sat on the sofa in the living room, dressed in a crisp shirt and nice trousers. Chiefs usually dressed like business people, never in feathers and animal skins. That\u2019s in the movies. Another thing about Chief Wimbe was that he loved his cat, which was black and white but had no name. In Malawi, only dogs are given names, I don\u2019t know why.<\/p>\n

We found Gilbert in his room singing to the radio. Gilbert had the most beautiful voice and dreamed of becoming a famous singer. My voice sounded like one of the guinea fowl that screeched in our trees as it pooped, but I never let that stop me from singing.<\/p>\n

\u201cGilbert, bo<\/span>!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBo!<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSharp?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSharp!\u201d<\/p>\n

That was our slang we used every time we saw one another. The word bo<\/span> was short for bonjour<\/span>, started by some chaps who were learning French in school and wanting to show off. (It means hello in that language.) I don\u2019t know where sharp<\/span> came from, but it was like saying, \u201cAre you cool?\u201d If we were feeling really good, we went a bit further:<\/p>\n

\u201cSure?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSure!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFit?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFit!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEhhhh<\/span>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s go to the trading center,\u201d I said. \u201cI bet there\u2019s a mountain of treasure outside Ofesi.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ofesi Boozing Centre was the local bar in Wimbe. Its most popular drink was Shake Shake, a kind of beer made from corn that was sold in cardboard cartons. I wasn\u2019t allowed inside Ofesi, but I\u2019m guessing they didn\u2019t have a garbage can, because every night the men tossed their empty cartons into the road. Gilbert, Geoffrey, and I liked to collect them. After we washed the cartons out with water, they made the perfect toy trucks.<\/p>\n

Even though we lived in a small village in Africa, we did many of the same things kids do all over the world; we just used different materials. After talking with friends I met in America, I know this is true. Children everywhere have similar ways of playing with one another. And if you look at it this way, the world isn\u2019t such a big place.<\/p>\n

My friends and I loved trucks. It didn\u2019t matter what kind. We loved the four-ton dump trucks that rumbled out of the big farms, kicking up dust. We loved the small pickups that took passengers from Wimbe to Kasungu, the nearest city. We loved them all, and each week, we\u2019d compete to see who could build the best one. I know that in America, you can buy toy trucks already assembled in a store. In Malawi, we built ours from Shake Shake cartons and pieces of wire. To us, they were just as beautiful.<\/p>\n

The axles were sections of wire we bought by picking mangoes. And for the wheels, we used bottle caps. Even better were the plastic caps from our mothers\u2019 containers of cooking oil, which lasted much longer. And if we took our fathers\u2019 razor blades, we could cut designs in the wheels to give each truck its own unique treading. That way, the tracks in the dirt told us if the truck belonged to Kamkwamba Toyota, for instance, or to Gilbert Company LTD.<\/p>\n

We also built our own monster wagons, called chigiriri<\/span>, that looked like American go-carts. We made the frames from thick tree branches, careful to find ones with giant knots or a fork that could be used as a seat. We then dug up large tuber roots called kaumbu<\/span> that looked like mutant sweet potatoes, and shaped them into wheels. The axles were poles carved from a blue-gum tree.<\/p>\n

After everything was assembled, we tied it all together with vines and hoped it didn\u2019t fall apart. To make the car move, one person pulled with a long rope while the driver steered with his feet. With two cars side by side, we held derbies through the trading center.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s race!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor sure!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLast one to reach the barber shop will go blind!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGO!\u201d<\/p>\n

After the race, if we had some money in our pockets, we\u2019d stop by Mister Banda\u2019s shop for a cold bottle of Fanta and some Dandy Sweets. Mister Banda ran the Malawian version of a convenience store. On his shelves were packages of margarine and powdered milk, since most people didn\u2019t have refrigerators at home to keep milk cold. He also sold aspirin, cough drops, lotions, bars of Lifebuoy soap, and on the very bottom shelf\u2015Drew\u2019s liver salts. I have no idea what liver salts were used for, but I\u2019m certain they tasted rotten.<\/p>\n

