Nouh Samy Samy من عند Govindanur, Tamil Nadu 642005، الهند من عند Govindanur, Tamil Nadu 642005، الهند

I'm not sure if this book made me want to do humanitarian work in the field more, or less. But the personal experiences of some of the most horrifying humanitarian crises of the 1990s were interesting and moving and for those who already have a good dose of UN-related cynicism this is a well-rounded picture of the people doing those jobs and the political constraints they face. But mostly it's just a series of great vignettes with some surprisingly good writing.

I haven't read many biographies. I checked this out because our library had it (I'm checking out every single book published by Deseret Book- I need all the LDS stuff I can get!) Anyway, this particular biography is about Henry Eyring, President Henry B. Eyring's father. I really enjoyed this book. It took me a lot longer than most fiction books, but that's because I had to actually think about what was happeneing- not a bad thing in my mind. Being a math mind, all the chemistry and physics talk interested me, but reading about Henry's life and how he viewed the world- well, it left me feeling like I could do much, much better myself. The chapters on his life paradoxes were particularly interesting to me; he seemed to have the key to understanding anything. He tried as hard as he could to learn everything possible but still accepted that there were things he would never learn in this life. He believed that science and religion work together, rather than providing opposing views (which is how I felt, especially in biology with the whole evolution thing). And he was funny- multiple times I caught myself laughing out loud at something he would say. I also enjoyed reading about his ancestors, mostly because I'm a sucker for pioneer stories, and also because Henry was born in an LDS community where some of my great's were raised (I wonder if they knew each other?!?) There were many parts that left me uplifted, but this story most of all (Henry B. Eyring has actually used this in a recent Conference talk): "Dad was the senior high councilor in his stake, and he had the responsibility for the welfare farm. An assignment was given to weed a field of onions, so Dad assigned himself to go work on the farm. He never told me how hard it was, but I have met several people who were with him that day. I talked to one of them on the phone, and he said … that the pain was so great that Dad was pulling himself along on his stomach with his elbows. He couldn’t kneel. The pain was too great for him to kneel. Everyone who has talked to me about that day has remarked how Dad smiled and laughed and talked happily with them as they worked in that field of onions. "Now, this is the joke Dad told me on himself afterward. He said he was there at the end of the day. After all the work was finished and the onions were all weeded, someone said to him, “Henry, good heavens! You didn’t pull those weeds, did you? Those weeds were sprayed two days ago, and they were going to die anyway.” "Dad just roared. He thought that was the funniest thing. He though it was a great joke on himself. He had worked through the day on the wrong weeds. They had been sprayed and would have died anyway. "When Dad told me this story, I knew how tough it was. So I asked him, 'Dad, how could you make a joke out of that? How could you take it so pleasantly?' He said something to me that I will never forget, and I hope you won’t. He said, 'Hal, I wasn’t there for the weeds.'" 303 pages, 2009 total: 7021