TWoGin’ it up in Zim
Despite all the weekend fun – flying planes, searching for bushman paintings and petting elephants – I was now starting to get a deeper understanding into Zimbabwe and the people who live there. Will assured me: “Through all of the turmoil going on here we still live a really good life.” And I started to see more and more of what he meant.
Will laughed at my reluctance to have his maid do my laundry. I washed it one day, which I think confused her, although she took it down from the line after it was dry and ironed it. I thought it was funny that she went through the effort of ironing these clothes that I’ve been wearing this whole trip so far (but the resulting holes in the clothes due to a hot iron were not so laughable.) However, someone explained to me why they iron all clothes. Tumbu flies. They lay their eggs on clothes hanging out to dry, which then bury themselves into your skin, developing into fully grown maggots. The heat of the iron kills them.
I don’t know if there’s a single white person living in Zimbabwe that doesn’t have a domestic worker. My guess would be no. I would put the minimum number of people any white Zimbabwean has working for them at two. Of course, it’s not all bad when there’s a high rate of unemployment – people are getting jobs. And, as one person explained to me, their workers are like their family – they take care of them beyond just providing a salary. They give them housing, pay for their children to go to school, even finance their funerals.
One woman, as she got off the phone, exclaimed: “Ah! Thank god the cook is back! I just don’t know how people work all day and then go home and cook and clean. I mean, really!” I don’t think I need to elaborate on my thoughts regarding this…
The problem I see here is that they complain about it. They constantly use names in reference to them (them being their workers or any black person in general), and the names are never complementary. Of course, their situation is one that I cannot understand. Their farms – their livelihoods – were taken away from them, but the blame is then put on an entire race rather than a corrupt government. As one person put it, “We’re all in the same boat now,” and I agree with that. Everyone in the country is dealing with the hyperinflation, the lack of basic necessities, and seeing those members of the Gravy Train cruise around Harare in their Mecerdes.
All these names flying around really got under my skin after a while, and I got into another (heated) debate about it. While I fully agree that I cannot fathom having my farm, all of my belongings taken away from me, I would still argue that life can’t be that all that bad for the white Zimbabweans (as Will originally pointed out to me). Life can’t be bad when you have dinner waiting for you in the oven; life can’t be that bad when you have all of your laundry washed, dried, ironed, and folded; life can’t be all that bad when you have a beautiful garden and never a grain of dirt under your nails; life can’t be all that bad when you fly your planes three times a week over local villages where people live in straw houses and transport water from the local well. Sure, life maybe could be better, but it can’t be all that bad…
In the end, I was nicknamed a TWoG, short for Third World Groupie after I assured my confronter that I hadn’t come to Africa to learn about the white Zimbabwean culture. However, I also hadn’t heeded my guide book’s most valuable bit of advice: It might be best to keep your political views to yourself.
In walking around Harare for a few days, I got a chance to mix in with the local crowd a bit. And I have to say, for the most part, people were just not nice. Not like they were in Mozambique, at least. If I asked someone a question, either I got no answer, some sort of incomprehensible grunt, or the shortest answer possible, which wasn’t necessarily the correct answer. There was definitely a grudge here.
I had almost had enough – talk about culture shock! – and almost skipped out on a trip out to the Zambezi valley with Will’s family. He encouraged me to go, as I hadn’t seen hardly any of Zimbabwe. So, I went, heeding that ever-so-valuable advice this time.
We camped at a beautiful spot; my tent was perched on a beautiful outlook over the river. I set up my hammock for the first time in months, and enjoyed hours of lazing around in it. We were constantly chasing away the pesky baboons, lingering around in persuit of our food (they got a few things!). At night I had illusions that all sorts of wild animals were breathing right outside my tent; the hippos snorting not too far away didn’t help my wild imagination.
We went on a game drive in search of wild animals; however, we were located in a hunting area (where people spend lots and lots of money to go shoot elephants and stuff), so we didn’t see very much – mostly bones and poop. We stopped at what’s called a bone yard – where the hunters dump the carcasses after they remove the more desired parts. It was an eerie place – full of bones and carcass, smelly, and with vultures and other carrion-eaters swarming around. Other than that, I was given a tutorial on the different kind of animal crap – essential information in getting acquainted with the bush.
We also tried our hands at fishing. Well, for me, the bigger challenge was hooking the worm. But I soon picked it up. Fishing was pretty much a lost cause due to high water levels, but we still had a good time getting our lines tangled up, losing the fish we already caught, getting stuck on sand banks, and watching a small family of elephants cross the river to an island. Finally, and best of all, I learned the call of emerald spotted dove, and can pick him out wherever I go.
Tags: Zimbabwe, Tag Index
Tania