absurdity adult adult-education adult-humor adulthood adventure africa african-safari airplanes american-culture american-expat american-expatriate american-humor american-literature anecdotes author autobiographical autobiography aviation belgium biographical biography boarding-school bravery british british-author british-empire british-literature childhood childhood-dreams childhood-memories colonialism comedic-storytelling comedic-timing comedic-writing comedy comedy-memoir comedy-of-errors comedy-writing coming-of-age communication courage creativity cultural cultural-commentary cultural-differences cultural-experiences cultural-misunderstandings cultural-observations culture culture-shock david-sedaris determination dreams dysfunctional-families dysfunctional-family east-africa education england entertaining entertainment escapades escape essay essay-collection essays expat expat-life expatriate experiences exploration family family-dynamics family-relationships fighter-pilot fighter-planes flying flying-ace foreign-language foreign-languages france french french-language friendship funny going-solo growing-up hilarious historical humor humor-writing humorist humorous humorous-essays humorous-memoir identity imagination immigrant-experience independence kenya language language-acquisition language-barrier language-barriers language-classes language-humor language-learning laugh-out-loud laughter learning learning-a-foreign-language learning-disabilities learning-french lgbtq+ life-experiences linguistic linguistic-misunderstandings linguistics london memoir memoirist memoirs middle-east military military-service misadventures mischief miscommunication misfit misunderstandings new-york-times-bestseller non-fiction nonfiction norway norwegian nostalgia observational-humor observations paris perseverance personal-essays personal-experiences personal-growth personal-narrative personal-stories pilot pilots planes raf relatable relationship relationships resilience roald-dahl royal-air-force safari sarcasm sarcastic satire satirical second-world-war sedaris-family self-deprecating self-deprecating-humor self-deprecation self-discovery self-expression self-improvement self-reflection social-commentary speech-therapy spy storytelling student sudan survival tanganyika tanzania teacher teacher-student-dynamics teaching travel triumph true-story unconventional war war-memoir war-stories wartime wartime-experiences wit witty witty-observations world-war-ii writer writing writing-style young-adult youth