Reflections on the first half

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Updated 6th November

Fault lines

I was paying Tony the rent that I owed him yesterday. He asked me if I’d heard of the rumour that the Zimbabwe dollar was going to be re-introduced. I hadn’t but he’d apparently heard that there had been a run on one of the branches of CABS and they’d run out of cash. I’d drawn $1000 out of my corporate account that morning and there were certainly no queues at my bank so it was probably all fiction; albeit very dangerous fiction. We are certainly in no position to start playing those sorts of silly games – the financial system collapse would be near instantaneous and probably irreversible. On the other hand it might be euthanasia for the increasingly ill GNU (Government of National Unity).

Jonathan Moyo, the arch villain, turncoat and sleaze ball of Zimbabwe politics apparently said last week that “…we don’t need the MDC in the GNU. Now that we have dollarized investment will come pouring in”. Right. I still think I’ll draw down the company bank balance a bit.

Telling honesty

-  Why didn’t you sell me your pickup?

- What’s wrong with the one you’re driving? I replied, evading the question.

- It’s not mine; I have to borrow that one every time I need to come to town, was the reply.

I’d had an old pickup truck for some years and he was one of several people angling to buy it. I’d eventually sold it to the first person to arrive with the cash. It was running but difficult to start and I’d made it very clear that once out of my hands it was not my problem.

-          So why don’t you go and get one from the second hand car sales places, there must be dozens – it’s a buyer’s market! I said.

-          Yes, but us chiboyi (blacks) are dishonest, we will say anything to sell the vehicle and you find out after 3 weeks that it falls apart. You whites are too honest and tell use all that is wrong with it in the first place!

Nyanga Odyssey

I am sitting typing this at 2200m in what is possibly the highest holiday cottage in Zimbabwe. It belongs to a mate who is only too happy to get people to use it. I am in the guest “house” which sits on a very steep edge of the World’s View escarpment and when the air is clear it is possible to see 100km quite easily. It was clear this morning but now it is very hazy again.

It is always cool up here, sometimes very cold, but that’s in winter. Now it’s the end of October, sometimes called the “suicide month” because of the oppressive heat at lower altitudes so it’s a relief to get up here. I left Harare and took a leisurely drive up, stopping to photograph some wild flowers by Headlands. It was an easy trip, the Landcruiser performed flawlessly with its “new” turbo charged engine – this was after all an excuse to test it within the warranty period. In Rusape I was stopped at a police roadblock and after the usual greetings the older policeman said “Have you just come from Salisbury?” grinning hugely (there was a momentary pause before “Salisbury” as he sought the long disused name). “No” I said, “I have come from Harare, it has not been Salisbury for some 30 years!”. For some reason this was a huge joke and I was bid safe travels.

Jenni on the World's View escarpment

Taking Jenni for a run yesterday evening she revelled in the cool air and spent a fair bit of time looking over her shoulder wondering why I was being so slow (a very bad road). The wind picked up and soon it was rather cold and last night was spent listening to the wind moan about the roof.

Behind the house to the south is a massive granite rock slope that drops off to the Nyanga village some 700m lower. It’s just begging for photos with boulders, lichen, aloes and at other times of year, flowers. I spent a happy hour or more this morning while the sun was still low, taking photos and daydreaming. Some company would have been nice (Jenni is an uncooperative model and let’s face it; a doggy expression is a doggy expression!).

Looking south towards Nyanga village

The only property I own is a half share in a 10ha plot on the northern flank of Mt Nyangani, Zimbabwe’s highest mountain. My mother bought is for some 600 pounds in 1960 (way over priced) with the intention of using it as a retirement property (she apparently had more money than my father!). It became obvious that it was just too far out of the way to be practical and what with the deteriorating security situation the only investment they made was to plant a few thousand eucalypt trees of varying species.  I had not been there for several years so this morning I set off. It took and hour of appalling roads that have had no pretence of maintenance for the time I have been away. I was surprised to find the km long track down to the property quite passable for a high clearance vehicle. On the way I stopped to chat to a personable black man who has set himself up on the southern boundary. Cephas claims to have known my father and also remembered my mother visiting in her small white sedan. Thinking it good sense to have a good neighbour I bought 2 litres of honey off him – it smelt really good but I think I’ll resieve it when I get home to get the bee parts out!

