<P> Throughout his childhood and adolescent years, Dahl spent the majority of his summer holidays with his mother's family in Norway . He wrote about many happy memories from those visits in Boy: Tales of Childhood, such as when he replaced the tobacco in his half--sister's fiancé's pipe with goat droppings . He noted only one unhappy memory of his holidays in Norway: at around the age of eight, he had to have his adenoids removed by a doctor . His childhood and first job selling kerosene in Midsomer Norton and surrounding villages in Somerset are subjects in Boy: Tales of Childhood . </P> <P> After finishing his schooling, in August 1934 Dahl crossed the Atlantic on the RMS Nova Scotia and hiked through Newfoundland with the Public Schools Exploring Society . </P> <P> In July 1934, Dahl joined the Shell Petroleum Company . Following two years of training in the United Kingdom, he was assigned first to Mombasa, Kenya, then to Dar - es - Salaam, Tanganyika (now Tanzania). Along with the only two other Shell employees in the entire territory, he lived in luxury in the Shell House outside Dar es Salaam, with a cook and personal servants . While out on assignments supplying oil to customers across Tanganyika, he encountered black mambas and lions, among other wildlife . </P> <P> In August 1939, as the Second World War loomed, the British made plans to round up the hundreds of Germans living in Dar - es - Salaam . Dahl was commissioned as a lieutenant into the King's African Rifles, commanding a platoon of Askari men, indigenous troops who were serving in the colonial army . </P>

Author born 1916 he wrote in an unexpected kind of way