THE CRAZY..

What do you do when you feel the blue haze of panic rising up to meet you with arms stretched wide, ready to drag you into the void? Hmm, what do you do, indeed!

Over the last few weeks things in Zim have been progressively unravelling – the Unity Government is not looking quite as united as it could be, farm invasions have recommenced and bodies are turning up.. having perished from slightly more than natural causes…. With all this resumed activity I have to admit to being somewhat anxious about my parents well being. Which brings us to why I was teetering on the edge of the void..

I haven’t spoken to my folks for a few weeks (no major panic there as my sister chatted to them last week) but I thought I would check in on Monday.. Tuesday.. Wednesday – by now I was desperately dialling.. nothing, nothing, nothing. No ringing, no dial tone just a disembowelled voice advising that the ‘line is unavailable at the moment’. At this stage I am almost obsessively calling; mom, dad, dad, mom - over and over, just on the off chance that I might get through, frustratingly, still nothing.

I could feel my grip on reason slipping and panic blooming in its place, time to control The Crazy! Unfortunately once the door to Crazy has been opened it is considerably harder to shut. It feels as though you have been torn in two, with your neurotic self throwing up awful questions, whilst your saner, lucid self sits back unsure how best to proceed.

So Mom & Dad, feel free to call your youngest, most recently married daughter - as she is only just in control of The Crazy!! – love you xx.

ET .. CALL HOME

On Saturday night I dreamt my dad had Alzheimer’s and he could only remember the part of his life prior to my birth. I frantically begged him not to forget me for how could I live knowing that my dad had no knowledge of me? I woke up distressed with tears rolling down my cheeks and a desperate desire to call home.

I have mentioned before the problems with communication to Zimbabwe .. mostly that there is no communication with Zimbabwe. All day Sunday I tried to call home and was amazed that I was getting the ringing tone, first time on each call – unfortunately no one was answering. (This always gets me a bit edgy as law & order is not a top priority).

This morning I got into the office and there was an e-mail from my mom. Dad has malaria and has been unwell all weekend but is doing much better today.

Sometimes you just know to call home.

Thinking of you dad - xxx

OBSESSIVE COMPULSIVE.. ME?

OCD.. the minute I hear of someone with obsessive compulsive disorder I imagine them washing and ringing their hands, muttering under their breath “out, out damn spot” - in a ‘Lady MacBeth’ manner.

With this in mind Americo thinks that I suffer from a mild form of OCD. I have all kinds of quirks that simultaneously amuse and amaze him.

For instance, I cannot go to bed with the cupboard doors open. One Christmas, when I was about 6 one of my cousins told us that open cupboards are the porthole to the ‘otherworld’. Under the cover of night, when little girls are fast asleep, the restless dead make their way into the living world.. and once there TERRORIZE those that were so careless.

As if that wasn’t bloody bad enough just after he had scared the wits out of all of us we had a slight earth tremor. Lights flickered, bunkbeds shook – needless to say it was a moment I have never forgotten. To this day I will get up out of bed, if Americo has left the doors open, and shut them!

By the way, congratulations to me – due to my sterling efforts last night I am now the proud owner of the Wifely Championship Cup…. How did I win this I hear you ask? Well, last night I got home, oiled the deck, did washing and managed to prepare dinner all in time for the starving trooper to arrive home at 9pm!

Instead of a cup I have requested diamonds … as we all know nothing says thank you quite like something sparkly!!!

PS:- I have added below a little picture I received from Zimbabwe - I am not sure how recent it is though...

Homesick

Tonight I am feeling incredibly homesick. Who would have thought that after being away for so long I can still feel it so intensely?

When Americo and I got married his company very kindly gave us a digital photo frame. Until this weekend we had not so much as taken it out of it's box. I am not sure what inspired him, but on Saturday afternoon Americo sat and downloaded photos onto it. Below is the reason for my melancholy mood!

Sunset over Lake Kariba

Dawn on Kariba















HOME!















Leopard Rock - Vumba

INVASIONS .. AGAIN!

Last night I received a call from my cousin whose mother’s farm has been invaded… again. My aunt no longer lives on the farm but rents it out to a young family. Anyhow I don’t know the full details, or whether anyone was hurt, but hearing these things starts an immediate chain reaction.

I call Americo to top up our phone card and desperately try to reach my parents. They only have mobile phones and signal in Zim is erratic, at the best of times. It takes about 30 minutes of continuous redialling to eventually, possibly, MAYBE get a ringing tone.

These calls of potential threats to family and friends happen often. I have learnt to control my urge to panic and realise that the chances are my parents will be okay… eventually I will manage to get through. That is the logical side of my brain, but a little voice whispers.. ‘yes, but what if this time it’s different?’

