A blessed daughter

Someone once said that I write the way I speak. It stayed with me and made me think if I was wrong in writing the way I speak or was it a more effective way of transforming what I was thinking into text without the cumbersome process of writing it all down on paper and editing it again and again until I was satisfied with what I wrote. I chose the direct method, so I started to use the keyboard to turn my thinking into a text. It suited me because my brain was telling me what to write quickly and be done with it.

This was long before I had ever written anything worthwhile except my dissertation, which was more of a scientific nature where I could not write in a freewheeling way because it required a protocol to follow. I did take some liberty in writing the introduction part of it, so probably that triggered the comment someone made, but this freewheeling idea stayed with me for a long time until I went to work in Burundi.

There I lived alone and had a computer that allowed me to write in my own fashion. No one saw me writing except my dog I called Jumbo, who looked at me from time to time, but I doubt if he was interested in what I wrote. His interest was more limited to food and chasing the village chickens on his short legs. He was a dachshund. The year was 1990 when I started on a whim to write about my life and all the experiences I got working in many countries, but I had no idea what to do with my story once it was finished.

Let us say that it started because I had very few people visiting me so being alone was one reason why I took up the task. There was no one to disturb me or make comments on what I wrote, so I continued day after day to pour out what was in my mind, which was quite a lot of information that had accumulated there since my childhood.

Once I finished, I got it printed in my printer and carried the voluminous story to India where no one was interested in reading it so it just stayed in a folder.

My next assignment was in Sudan where also I stayed alone but had no jumbo to give me company and I did not have a computer at home so I wrote nothing and got busy with my job as a Project manager of a large project spread out in many parts of the country. I observed the people in Burundi and Sudan, their culture and their social issues, so I added it to my story later.

By this time I had lived and worked in over 8 countries as an agronomist in various agricultural projects, so I wrote about all the countries where I worked, but I had to start somewhere so I started in India where I was born and grew up.

Then my fate or destiny brought me to the Philippines where I came on a scholarship to study and found my wife, got married and had our son born in a small provincial town. I was offered a job in Mali after my graduation, but first we went to India where our beautiful daughter was born, so we took our two small kids to Mali where they grew up for a while.

I then worked in Haiti, Burundi and Sudan, but I started working first in Vietnam and then USA where I went for graduate studies and then to Algeria and the Philippines. The printed story stayed with me while I added more chapters to it about all the countries where I worked.

In 1994, I felt that living alone in Africa was not worth it, so abruptly I ended my professional career and returned to the Philippines to start building a new home in a small town and to reunite my family under one roof.

I bought a computer and one day sat down at the keyboard because my mind was full of ideas and issues I wanted to write about so took up blog writing to publish them in various platforms and in many languages. This was some 9 years ago. I also finalized my biography and published it in 6 languages. Now I was happy because writing was a way for me to express myself and share it with my numerous readers. People like me who lived alone or have very few friends choose this method to communicate with unknown people all over the world. Their wonderful comments lift my spirit and encourage me to write more on many issues.

Then suddenly an idea started to gain a foothold in my mind. What if my writings could be uploaded to the Amazon KDP program and publish them as e-books? Amazon reaches all parts of the world, so it can reach many more readers.

This is where came in our beautiful daughter, who is an IT expert and well-trained to handle this job. She took over the job of getting thousands of pages ready in a form that Amazon could approve for publication. I was very happy to see how deftly she handled the job and spent countless hours to do it.

To prepare the manuscripts of 30 volumes in a particular format is no joke. I helped from here as much as I could do, but I am no IT expert like our daughter. She is our blessing who is helping me to complete this massive task. She is redefining the meaning of legacy in the form of the e-book publication that will endure long after I fade into oblivion.

My life has been an exciting journey full of adventure and some dangerous experiences in some countries that I have shared with my readers. My long journey in life has literally come to an end, but I was a happy wanderer who learned a lot about many things that I want to share with you, my readers. It makes me happy to think that all I have written will stay long after I become dust. That is a priceless gift our daughter has given me. What more could I ask ?

I want you to know that 4 books containing my blogs have been published by Amazon as e-book that anyone can download and read them in Kindle, so that is good news. In the future there will be more books that our daughter is working on to make them up loadable to the Kindle Direct Publishing. My biography in 6 languages will be a major part of the publication. If you are interested in reading my e-books, then just type Anil the bard series on Amazon and download them. At present, they are available in English, but other languages will hopefully be added to it in the future. So happy reading.

Anil the bard.

These are the four e-books available in Amazon now. The 5th book will be available in the future. It is named Grit and glory.