Whenever we entered, Mister Banda greeted us in our usual Malawian custom.<\/p>\n

\u201cMuli bwanji<\/span>,\u201d he said. How are you?<\/p>\n

\u201cNdiri bwino. Kaya inu<\/span>,\u201d we answered. I\u2019m fine. How \u2019bout you?<\/p>\n

\u201cNdiri bwino. Zikomo<\/span>.\u201d I\u2019m fine. Thanks for asking.<\/p>\n

After that, it was more of the same stuff:<\/p>\n

\u201cYou boys keeping out of trouble?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYah.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHelping your mother and father at home?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYah.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWell, give them my greetings.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

If we were really hungry, we combined our money and headed to the kanyenya<\/span> stand, which was like a Malawian fast-food restaurant. It was really just a vat of boiling grease over a fire, but the fried goat meat and potatoes they served were heavenly.<\/p>\n

The man tending the fire would grunt and say, \u201cHow much?\u201d and we would answer \u201cFive kwacha\u201d or however much money we had. Five kwacha was less than one American dollar. The man then turned around and cut a few chunks of meat from a goat hanging from a rail. He dropped the meat into the boiling oil, followed by a handful of sliced potatoes. When everything floated to the top, he served it on a wooden counter, along with a pile of salt for dipping.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour mother is a good cook,\u201d Gilbert told me once. \u201cBut not as good as this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYah.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

My parents wanted me home before dark, but that was my favorite time of day anyway. It was when my father and Uncle John\u2015Geoffrey\u2019s father\u2015finished their work in the maize fields and came home for supper. In the kitchen, my older sister Annie helped my mother prepare the food. Since we had no electricity, we still cooked everything over a fire. As Annie fed sticks into the flames, my mother stirred a pot of something delicious, letting the smells escape into the courtyard. Since I was a growing boy, it was hard for me to wait\u2015even if I\u2019d just eaten kanyenya<\/span> in the trading center. With my stomach growling, I\u2019d stand in the doorway begging.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust a few more minutes,\u201d my mother would say. \u201cBy the time you wash your hands and face, it will be ready.\u201d<\/p>\n

Usually before supper, my cousins gathered in the courtyard and played soccer. Since we had no money for a real ball, we made our own using plastic shopping bags (that we called jumbos<\/span>) wadded together and tied with rope. They didn\u2019t have the same kind of bounce as a real soccer ball, but they still allowed us to play. All across Africa, children use the same jumbo<\/span> balls.<\/p>\n

If it was the rainy season, when the mangoes were ripe, we filled our pails from the neighbors\u2019 trees and ate them for dessert. We bit into the juicy fruit and let the sweet syrup run down our fingers. If there wasn\u2019t any moonlight for playing soccer, my father gathered all the children\u2015cousins and all\u2015in the living room, lit a kerosene lamp, and told us folktales.<\/p>\n

\u201cBe still and hush up,\u201d he would say. \u201cNow, have I told you the story about the leopard and the lion?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTell it again, Papa!\u201d<\/p>\n

Sometimes my father forgot the stories and made up new ones as he went along, creating new characters and outrageous endings. And while we loved hearing these tales, the truth was that real life was sometimes difficult to distinguish from fantasy.<\/p>\n

During the times of year when we planted and harvested our maize, two jobs that required lots of work, my father and Uncle John hired someone to help them. The most famous of these workers was Mister Phiri, a man of incredible power. In fact, whenever John and my father needed to clear a new field for planting, they didn\u2019t even bother with tractors. Instead they sent Phiri, who yanked entire trees out of the ground as if they were weeds.<\/p>\n

Everyone knew that Phiri\u2019s secret was mangolomera, <\/span>a kind of magic that delivered superhuman strength. Only the strongest wizards in Malawi could give you this potion, which came in a paste made from the bones of leopards and lions. To get the strength, the wizard cut your skin with special razor blades and rubbed the medicine into your blood. Once part of you, it never left. In fact, the magic only became stronger with time. Only the toughest men like Phiri could live with it inside them.<\/p>\n

