Maria Knodt

Dionne Searcey

In Pursuit Of Disobedient Women

The title already – it’s my favorite book title ever! Journalist Dionne Secrecy recounts her experience living in Dakar and covering West Africa as The New York Times bureau chief for the region. While she struggles to balance her career and family, navigating difficulties with her partner and her children, she encounters many inspiring and extraordinary women. For example, she tells us about her experience reporting about the schoolgirls and other survivors of Boko Haram. A book that gives an insight into a world and a job that many of us know little about!

“The hotel looked like all the other big hotels around here. It was trying hard to be five-star but was no match for the elements. One too many rainy seasons had dulled and dented its mirrored exterior. The heat seeped in from outside, overwhelming the air-conditioning. The lobby’s mahogany-looking floors were actually cheap linoleum that had bucked in the humidity. Mold crept along the edges of the walls.

It was early 2016, but the music blaring out of the speakers was a mix of Elton John and Billy Joel and Sting, an easy-listening soundtrack apparently meant to sooth the harsh realities behind the lobby’s glass doors.

I had been living in the region for only a few weeks when shipped out for one of my first assignments as West Africa bureau chief for The New York Times.

Fifteen hours of airplane and car rides later, I arrived in the muggy southern tip of Nigeria, deep in the country’s oil-rich Niger Delta, tucked right in the geographic middle of the continent’s armpit.

My plan was to talk to residents about the damage a group of militants had done as they blew up oil pipelines in a country that relied on oil proceeds to pay for almost everything in its budget.”