visit

11 o'clock, Sunday morning. There's loud hooting at the gate. I am expecting a woman to drop round with vouchers for a short trip we've planned. I run outside, squeeze through the gap and... it's a police car. Inside are three policemen in luminous vests.

They're aggressive. "Where's Mr B?" they say, naming a local store.

Not here. "Why don't you know? Aren't you a resident?" the officer in the back says.

I look him in the eye, something a good Shona woman (especially a young one) does not do.

"We've only had this house for two years," I say. Immediately I regret the words: the police are looking for anyone who's acquired wealth in the shape of houses and cars since the diamond rush started.

That was two and a half years ago.

"Let me go find a number," I say. I close the gate before they have a chance to stop me, rush inside, try to make a 'phone call, fail, grab the telephone directory and run outside to the car again.

"Is this guy Indian?" I ask.

"No, black," the officer in the driving seat says. I see he has a clipboard. The infamous list?

I page through the directory and find a number for the store, at least. Eventually the police drive off.

My hands are shaking when I go inside.

black boots

These days when I go into town, I look for the army girl. Aged about 22, he said she was. She was the one who lashed the females. "She loved it," he said. "She was relishing it." She beat one digger -- unlucky enough to be found with a tiny electronic diamond scale on her -- until she screamed. A policeman's wife from the nearby bivouacs sneaked into the cage later, to bring the victim water.

He says he's seen the army girl in town, near the Holiday Inn Hotel. It was on Friday, a day after he was released. "Must have been her day off," he says.

There are soldiers in camouflage dotted on the streets this Friday. In Spar I see an army woman. Under the black beret, her hair is freshly curled. Her trousers are tucked into black boots. She's browsing among the imported baby nappies and aqueous cream. She approaches me. "Excuse me, Madam," she says. I look at her face, my heart pounding. Early 20s, I'd guess. "You don't have change for 50 US, do you?" No, I don't.

Of course, it won't be her. I know that.

But what has to happen to a young girl to make her enjoy beating another woman?

face cream

In the end, it all comes down to face cream. I would like to live in a place where:

a) it is possible to walk into a pharmacy during your lunchhour and buy a decent pot of face cream (impossible in Zimbabwe now)
b) buying a pot of face cream would not be an unimaginable luxury requiring a trip across the border to South Africa
c) just thinking about buying a pot of face-cream wouldn't be a thing to be ashamed of given the overwhelming human misery all around.

racing

"Shall we leave?" I ask for the hundredth time (this week? this month?). Zimbabwe always looks worse in the dark minutes before sleep.

"Don't keep saying that," he says. "It's like running a race. Every time you say that it's like we're slowing down and stopping for a second."

"It only makes it worse."

decisions

When do you stop sending your child to school? When cholera has reached the next town (which it has)? When it's reached the high-density township of Chikanga near the school? If I pull him out now, he will miss the Nativity Play they've been rehearsing for all term. ("We three kings of GLORY AND TAR", he chants).

There is likely no treatment for cholera in the local private clinic. A classmate's father was supposed to be bringing in cholera treatment from Mozambique but not till this weekend. Cholera kills in a few hours. You need a simple rehydration solution to treat it. I should stock up on Coca-Cola. But where do I find it? I went to the forex shop two days ago, but there was little for sale. The truck with provisions on wasn't due from South Africa till the end of the week.

Cholera needs no transport, it has no passport, the head of the Zimbabwe Doctors for Human Rights Douglas Gwatidzo said today.

Better safe than sorry?

radio ga ga

Our four year old has been brought up to the sound of the ZBC news jingle ("news on the hour, every hour"). Now he's getting tired of it.

"Switch that radio off," he says when we sit down for whatever it is I've mustered up for lunch (toast but no spread yesterday). "All they say is Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe. It's so boring."

"I want to eat my lunch peacefully."

So do we, boy, so do we.

operation no return*

"There are lots of children away," the headmistress at the preschool says. "We don't know why." Chickenpox? That was last month. The owner of a Montessori preschool across town has more of an idea. "It's the diamond dealers," she told C. "They're in hiding. Lots of kids are absent now. And the kids that are left are being picked up by different people." Obviously they've been left with friends or relatives until the dust has died down and the dealers judge it safe to return.

* Operation Hakudzokwi (No Return) = brutal army/police clampdown on gwejas (dealers) and diggers in Chiadzwa diamond fields and nearby city of Mutare. "After this operation, no gweja will think of going to Chiadzwa again," official close to Hakudzokwi told local Manica Post newspaper