Zimbabwe Absurdity

Monday is Heroes Day in Zimbabwe, a national holiday. According to the letter I was hand delivered to my office earlier this week  “Once again it is the time for us to celebrate the day when we remember Zimbabwe’s heroes.

These men and women who did not only contribute to the total political liberation of out country, but guided and contributed to the Zimbabwe we now live in. (Do I detect a trace of irony here?) Others had dreams, which have to be fulfilled.” I am really clueless as to the meaning of the last sentence.

Yes, once again, ZANU-PF was on the scrounge and once again they were trying to gain a veneer of respectability by using the owner of Eskbank Farm to write the letter. He even had the cheek to start off “Dear Friends and Comrades”. Get it right mate, I am neither of those.  He had even “…set three million ($3 000 000-00) as minimum contribution per farmer”.  This so that “In view of the above current hard times…” they could have a party. Forgive me for being slow but why don’t they just stand on a street corner and shake a donation tin? Then on Thursday the local ZANU-PF representative called by “just to see if I’d come to any decision” regarding the donation. When I said that I could not see why I was being asked to contribute to the ZANU-PF coffers he very quickly said no, ZANU-PF was just organizing the party and donations were not at all compulsory. Well thank goodness for that. Then he received a call on his cell phone and walked out. Yesterday I did not spend too much time around the office as “…pledges and donations..” had to be in “..by 10/08/2007 at Eskbank Farm (Deadline for contributions 10-08-2007)”. I guess not everyone can be trusted to recognize the official date format. I showed the letter to the others who have businesses on the premises and it generated little enthusiasm.

This morning I went past a small orphanage not far from here that I support with vegetable seedlings. There are about 11 children there, not all are orphans, some are from abusive homes and are in foster care, others abandoned by parents leaving the country or unable to support them. Most are pre-teens and all colours are catered for. The cat is also a stray and because there was no cat food it was being fed milk and bread. Cats are obligate carnivores so although I am not a cat person I dropped off some pets’ mince for it. We also had a great time sieving sand for the fish tank that unknowingly had been filled with gravel from a lithium ore!

Like most underprivileged children the kids there are very easy to entertain though I must add that they are well cared for. The couple running the setup where hoping to retire but got caught up in looking after these needy children.  They get by entirely on donations from various organizations and individuals and are as far as possible self sufficient. Heroes indeed.

Early this morning I was standing outside the local microlight club, scene of a forgettable all-night New Year’s party, waiting for the sun to rise. I suppose that rather typically I was wondering what the new year was going to bring; where would I be a the same time next year given the disastrous state of the Zimbabwe economy? All the usual greetings and compliments had been exchanged at midnight and somebody standing next to me had commented that we’d been hoping for better things since about 1965! I was almost certain that I’d had similar thoughts a year earlier.

Back at my house I listened to the BBC news detailing amongst other things the wild celebrations in Romania and Bulgaria as they became the newest EU nations. One man interviewed said yes, he thought it was great now that he could get out of Romania. Of course we never experienced the overwhelming brutality of a Ceausescu but it has not stopped and estimated 25% of the population leaving the country to greener pastures (often illegally). Leaving Zimbabwe is frequently on my mind but actually implementing it requires a bit more courage than I have at the moment. Perhaps like the rest of the country’s population who seem too timid to revolt, I am too timid to move. I am forever making excuses, mainly to myself, about how difficult it will all be and what would I do without Jenni? I can find her a good home easily and she would miss me only for a short while. I would be devastated without her.

The sunrise was not to be. Mist descended on the vlei and the sky remained clouded over.  Night merged into day and now it is raining. We are a ridiculously superstitious species that will believe in just about anything as diverse as an all seeing, all monitoring God to UFOs so I must avoid the trap of thinking that the lack of a dramatic sunrise means anything more than that but I do think it is symbolic of a less than dramatic year to come.

May 2007 be a fulfilling year for you.

Good books are hard to come by and all books are expensive in Zimbabwe. I have spurned the temptation of satellite TV (not difficult due to the cost and repetition factor) and prefer instead to spend my evenings reading, computer programming or when the mood grabs me, gemstone faceting. Mostly I rely on a loose network of other book enthusiasts to garner good reads and when I go out the country a visit to a good bookstore is a childish must and deadly to the credit card. Good quality writing is as important as the story, and yes, I do like a good novel. That’s not to say that non-fiction does not get a look-in, it just requires a bit more research to find what I want. So, taking advantage of this internet usable connection I have through a neighbour’s business, I decided to treat myself to a birthday and Christmas present of some quality science writing. I relied heavily on the book reviews in the Scientific American to which I subscribe and it has proved a sound basis.

Yesterday I received (I could have used “got” but we were always taught to avoid it in English language classes; it was classed as being ugly though not as ugly as “gotten”) a parcel slip from the post office and was delighted today to find out that it was the books I’d ordered only two weeks ago from Amazon. Two are by Richard Dawkins; The God Delusion and The Blind Watchmaker, and the other two are The First Human by Ann Gibbons (no pun intended) and Walking Zero by Chet Raymo. Dawkins has created waves recently with his take no prisoner approach to eviscerating religion in The God Delusion and I’m already nearly 60 pages into it despite it being a slow reading type of book. I’ve also succumbed to temptation with The First Human, an account of the paleoanthropological search into the origins of humankind. Some discipline is required here as I’m already reading Evolution: The Triumph of an Idea which I must add I’ve read twice before but is an incredible book. Again, it requires slow, concentrated reading even though it is so well written that anyone sans a scientific background would understand and enjoy it.

I like to think that I live in awe of no-one. I really don’t want to meet any movie stars or chat to glitterati. I do however admire some people. I am fascinated by the artistic/creative process that allows artists and artistes to be creative in ways I could never imagine. I also admire those who commit to a cause, especially where there is little financial reward – the likes of MSF come to mind. And I would dearly love to be able to craft the written word as well as the authors of the books I have just bought!

I find it incredible that the book format has not changed significantly since Caxton’s day though I do believe that “e-books” are becoming a bit more popular. No doubt they will get more convenient; as many texts as you like on one device. But will they get them to smell the same? There is something about the smell of a new book that is so enticing!