By Mark Levison
The Levison Group
This column is about Africa, lawyers and the law of averages. Lawyers think we are pretty smart. That generally may be true, but smartness is an elusive thing. Are you smart if you anticipate your opponent’s argument and have a case ready to refute it (as opposing counsel did to me this morning)? Are you smart if you make a lot of money from your legal practice? Maybe you are smart if you know how to structure your life in a manner that results in you being happy? There are probably a lot of measures of “smart” and a question or two about its overall value.
Last month, I went on an East African safari. The trip was designed by me, and the tour group included a number of trial lawyers. I cautioned my fellow travelers to leave showy jewelry behind for several reasons. First, we were constantly moving from game park to game park, and it would have been easy to leave something on the night stand. Second, it didn’t make a lot of sense to increase the risk of criminal activity. Finally, it doesn’t feel right to look too rich in countries where most people look awfully poor.
My wife and I travel a fair amount and someday I will write a book about it. I might title the book, “Travels With A Non-Linear Thinker.” Lawyers, of course, are quite rational, and exposure to irrationality makes us itch. Before we left, Cheryl insisted we hide our jewelry. I have a small two-foot-by-two foot safe. It’s very heavy, but I suppose with considerable effort it could be picked up and carried away. The big safe is five-feet high and four-feet wide. We also have a wall safe. It’s very cool and old, although the fellow who put it in installed it so it protrudes four inches from the wall. He apparently had not mastered the concept of recessed wall safes hidden behind a framed picture of apples. At any rate, when we took off our wedding rings I presumed we would put them in the big safe. Cheryl was aghast at that thought. There was no way she was going to put anything of real value in our safes. She explained that if we got burglarized our safes would be the first place the thieves would look! Sometimes I can’t even speak after hearing her logic. She just seems to take my breath away.
Twenty-one people were in the group that was to head off to the so-called “Forbidden Continent.” A few weeks before departure date, there was a well-publicized terrorist bombing in the Westgate Shopping Mall in Nairobi. The first time I traveled to Nairobi, its population was 500,000. As one walked along the streets, everyone greeted each other with the salutation “Jambo” or “hello” in Swahili. American cities were far more dangerous than Nairobi. Since that time, there has been dramatic population growth in Nairobi, but the bombing and takeover of the Westgate Mall, had little to do with that problem. It was a terrorist attack from the Somali terrorist group al-Shabab. Dozens were killed and others taken hostage. It was purportedly in retaliation for Kenya sending its military into Somalia, which was reportedly in retaliation for al-Shabab’s kidnappings and raids. When only days before we were ready to embark, there were problems at another mall, two of the travelers pulled out. They were scared and maybe for good reason, but not me.
The thought of being terrorized by terrorists was too much for my macho trial lawyer self image. If the old Federal District Court judges that were serving their life appointments when I was a young lawyer didn’t terrify me, I certainly was not going to be cowed by a bunch of al Qaeda wannabees! Further, the appeal of East Africa, the animals, the landscape and the people, simply overrode any potential hesitation.
Once you are into East Africa, it is never forgotten. Most people go for the animals and then fall in love with the people. On our last night, eating dinner in one of our luxurious game park lodges, the wait staff came out dancing, singing African songs, and carrying a birthday cake for an African visitor at another table. After singing and dancing, someone at the birthday person’s table cut a large portion of the cake into small pieces and brought it to my group of 19. I couldn’t help thinking that the chances of Americans cutting up a birthday cake and bringing it to a bunch of complete strangers visiting America was not very likely. That simple gesture was a symbol of the friendliness of the East African people. I often say that when I am on the Savannah in East Africa, it feels like I am standing at the birthplace of man — because I am. One senses the heart of creation beating just below the red dirt. Somehow being in that environment seems to center even the most distracted among us.
Two of the lawyers on the trip were married to each other. When Wendy first suggested to Norm that they go to Africa, his response was “[R]eally, why should we do that when we have such a good zoo here in town?” Norm very quickly learned that when one is surrounded by the laws of the jungle — the circle of life — it is a different experience from seeing a lion pacing in a concrete cage. It changes you.
When I saw Norm after returning home, he told Cheryl and me, “[I]n the future, I am going to travel more and work less.” As hard as lawyers work, my wife works even harder. It worries me. There is something about the atmosphere of East Africa, however, that makes her relax. She is much more laid back post-East Africa, and she tells me it’s permanent. We’ll see. Even though visiting a country where travelers’ warnings had been issued didn’t really scare me, I don’t consider myself stupid. Since there had been several problems in malls, that was the one place I told myself I would not go — but then I left the battery charger to my video camera at home. The only place to buy one was in a fancy Nairobi mall. The rest of the travelers in my particular safari vehicle waited in the parking lot. I didn’t dawdle, I did keep an eye out, and before visiting the mall, I did a lawyer’s analysis of the situation.
It went something like this: the chances of a terrorist attack in this exact mall during the same twenty minutes I will be here is infinitesimal. If such an attack occurs, the chances of me being killed or taken hostage, as opposed to all of the other people in the mall, is even smaller. Finally, I thought to myself, if I am killed, I won’t remember anyway, and if I am taken hostage, although it will be a terrible experience, someday I can tell my grandkids about it. Finally, I concluded that the chances of me being hurt in an automobile accident while driving on the treacherous, third-world traffic roads of Nairobi were far greater than being harmed in the mall. It was a lawyer’s rational analysis of one of the most important laws of all — the law of averages. By the way, they didn’t have the battery charger I was looking for.
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Under Analysis is a nationally syndicated column of the Levison Group. Mark Levison is a member of the law firm Lashly & Baer. You can reach the Levison Group in care of this paper or by e-mail at comments@levisongroup.com.
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