From Malawi to Vancouver: Two stories to inspire
Today’s column is about inspiration in unexpected places and from unexpected people.
This is about what we can learn from a boy in Malawi trying to survive a famine and a Vancouver woman in her 90s who defied everything we think we know about growing old.
So, first lesson: if you amble, mosey or meander, you may want to pick up the pace. Apparently, as you get older, the faster you walk, the longer you live. Oh, and always intuitively knowing the time, even when you don’t have a watch helps, too.
Olga Kotello did both these things.
She also smashed track and field records into her 90s. She did something else very rare: She got stronger as she got older. She could hurl that shot put further at 91 than she did at 90.
Olga died this summer, but not before she changed the life of freelance journalist Bruce Grierson.
In his book What Makes Olga Run? Grierson picks apart almost every aspect of the Canadian geriatric’s life — how much she exercises, how well she sleeps, what she eats, how she treats people — looking for the answer to the big question: Is her secret to a long, healthy, happy life something we can copy?
The answer is yes and no.
Grierson takes Olga to the top researchers on aging. They do tests, biopsies and brain scans, and they are shocked by what they find: Her brain and her muscles are in better shape than most middle- aged people.
Some of the biology is luck of the draw, but scientists are learning more about what Olga is doing right, and what that means for the rest of us.
The research compiled in this book is fascinating and reason enough to read it. Grierson offers it up in a compelling, and often funny, way.
But the real star is Olga.
And it’s not just about how much she exercises, and it is about far more than her positive attitude. Grierson gets Olga to open up about her beliefs, her values and her daily habits.
And you can’t help but compare that to your life and realize, on a profound level, there are things about your life you need to change.
Over in Malawi, William Kamkwamba knew he was the only one who could change his life.
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is a simple and sincere first-person story of a starving, uneducated farm boy determined to make his small corner of the world a better place.
When William was a young teenager in 2002, a devastating drought hit his country.
He captures the horror of watching your family starve. Of watching living corpses wander past your farm looking for anything to eat. Of the cholera that swept through his village.
Throughout this nightmare, school was not an option — his family couldn’t afford the tuition. So William went to the local library, which was filled with random books donated by westerners.
He taught himself English by reading about electricity, and that gave him an idea.
He spent months scrounging in the dump looking for parts to build a battery. He had to be innovative — finding new uses for bicycle spokes, old tubing and tractor parts.
And it worked.
He built the most haphazard-looking windmill you ever saw from scraps from the dump. That windmill powered his homemade battery. He brought electricity and eventually water to his farm, and his village.
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is a deeply intimate look at life during a famine.
As a young teenager, William may not have known or understood the political, cultural or economic currents affecting his people. But with the help of a journalist co-author, the reader does get a sense of the bigger picture as well.
Both books are fascinating reads for any age, but Olga’s story will likely resonate most strongly with those struggling to come to terms with the aging process as they reach the midpoint of their lives. William’s story is appropriate for all ages, and would be an eye-opening read for pre-teens and young teenagers.