This week Zimbabwean’s had so much hope for our country. Yes Mugabe is still the figurehead but change is coming our way. I wish I could say that my voice joined those of the true optimistic, but it did not. I have watched Zimbabwe flounder and fail so many times, had my hopes dashed and watched my parents struggle in a doomed economy.

Now just as there is a resurgence of hope what happens? Well the ‘war veterans’ have been advised that they have carte blanch to re-invade land, even those properties returned via court order. The story has it that this spate of lawlessness includes an expiry date of 21st February 2009 – ironically Mr M’s B.day celebrations are on this day.

It makes you wonder what little bobby dazzler he has up his sleeve? Rumours are rife that the ‘high chief’ will be retiring after his b.day. We shall see, we shall see.

In the meantime it looks as though things for Mr Tsvangirai will be off to burning start..

FINDING HOME

Last night Americo and I sat down to the news and watched the devastation the fires in Australia have caused. There are some amazing stories of heroism and awful tales of loss. Our thoughts go out to the Australians at this time.

Actually our thoughts have been on Australia a lot recently. We are debating the pro’s and con’s of shifting to the other side of the universe. This is a topic that has had much mileage in our household. As much as I love my life here, in London, I really love the sun more!! In an ideal world we would be going home. Sadly though there is now no home to go to. We are of the lost Zimbabwean generation – two of millions that left always expecting to go back, only to find that there is nothing to go back too. And so we must find ourselves a new heritage.

Our search has been extensive, including a little sojourn into Mozambique. It was a fated trip from the beginning…

We had borrowed my sister in law’s car for the journey from Nelspruit to Maputo. The night before we were due to leave the mechanism for the automatic window broke so we sealed it in the ‘up right position’. Off we set in the sweltering December heat with our unopening driver’s side window for the border of South Africa & Mozambique. How to explain the border control…. Basically I sat in a delightfully air conditioned room, handed my passport over to some fellow who, for a small fee, got it stamped and cleared ready for entry into Moz – all this done without me once setting foot into the customs office. In any other country this would SO not be permitted but hey! Onwards to Maputo…

As I mentioned the window on Americo’s side of the car was sealed shut so every toll we came to he basically had to open the door, undo his seatbelt, step out of the car and hand over the cash. A long and drawn out process that, when you are stopped at roadblocks manned by police carrying AK47’s, becomes somewhat life threatening. I feel I should mention here that while some nations excel in sports, cultural diversity and so on Mozambique has taken corruption and honed it into a fine art form. The police are so crooked they make a zig zag look straight. In fact, I wonder how any illegal activity ends with a prison sentence as I feel that moral standards are left to the highest bidder!

So saying, YES we did get stopped by the police and YES we did have to pay a ‘fee’. Actually we were stopped by the police numerous times all desperately seeking something, anything.. At our last road block finding that there was nothing to hold us for, (we having become quite savvy) the copper requested that we drive to the nearest supermarket and grab him a drink – all that thirsty work! Thus we ended our trip to Moz

Once safely back on South African soil we were chatting to a bloke who contracts in Moz for a large company. He was very sympathetic about our bribery problems saying..

“If I had known you were going I would have given you my card”.

“Card?” asks Americo

“Ja man, the company pays a ‘donation’ annually to the police force, show them the card and no problems”.

Anyway we decided that Mozambique was not for us. It is fine for a holiday far, far away from civilisation, in the middle of the bush, but not for us who stupidly believe the police should be of some assistance!!

So we look to Australia and carry on hoping for Zimbabwe.

In the News today!

Markets fell again today amongst more uncertainty in the banking community. Watching the chaos with the banks is like a virtual rollercoaster ride, yesterday up today down - I am curious to see what tomorrow will bring….

For once there is some good news in Zimbabwe, the ‘government’ has seen the light and are allowing businesses and people to trade with forex. For years the government has been losing out on taxes – how can you tax a bartering system? Well you cannot! There is no way to document getting your house painted or roof repaired for the other party to service your car in return. Mugabe & his fighters fought the Rhodesians so ‘his people could be free’ but who is there now to save the Zimbabweans from Mugabe?

With the whole world in various stages of turmoil and the first world countries needing to keep their resources close to home what happens with regards to aid? Historically these countries have been the first to step up offering assistance to the poorer nations in times of need. However, everyone is in need at the moment. Europe & America cannot, in good conscience send money out when they will be having issues of their own. With this in mind I wonder if it will incentivise the African communities to pull together and feed their starving?

Either way I view aid as a catch 22 – the more it is given to Africa (for example) the less likely Africa is ever going to be able to stand up and be counted. There is no reason for such a rich continent to be reliant on anyone else.