World Traveler Donna Gottardi at Moorestown Library Aug. 10

My favorite thing is to go where I've never been. -- Diane Arbus

All summer long, readers have been exploring the world through books in the Moorestown Library’s Novel Destinations Summer Reading Program. On Wednesday, Aug. 10, join us for an evening with Donna Gottardi, a local author who has traveled throughout the world, living in remote regions and immersing herself in a variety of cultures. Her memoir Raining Cats and Rats recounts her adventures in Chinese Siberia.

Currently a professor of sociology, Donna’s curiosity about the world began as a student at Rutgers University. During her studies, she conducted archaeological and ethnographic research in Chile and Portugal. After graduation, she spent a year teaching English in Manta, Ecuador, before returning to pursue a master’s degree in education from the University of Pennsylvania. Her continued passion for the cultures of Latin America led her to rural Guatemala, where she worked as a translator for a maternal health hospital, helping to deliver babies and learning about the social and cultural issues surrounding indigenous women’s health. In the Latin American region, Donna has also traveled in Mexico, Costa Rica, Belize and Columbia.

Donna has also traveled solo through Turkey, Vietnam and India, where she spent most of 2002. The people, places, history and gastronomy of the diverse cultures of India made a particularly strong impression on her, and it remains one of her favorite places on earth.  

After answering an online ad, Donna suddenly found herself at the head of a classroom in the remote village of Fu Yuan on the Chinese-Russian border, 10,000 miles from her home in South Jersey, and not knowing a word of Chinese. Raining Cats and Rats recounts her experiences as the first-ever Westerner hired by the Chinese Bureau of Education to train English teachers in Chinese Siberia.

Please join us Wednesday, Aug. 10 at 7 p.m. to find out more about how Donna came to navigate the cultural maze of everyday life in rural China and to hear more fascinating stories from her travels all over the world.

Copies of Raining Cats and Rats: Lessons and Life in Chinese Siberia, will be available for purchase.