The Foreign Service Journal, November 2003

of this book. It is an excellent guide for Western families heading for South Asia, whether for a stay of several weeks or for a longer-term visit. The rich opportunities for travel with children are well illustrat- ed, and the questions and concerns of parents taking their families to distant cultural venues are sensitively addressed. The preparations, both material and otherwise, that wise parents make to ensure their children’s experience is the best possible are also revealed. Last, but by no means least, the author’s keen insight and exceptional prose make Family Travels in India a delight to read. Point IV: Memories of a Foreign Service Officer James O. Bleidner, Power of One Publishing, 2002, $24.95, paperback, 204 pages. James Bleidner joined the Foreign Service in 1956, after duty with an Air Force fighter squadron during World War II and several years managing a modern dairy farm for ARAMCO in Saudi Arabia. Bleidner, an agricultural scientist, recounts his experiences working to bring to fruition the “Point Four” vision of making the benefits of American science and industrial progress available to underdeveloped countries. His narrative takes us from an assignment with the then-International Cooperation Administration devel- oping a livestock-raising and meat producing complex in the Bolivian highlands, to a tour as acting chief of the Agriculture and Rural Development Division of USAID in Colombia, and on to Chile, Costa Rica, Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Sudan, and finally retirement in Florida. Insights into South American politics, traditions and problems of develop- ment are interspersed with family anecdotes and post- retirement adventures. The other half of this story can be found in Alligators On My Roof (Vintage Books, 2002), a memoir by Mr. Bleidner’s late wife Marjory that was featured in these pages last year. To purchase this book, contact the author by e-mail: bleijob@aol.com, or at 708 Leah Jean Lane, Winter Haven FL 33884-3198. Jungle Paths and Palace Treasures: An American Woman Encounters the Romance and Reality of India Mary Seniff Stickney, Writer’s Showcase, 2001, $18.95, paperback, 347 pages. When Mary Stickney’s agrono- mist husband was offered a Foreign Service position, they and their four children headed to India, at the beginning of that country’s “Green Revolution,” with great anticipa- tion. They found the adventure of a lifetime, told here in lively, highly readable detail. There were moments of despair, moments of joy and moments of terror. They traveled thousands of miles throughout the heart of India, sometimes on tracks so impassable they had to park the jeep and walk through the jungle. As they encountered this often-baffling land, they learned from their experiences and from the many individuals they came to know and love. This book will appeal to a wide audience, both young and old, travel-buff and armchair globetrotter. But it is a special treat for India hands, as agricultural engineer Donald James Minehart notes in his foreword: “Mary Stickney has taken the time to explore India in a manner that many of us old India hands can only admire. … You may not understand India when you’ve read the book, but you will understand why she was transfixed by the country and its people.” Diapers on a Dateline: The Adventures of a United Press Family in India During the 1950s Pegge Hlavacek, Writers Club Press, 2002, $23.95, paperback, 400 pages. In 1951, Pegge McKiernan was a young widow working as a vice consul in Lahore. Pegge’s first hus- band, a CIA agent, had been killed by Tibetan border guards three years earlier as he fled from the Chinese communist advance in Sinkiang, and her twin toddlers were back home with grandparents. That was when she met and, a year later, married John Hlavacek, United Press Bureau Chief for India and Pakistan. There her story begins. This book is not a story of India, so much as the F O C U S N O V E M B E R 2 0 0 3 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 23