The plot is now almost entirely covered by trees. Most are still the original and are now giants of some 50m or more. They are too big to harvest safely and even then the transport costs will eat up any profit margin for the timber. We scattered some of my parents ashes at the place where we used to picnic as a family so I was a bit emotional as I reflected on two lives that ended way too prematurely; my father murdered in 1978 and my mother from misdiagnosed melanoma in 1992. I have no idea what I will do with the property. The other partner lives in Europe, I have no progeny and I don’t see any chance of developing it any time soon; it will still be out on a limb no matter what the political situation of Zimbabwe.

Butterfly on Helichrysum ("Everlasting")

Part of the property where I am staying burned down last year. Derelict buildings are just loaded with photo opportunities and I have been watching the sun move down a rather photogenic wall while I type this. I must go and check it out.

Betrayal of trust

Her coat is matted and dirty; sort of Labradorish. She is young but middle aged on the street and surprisingly not too thin, yet. Her tail is only half as long as it once was but she cannot remember what happened. All that matters now is that she must eat to feed her family – an instinct so deep she does not even think about it. She has vague memories of laughter and games a ball to chase and young friends to play with and security and friendly voices to … wait! What was that? Her nose, supreme sensory organ that it is tells her there’s food around. Where? Look, down there! She jumps easily down into the ditch, and yes, it can be eaten. What is it? No matter, food in a bowl was long ago – she has no choice. She picks it up, jumps back up on the bank and ducking under the railing away from the traffic makes off with her find. She must feed her family.

Just soldiering on

The Dance Trust of Zimbabwe put on their annual “Starlight Dancing” show over 5 days last week. I took the opportunity to get some photo practice and they liked what they saw after Thursday night so I was invited back. It was amazing what they managed to put on considering all the various dance studios are cash strapped and the DTZ is pretty much broke.

End of “Here’s to you MJ”

Most of these photos are from the first night when I took photos for my own enjoyment. On Sunday someone came up with the idea that we should sell them to raise a bit of money for the DTZ and that totally changed my approach to a “mass appeal” market. The best photos are not usually from the front of the stage where the background can be cluttered!

Full screen (1280 pixels width) are viewable at http://gonexc.deviantart.com/

All hope is lost

- Please may I have time off tomorrow to go to court.
- Why do you have to go to court Gladys.
- Because I was caught chopping (down) wood.
- On ART Farm?
- Yes.
- That was stupid!
- But I was not the only one!

P.S. Gladys is my domestic servant (labour is relatively cheap in the Third World). To me this incident was symptomatic of the Zimbabwe malaise; if someone else is behaving badly it’s OK for me to do so too.

The insects are back

Pseudocreobotra wahlbergi makes an appearance

You know that summer is on its way when the insects start coming back. I found this mantis on a loaf of bread in the kitchen but thought I could find a better background! The moths are swarming around the verandah light as I write this and I expect the rose beetles are destroying the roses too!

el Niño

It's an el Nino year (Acacia polyacantha thorns against a smoky sky - no PhotoShop required!)

Sycophants we

It was all on the news the last couple of days; the SADCC (Southern African Development Co-ordination Community) leaders meeting in Kinshasa, DRC, had called for an immediate and complete lifting of sanctions imposed on Robert Mugabe and his cronies as it was “hindering progress” in the Unity Government. That is complete nonsense of course. The hindering of progress is entirely the province of Mugabe’s ZANU-PF and the sanctions are targeted on individuals in the aforesaid regime. This is much more of a racial brotherhood (brothahood?) thing where the nasty western nations imposing the sanctions (mainly white) are victimising “one of us”. Perhaps the strangest thing about the announcement was that it was backed to the hilt by none other than Jacob “Showa” Zuma, the incumbent South African president, whom up until his inauguration was an avowed Mugabe enemy!

It was perhaps notable that in the same newscast was a report by a branch of the IMF that Africa was the most difficult place in the world to do business and while some countries had progressed in cutting red tape others, such as Tanzania, showed absolutely no interest in making life easier for potential investors. I guess it’s easier to beg.

I had a note on my desk last week to call back a potential customer who was looking for a large quantity of tobacco seedlings. As it happened we did not have any to spare but I made a note of his number anyway. Later in the week Tony, my landlord who knows the farmer, told me that this project was unlikely to happen. The farmer had agreed to lease a tobacco farm off a black farmer who’d bought (not stolen) the farm in the mid 1980’s in the same area where Tony had farmed. He’d gone through all the channels and had the scheme approved by the local community, the District Administrator, the Lands Council, and the police. The Governor of the area had vetoed it; he didn’t want any white farmers in the area.