By Chris Shott
THE ERICKSON TRIBUNE
To Verena Rybicki, Brooksby Village is merely the latest stop on a lifelong odyssey that has carried her to virtually every corner of the world.
A native of Great Britain who spent a large chunk of her youth in India and who has lived in the U.S. for more than 50 years, Rybicki possesses a tart wit and keen insight into human nature, sprinkled with a healthy dose of self-confidence.
“Mercifully, I have had since shortly after birth a sense of humor,” Rybicki says in a smooth British accent. “I don’t do boring.” But Rybicki does many other things and does them well. The 2002 author of a book about quilting, she recently published the reflections of her father, Dr. William Stanley Morgan, Amchi Sahib: A British Doctor in Tibet, 1936-37.
The book details the hardships and travails of Morgan while stationed in pre-World War II Tibet as a member of Great Britain’s Indian Medical Service (IMS), but also the affection and respect he developed for its inhabitants. Morgan compiled his memoirs during the course of many years after World War II, but never published them prior to his death in 1977.
The task of organizing and editing Morgan’s ruminations fell on the shoulders of Rybicki and her husband George, who inherited Morgan’s work but did little with it until moving to Brooksby in 2004.
“George and I were working and raising a family, so we didn’t have much time to devote to the book,” Rybicki says. “It wasn’t until we moved to Brooksby that we were able to organize the manuscript.”
During the ensuing 30 months, the Rybickis extensively edited Morgan’s work to a finished product encompassing 216 pages. They also edited numerous photographs taken while Morgan worked in Tibet, several pages of which are included in the book.
“My father had written multiple drafts of some chapters, so we had to go through everything and make changes,” Rybicki says. “It took a great deal of time and work to produce the final draft.