From left: Deputy Government Commissioner Alida Francis, Leontine Durby-ten Have, book author Marion Schroen and Rita Wilman.
From left: Author Marion Schroen signing a copy of her new book “Wandelen op Statia” for Deputy Government Commissioner Alida Francis as Leontine Durby-ten Have looked on.
Deputy Government Commissioner Alida Francis (extreme left) speaking at the book signing as author Marion Schroen (second left) and others in attendance listen.
ST. EUSTATIUS–Author Marion Schroen held a signing for her new book Wandelen op Statia on Sunday, March 7, at Mazinga on the Bay.
Schroen’s book gives a new and exciting take on Statia’s mostly forgotten history and wonderful sites. The book features many hard-to-reach locations on the island that can only be traversed via foot. Schroen originally came to the island to work with former Government Commissioner Marcolino “Mike” Franco’s administration, and she fell in love with the island and decided to stay and make it her home. Island Councilman Koos Sneek was also in attendance.
Family, friends and onlookers came out to the event to show their support to Schroen on the release of the Dutch version of her book. Another book signing event will be held in a couple of months when the English version will be ready. Deputy Government Commissioner Alida Francis, who wrote the foreword for the book, said when Schroen asked her to write the foreword for the book, she was experiencing the most difficult period in her life – managing an island while also managing a pandemic.
Francis said she was inspired by work and beautiful pictures and the experiences of Schroen and her friends: Leontine Durby-ten Have, Rita Wilman, Tony Durby, as well as Schroen’s husband. “I do not imagine you know what this book means to many people here on Statia, simply because you have exposed parts of Statia that most Statians have never seen. I really hope the everyone on Statia will embrace this book, by not just reading it, but that they would want to experience it by climbing those hills,” Francis said.
The deputy government commissioner said she will personally hike to many of the locations in the book because one of the things she loved the most was being able to see the beautiful stone walls, which are made up of rocks (boundaries) placed neatly on top of each other by human hands, hundreds of years ago, and are still very much intact.
While on her way to the event, she also saw some of the pictures that were taken of Schroen and her friends in the dive pools and it reminded the deputy government commissioner of when she was in the sixth grade, how her teacher Jan Smid would take the entire class on hikes. The class would always hike into the mountains and the hills. Every year when it was the teacher’s birthday, he would take the class to the hills so that the pupils could learn about old forts and how they were fortified.
Francis hoped that everyone would either get a book or give a copy as a gift so they would be able to learn about the wonderful and mostly undiscovered sights that can be found on the island. She wants everyone to know that the island has a writer living among them, she owns a home and she is not leaving. She congratulated Schroen on her book release.
Schroen explained that the idea for her book came when she took pictures and sent them to a few of her friends who commented on them. Schroen explained to her friends that the pictures were taken in Statia and they could not believe it. So, the writer decided that she wanted to share the knowledge of what Statia has to offer with more people.
While hiking in Boven, Schroen said that she learned that her friend Wilman’s great-grandmother Betsy Duinkerk was born there, and also that her grandmother Maryanna Duinkerk lived there. About a year ago, when Schroen came back to the island, she discovered that her new neighbour was Durby-ten Have. Schroen said that she tried to convince her to go hiking several times, but Durby-ten Have was not a fan of hiking. She begrudgingly agreed to go hiking with Schroen once, and fell in love with hiking.
Schroen said Durby-ten Have is a beautiful photographer and she helped her make the book even more appealing because of the pictures. Schroen thanked her for her friendship, and also for her photography. Durby-ten Have in turn thanked Schroen for showing her Statia.
Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/marion-schroen-holds-signing-for-book-wandelen-op-statia
Problem solver, confidential counselor and writer, that’s what she’s calling herself in het LinkedIn profile.
But since she lost her job one year ago.
This Schroen was secretary of the Royal Decoration Committee, one year ago.
In 2019, she was called advisor of the government.
In 2018 she was part of the landing party of the golpe d’estado of the dutch colonialists.
Before she has done jobs on Curaçao, St. Martin, in healthcare. Originally a midwife.
She’s from Limbabwe, which means unconditional obeying authorities.
When we read this article, it has become clear that one woman came to the island together with the dutch staatsgreep in 2018. She therefore is heavenly compromised and without clean hands towards this killing of our democracy. The second woman today forms part of this imposed un-democratic structure. She is the representative of the dutch colonial regime. Woman number 3 is the owner of this building and several other premises on the island. She welcomed the staatsgreep together with her dutch friends on the island. This group initiated the staatsgreep with the commission of so-called wise men.
And don’t let color fool you, there are always collaborators who do business with the enemy.
The location is of course the location where the ordinary people of Statia always come?
Not likely, it’s a building of one of the rich families of the island.
Here you’ll find only the rich and powerful, plus tourists.
Eiusdem generis incommoda.
The subtitle of the book is: “Geschoeid op Nederlandse leest”.
A remarkable sentence with a more than one signification.
‘Geschoeid’ means both ‘the making of shoes’ as ‘wearing shoes’, but also: ‘modeled to’.
And a ‘leest’ is a form or fitting around which the leather is formed for a shoe.
One could read this subtitle as: the writer is Dutch and therefore looks at things with her biased Dutch eyes.
But you could also understand that the writer looks at Statia as: formed and wrinkled in the way the Dutch like it. And that’s not particularly good for the Statians. But it resembles the result Leslie described in her book about Statia. Only they have a totally different opinion of what’s desirable.
Read for yourself and make your conclusions.
Nice book, good idea, excellent propaganda for the island.
Unfortunately all we see on the photos is the island elite.