View article

The trajectory of a person’s life is to some degree unfathomable, but notable experiences during the early years surely play some role in this trajectory. In my own case, being uprooted every three to four years and living in remote regions in diverse environments across the globe at a time when such transcontinental nomadism was a rarity no doubt had its effect. My father was a mining engineer who was open to new experiences and travel. His vocation offered opportunities for both. Before I was born, he and my mother had lived in small mining camps in British Guiana and Northeastern Ontario before moving to Southern Quebec where I was born. When I was three years old my father took up an offer by the American mining company he worked for to move to a small remote mining camp in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). And so began my own life of serial transplantation.