fine

"Your mother's name?" the policeman asks my husband.

We're being fined. Mozambican traffic police have a terrible reputation for jumping out from behind the mango trees on lonely roads. This time though, they didn't even jump. They were waiting on the wide exit road from Beira, stopping every car in turn.

The officer checks my husband's driving licence. He checks our Temporary Import Permit. He checks the piece of paper that says my husband has permission to drive the car outside Zimbabwe. He checks his passport. In the end he runs out of papers to check so he tries the windscreen wipers. He moves to the back of the car and orders my husband to flash the indicators. The brakelights. Triumphantly the policeman returns to the driver's window: "Back brake does not work," he says.

"Bet it does," I say grimly. I'm flat on the backseat, panting in the midday sun. My son is stuffing raisins -- a rare treat -- into his mouth. "What's the policeman saying, Mummy?"

Living in Zimbabwe, it's been difficult to convince my son that policemen are the nice helpful Mr Plod-types I was brought up to believe in. I have tried. When he is older, I'll tell him (or maybe I won't) that he played with Lego on the backseat of our Toyota as riot police let off teargas near Zimbabwe's ruling party headquarters. "Keep looking at me," Mummy said cheerily as she caught a glimpse of someone being beaten yards from the passenger seat window. "Next time we leave him with Granny," I hissed at my husband.

Now in Mozambique, a policeman is fining us 1,000 metacais (about 40 US) and he wants to know Granny's name?

Come to think of it, Granny does have a theory about traffic cops and Christmas...