2008-07-04Staff Report 2 "Afiah //Gowases, Sybille van Wyk, Matthew //Gowaseb Published by Legacy Publications, ISBN 978 99945 -68 - 24 - 6 ONCE upon a time, long, long ago there were two pretty and clever young maidens called Afiah and Sybille. They lived in a beautiful country called Namibia They also lived at a time when the gods of laziness ruled the world and people did not read very much because there was so much else to do which needed less effort and the two young girls called upon the wizards of the deserts and the skies to make the people read again. The grand wizard, Matthew, heard their cries and he gave them a long story which they had to make look good and interesting for those who did not read regularly - or at all - and would get tired very quickly with lots and lots of words, especially the big words that only a true wizard or young maiden could pronounce as they were so powerful. The two young maidens were visited in their dreams by the good fairy, Olga, who told them exactly what to do with the story and this is how the tale of the first diamond came to be passed on the printers wand from there to the people passing them on to all the children of the land against a small token. The results of this cooperation landed on my desk last week. The Story of the First Diamond (found in Namibia) is written by two Grade 5 teenagers: Sybille van Wyk and Afiah //Gowases, and is based upon ""Diamonds in the Desert"" by Olga Levinson. The original tale is most interesting, but if you thought that the new book is equally demanding, you are wrong. Afiah and Sybille have put together the bare outlines of the fascinating story of diamonds. If you read it to your children or read by yourself and want to know more, the two authors will have achieved more than their goal. Their little tale is the skeleton of the history of diamonds in Namibia. The more you read, the more you fill out the skeleton until you get to where it begins to have a persona of its own, including the part where in 1883, Adolf Luederitz, a merchant from Bremen, bought the bay from the Nama chief Joseph Fredericks from Bethanie. The selling price amounted to 10?" 2008-07-04Staff Report 2
