The long and the short of it in Africa

As late as the 1920s, it was believed that Africa’s tropical sun would boil a European’s brains. ‘The direct ray of the sun – almost vertical at all seasons of the year – strikes down on man and beast alike,’ Churchill had written on his visit to East Africa. ‘Woe to the white man whom he finds uncovered!’ When my father first arrived in Tanganyika he was advised to go about in a spine pad and solar topee, which he swiftly discarded. He wore a khaki drill bush shirt and shorts as long and baggy as spinnakers. In old age his face, neck, arms and legs were very dark brown, but his torso remained a much paler colour.

As a boy I also went about in khaki shorts, made by the Indian tailors in old Malindi town. All the white boys like me wore shorts, which made sense in the heat.