Electric Trees

Some ten years after a 30-year brutal civil war, a foreign developer set up jointly with the Angolan government, rural agro-industrial settlements that were designed not only to instill the spirit of collaboration between waring factions, but also to show that it is possible to offer meaningful aid not based on charity but on the attempt to create thriving communities. The authors were part of team that installed these settlements and during their years there kept both a visual record and written records of their daily experiences. Rather than set it down in documentary form, they collated the stories, sometimes conflating events and characters, to make a truly readable factual account couched in literary terms. The photographs, were all taken during those years, and not only are they fascinating in their own right, they are also unique in that they show a vista of rural Africa over a lengthy period that most people have rare access to. Angola is a land of contrasts: equal to its turbulent history of Portuguese colonization and a civil war that spanned three decades are the richness and diversity of its landscapes and its people. Now, with the war behind it, Angola and its people are reawakening. From 2002 onwards, Jenny and Eran Gal-Or formed part of a team setting up new rural settlements around the small town of Waku Kungo deep in Angola's interior. In this book they reflect on and bear witness to the country's defiant revival in the form of 27 personal essays and a collection of nearly 70 photographs. Learned, incisive, and humane, the authors never lose eye contact with their readership, presenting an unparalleled picture of contemporary Angola.