Maybe hitching ain’t my thing…
I originally had no plans to go to Zimbabwe. The last bit of news I remembered was about Mugabe demolishing housing projects with no warning and no justification. They’re got their problems, I figured; I’ll just wait until some other day. Well, as I got closer and closer to Zimbabwe, I met others who had been there, and assured me that it was safe. Besides, I knew Will from back when I was in London, so I figured I’d check it out.
So, what are Zimbabwe’s problems? Well, other than their president Mugabe and everyone on the government’s so-called Gravy Train… The country is experiencing something like 1000% inflation. I’ve actually seen numbers like 1100%, and heard that predictions are that it will be as large as 4000% by the end of the year. There’s shortages of a lot of basic necessities – I saw huge lines waiting for bread in a supermarket. At gas stations, instead of listing a price for unleaded and deisel, there’s simply a YES or NO, and it’s more often NO.
There is a thriving black market, or parallel market, as it’s referred to. When I was there, the official exchange rate for the dollar was $Z250,000 to $US1 (250,000 Zim dollars to 1 US dollar). On the black market, you could find $Z550,000 – 600,000, so of course you’re going to change on the black market. But, this is illegal, and who knows what happens to you if the police catch you.
Now, here was the more exciting part. Zimbabwe was in the process of undergoing a currency change. This was the second country in a row I had been that was undregoing a currency change. However, Mozambique’s currency change was extremely fair: currency changes July 1st; old currency is good through the end of the year, and can still be changed at the bank until something like 2010. Fair enough. Here’s how Zimbabwe implemented their currency change: Notice is given August 1st that the currency will be changing, effective August 21st. Old currency will not be accepted anywhere after August 21st. Other rules include the following:
- You are only allowed to deposit $Z100 million per day – per the official rate, that’s about $400; per the more accurate black market rate, that’s somewhere less than $200. With only 21 days, that’s a maximum of $4100; this comes in a country where many people do not have bank accounts, but rather stash their money in their mattresses, which means a lot of people will lose their money.
- You are not allowed to enter the country with more than $Z5 million in the old currency. (Equivalent to about $9.) Any extra currency was confiscated – and I saw it happen. The rationale here is that people were hoarding Zim currency outside the country, which was one of the causes for the high inflation, so this would burn all those people.
- Locals are not allowed to carry foreign currency and can only have a maximum of 100 million on their person.
Luckily, when I arrived in Zimbabwe, I had a contact who would change my money, so I didn’t have to worry about wandering the street looking for someone and run the risk of being seen by the cops. The other lucky thing was he had mostly new currency, so I was able to change more of it. I entered something like 5 days before the currency change went into effect, so if I got a lot of the old money, I would end up losing it all.
Here’s a few other interesting things to note about the currency:
- The money actually comes in the form of bearer checks, not notes, or bills. This is because Mugabe refused to have any official bills larger than 1000 on the market. the old $Z1000 notes are very elaborately designed, with lots of colors and even silver woven through. the bearer checks (both old and new) look like photocopied paper, very plain, with nearly nothing on them.
- In the old currency, the largest note was 50,000 which, according to even the official market rate, would be equivalent to about 20 cents. I went to the grocery store and had to count out 3 million-something in 50,000-dollar notes. You can imagine this leads to huge, HUGE wads of cash. I literally had money stuffed everywhere; even men had to carry bags to transport the day’s spending cash.
- All bearer checks, both old and new, came with an expiration date. This was the first time I’ve ever seen money with an expiration date. However, per my experience with the old currency, this was not heeded in any way.
So, I got into Mutare, the town on the border with Mozambique. Mutare was set in the lovely Vumba mountains, though I never did do any exploring there. I stayed at a guesthouse run by an older white woman, Anne, who had a maid and her family living on her property. Two of the girls walked with me to the local nature reserve one afternoon, where they told me about their school (which were both in different cities; they were on break now and visiting their mother). Their classes included math, English, and Shona (the local language), as well as something equivalent of “Home-Ec” for the girls and “Shop”, or carpintery for the boys. They also mentioned something like “life skills”, which I think was a class where they learned about HIV/AIDS and other issues.
I stayed in Mutare just long enough to sort out transport to Harare. My plan was to take the train (a break from buses and other road transport), but as I went to buy my ticket, I was greeted by a line probably 200 people long. Really, I have no sense of numbers like that, but the line was ridiculous, I promise you that. I talked to Anne about other options…I had heard the bus was quite expensive, so I asked her about hitching, which I had yet to do in Africa. “Do it!” she said. I admitted to her that I hadn’t hitched before and asked her how to do it. “You know,” she said, “just go out there, stick your hand out, and go for it.” Uh, ok.
So, the next morning I headed out. I walked out to the road to Harare and plopped my bag down right under the sign saying “Harare”. I figured that would make it obvious where I wanted to go. As my luck would have it, it was raining for only the second time during my stay in Africa, so I put the rain coat on and slumped into it, assuming this would get me a ride even quicker. I stood there for a while, getting wet and cold and feeling a little stupid and reluctant to stick out my arm, laughing at myself, before someone told me that I wouldn’t pick up a lift where I was because it was a roundabout, and people couldn’t stop there; I needed to go down the road to the bus stop.
OK – thanks. I walked down to the bus stop where another hitchhiker was waiting. Ah! Competition! I was sure I would never get a ride now. Someone stopped and picked him up – I let him have the ride, figuring he was there first (although there really is no such thing as courtesy in Africa). Another guy stopped, but wasn’t going to Harare. Finally, a ride picked me up. And you know what it was? The bus. I must be the worst hitchhiker in the world.
Tags: Zimbabwe, Tag Index
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