Phiri was so strong that no person or animal could beat him. Once while working in the fields, a deadly black mamba slithered over his foot and prepared to strike. But Phiri wasn\u2019t afraid. He reached down and whipped the mamba with a blade of grass, leaving it paralyzed. Then he grabbed it by the head and tossed it all the way to Mozambique. People said he carried another mamba in his pocket for good luck, and that snake was too afraid to bite him.<\/p>\n

By the time I was eight or nine years old, the thought of mangolomera<\/span> seemed more and more attractive. You see, I was very small, and this led to constant trouble with bullies at school. The worst was named Limbikani, who was tall and muscular and had older brothers at home, which made him even more ruthless.<\/p>\n

For some reason, Limbikani liked to pick on me and Gilbert. One day on our way to school, he waited for us on the road and jumped out from a grove of trees.<\/p>\n

\u201cOh look, it\u2019s William and his friend Little Chief Wimbe.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLeave us alone,\u201d I shouted, but my voice cracked and gave me away.<\/p>\n

Limbikani put his chest in Gilbert\u2019s face.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere\u2019s the big chief, monkey boy? Looks like he\u2019s not here to protect you.\u201d<\/p>\n

He grabbed the backs of our shirts and dangled us in the air like two sad puppies. Then he stole our lunch. This happened again and again.<\/p>\n

Not only did my size leave me defenseless against bullies, it also haunted me on the soccer field. I loved soccer more than anything, and each week I\u2019d glue myself to Radio One for Malawi Super League action. My favorite team was the Nomads, whose star player was Bob \u201cThe Savior\u201d Mpinganjira. The Savior got his nickname one Christmas Eve when he saved us from defeat against Big Bullets, and I can\u2019t tell you how much I hated Big Bullets.<\/p>\n

Despite my size, I longed to be a player as worthy as my heroes. Whenever all of us boys gathered for practice and drills, I was some kind of star\u2015in my own mind.<\/p>\n

Oh, how I would shine\u2015zigzagging between defenders and firing the ball at missile speed.<\/p>\n

Then one day I was displaying my various skills when Geoffrey and some others called out to me, \u201cHey, Kayira, give us the ball!\u201d<\/p>\n

Kayira, as in Peter Kayira.<\/p>\n

Despite my love for the Nomads, my greatest hero in all the universe was indeed Peter Kayira\u2015the best player for the Flames, our national team\u2015and to me, a man even greater than the president. To be called Kayira was no small thing. I couldn\u2019t stop smiling.<\/p>\n

Soon everyone on the practice pitch was calling me Kayira. Even when I went to the trading center, I was greeted with shouts and praise:<\/p>\n

\u201cHey, Kayira, I heard you play like a lion!\u201d<\/p>\n

But when it was time to pick the teams for competition, the captains somehow skipped over me. Thinking this was a serious mistake on their part, I pointed it out, only to be told to sit on the bench. How could this be?<\/span><\/p>\n

Well, I thought, the captains are clever fellows. Perhaps they\u2019re saving me from injury, keeping me as a secret weapon for the finals. This made me feel even more special. But while I sat on the sidelines, the other players ran past me and yelled, \u201cKeep the bench warm, Kayira!\u201d or \u201cKayira, we\u2019ll be needing you soon . . . as the bolela<\/span>.\u201d A bolela<\/span> was a ball fetcher.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/i>Read more<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\n
\n
Now a Netflix film starring and directed by Chiwetel Ejiofor, this is a gripping memoir of survival and perseverance about the heroic young inventor who brought electricity to his Malawian village.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":5944,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"product_brand":[],"product_cat":[341,640,642,641],"product_tag":[],"class_list":["post-5943","product","type-product","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","product_cat-books","product_cat-childrens-books","product_cat-explore-the-world","product_cat-geography-cultures","first","instock","sale","shipping-taxable","purchasable","product-type-simple"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product\/5943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/product"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5943"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5944"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"product_brand","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_brand?post=5943"},{"taxonomy":"product_cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_cat?post=5943"},{"taxonomy":"product_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/electronify.ae\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_tag?post=5943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}