Charlotte Stryker

Yet another country heard from in a Dad, Mother and family report -- this time it is Java and Dad's determination to produce and process tapioca for his glue company back in Pennsylvania. Trekking out in 1927, getting a glimpse of the life in Batavia, and finding out what it was really like on a jungle clearing (when finally Dad had been permitted to rent (not buy) the land he wanted), the Strykers learned the hard way that American way was not the Javanese -- but once taught settled in to enjoy the new type of living. The diet of rice, the slow movement, the primitive and alien world came to life for them as decorum superceded hurry and noise, and waste and ugliness no longer harried them. Dad did build an inn, a railroad, a factory, but he had no control over the weather, the Javanese response to electricity, the telephone, the movies, the celebrations for each completed project (and the beginning of the next). But through a combination of customary lay-off and weather (although the product was unsurpassed) the undertaking had to be abandoned -- and the family left to take up the white man's burden unhappily. Not quaint or cute, but colorful and interesting, this juxtaposes two cultures in warm and amusing terms.… (meer)