A humorous memoir of a young life in colonial Africa, with occasional interludes of sombre reflection by this son of German Jewish refugees. Set in Rhodesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, the author allows us a glimpse of his idiosyncratic family, the oddities of a vibrant Jewish community in the heart of Africa, schooling clothed with the trappings of Empire, holidays in apartheid South Africa and doomed attempts at athletic prowess.