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From: DEBESSAY GABRIEL (gdebessay@msn.com)
Date: Sat Mar 06 2010 - 11:51:31 EST
Once the information is out & available on Eritrean websites, I am sure that Eritreans will act & rise to the challenge. So here is the history of our RAILWAY for us to keep, cherish, appreciate & always remember those heroes who sacrificed their lives to build the foundations of our bright future.
This portion is an extract from Google:
Tuesday, 15 December 2009 03:59 AI Staff
Red Sea Railway is the first complete and authoritative history of the railways in Eritrea. The detailed account has been a collaboration between Jennie Street, a writer long involved with Eritrea, and Amanuel Ghebreselassie, the General Manager of the Eritrean Railway.
Its account covers the line built in 1868 by the British for the Abyssinia Campaign, the line built by the Italians in their quest to conquer Africa, several Decauville lines, and the Ropeway built in the 1930s as the longest cableway in the world.
10 years in preparation, Red Sea Railway is packed with a wealth of previously unpublished material, and will delight and fascinate the reader.
With 374 pages and 385 photographs, 19 maps and 73 images, this book will have something new or different for everyone who reads it. Many of the photographs are hitherto unpublished.
The historical scope of the book means that the earliest photos date from 1868. Much previously undiscovered archive material has been included and there will be a few surprises and at least one myth destroyed.
The book also contains an extensive bibliography for further research.
For more information and to order the book, which can only be ordered through the website, go to www.redsearailway.co.uk
From: jennie@hadish.f9.co.uk
To: gdebessay@msn.com
Subject: Re: RED SEA RAILWAY
Date: Sat, 27 Feb 2010 17:16:47 +0000
Hello Debessay
How lovely to get such a speedy reply from you and to hear of your rail journeys in various places. You are well travelled. And I am very interested to hear that your son is an engineer on the Virginia Railway Express.
I have had email from another Eritrean who works in a locomotive repair shop in Canada, so you can imagine he too was delighted to learn about the book. I am making a whole network of new Eritrean contacts since RED SEA RAILWAY has been published.
How did you learn about the book?
Thanks you for saying you'll spread the word about RED SEA RAILWAY and if you are so minded to print out some leaflets that I have attached here, I would be very grateful. There are two files as one is the back and the other the front of the leaflet, and two to an A4 sheet, for economy! You could take them if you go to Eritrean gatherings or churches etc.
But please don't feel obliged to - I just want to give Eritreans the opportunity at least to know about the book and have some interesting insights into an important aspect of their country's economic and social history.
With best wishes to you and your family
Jennie
From: jennie@hadish.f9.co.uk
To: gdebessay@msn.com
Subject: RED SEA RAILWAY
Date: Fri, 26 Feb 2010 22:46:17 +0000
Hello Debessay
Many thanks for your paypal payment for RED SEA RAILWAY which we received yesterday. We have sold more than we expected so are having more printed at present, which should be ready next week. As soon as they are off the presses I will send you a signed copy.
However, though we have sold many, you are only the third Eritrean to have bought RED SEA RAILWAY which I think is because Eritreans are not big book buyers and they would see this as expensive. However, as you can imagine, having taken 10 years to write and having published it ourselves, it has cost us a great deal in time and money which we will never recuperate. I have basically done it for the love of Eritrea.
If you are interested to read a bit more about the writing of it before the book arrives, you can see what the local paper in Sheffield wrote (with a few inaccuracies, but that's only to be expected from a newspaper e.g. I did not work or live in Eritrea before Liberation, only visited the liberated areas in 1988!) about it yesterday on this link:
http://www.sheffieldtelegraph.co.uk/headlines/Jennie-reaches-destination-after-epic.6103470.jp
I wonder if you are old enough to have remembered the railway working when you were younger? A lot of older Eritreans have great memories of the line, and some of these are in the book, as I have a whole chapter devoted to the railway workers, both past and present. It includes a photo from 1949 of a large group of men standing on a loco during the 1949 Railway Strike. If you have any memories, I would be pleased to hear of them.
I hope you enjoy the book.
With best wishes
Jennie Street
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