A Quest for New Dawn: A Memoir

(Paperback)

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In A Quest for New Dawn, Joe Ngatia gives the reader an intimate glimpse of his epic life journey. Through a rich and vivid narrative, we are compelled to contemplate life's most timeless and universal questions. The story begins in a remote village on the foothills of Mount Kenya. Towering mountains and pristine valleys surround this enchanting natural paradise. But it is also a pitiless world, where, in the words of Goethe, "life and freedom must be conquered anew each day" by all its inhabitants. This region has a dark past as it was the epicenter of the Mau Mau uprising against British colonial rule. Long after the end of the war of liberation, the invisible specter of imperial terror still casts a shadow of dread in the hearts of those who survived it. It is on the laps of these veterans that the author finds his first perch in life. We encounter a restless society, as it turns away from an ancient rhythm to the chaos of modernity. Nowhere is this change more acutely felt than on the brutal campuses of the nation's boarding schools; here, ambitious teenagers are ushered onto the path of intellectual curiosity while confronting momentous privations and challenges.
The most transformative event in the author's youth occurs at the age of seventeen when he meets Mormon missionaries. His conversion and devotion to this foreign and maligned religion set the stage for a moving psychological drama that takes centerstage during the next two decades. It is as a Mormon that he embarks on a grueling mission to convert "the gentiles" in his own country; he is inspired by its theology to seek an immigrant visa at the American Embassy in Nairobi where he is nearly annihilated by a terrorist's bomb in the process. He eventually moves to an alien landscape in the American West where his eyes are opened to the hidden history and unsavory secrets of his new faith. Accompanying this spiritual drama is an intense, and at times humorous, lived reality of a poor foreign student with an oversized ambition. His insatiable quest for meaning, more than his grit and wits, sees him through the long and fierce struggles that pave his path through college and medical training. After he is inducted into the specialty of anesthesiology, he discovers in its practices a power more potent than a magician's spell. In its craft, the curtain of consciousness is pulled back, exposing a magnificent hidden universe behind our eyeballs. Through the discerning gaze of his brilliant mind, we are exposed to the intricacies of the human condition in captivating and affecting details. In the end, we are at once awakened and liberated from a primal innocence. It is at this intersection of grace and terror that he finds a new dawn.

Author Bio

Dr. Joe Ngatia is an anesthesiologist who provides life-supporting care to patients undergoing minor and major surgeries. His breadth of clinical expertise ranges from newborn care to older patients undergoing complex surgeries. He was born and raised in a remote tribal village in the foothills of Mount Kenya. His extensive and unique life experiences include a childhood among the veterans of the Mau Mau uprising, a four-year stint in a tough all-boys boarding high school, and a two-year full-time service as a Mormon Missionary in East Africa. He received his associate's degree in pre-medicine from Ricks College in Idaho, a bachelor's degree in microbiology from Brigham Young University, and a medical doctorate from the University of Utah School of Medicine. He completed a surgical internship and anesthesiology residency at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida.