No money = no wife.
A. has three sons, all in their mid- to late-20s, all with university or poly degrees. One has a job with Customs and Immigration, another's been working at the Blair Research Station near Marondera as he completes his Masters, the third is waiting for his poly results (a paper he wrote has mysteriously disappeared, meaning he might have to sit -- and pay for -- it again). There are no fiancees or wives, not even a girlfriend. How can there be, when prospective in-laws expect lobola (bride price), lots of it and payable in foreign currency?
The sons are home again this weekend. Unaccompanied, of course.
"Other people complain about an empty nest," she says. "In my case, they're coming home to roost."
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
diary of a 30-something
Zimbabwe has its own Bridget Jones. She writes in the Manica Post newpaper every Friday. Unlike Helen Fielding, she doesn't sign her column. But this chocolate-loving 30-something's dilemmas are just as pressing.
Ms 30-something, a top-level executive who comes complete with secretary, is torn between two men: Mr IT, who works in the IT section of her company and Mr Old Mutare, who comes from Old Mutare*, is from an apparently politically-powerful family (government, possibly though it's never spelled out) and has money (and a farm). Lots of money. When he and Ms 30-something quarrel, he sends her a "roomful" of flowers. The memory of that has her a weeny-bit scornful when Mr IT -- to whom she finally succumbed a couple of weeks ago -- sends her a bouquet of flowers by dint of an apology. An apology what for, you may ask, only a fortnight into a relationship? Mr IT has made the mistake of refusing to eat chez Ms 30-something (he prefers restaurants every night, which she concedes could be a problem if she married him: how would they save?). He says it's because she might put mupfahwira (love potions) in his supper so he'll never leave.
Ms 30-something has her fair share of drama. She was in a car crash earlier this year, was horrified when taken to a rural hospital (where she was left groaning on a stretcher) and relieved when her church in Harare (Ms 30-something goes to one of the trendy new monied churches the well-connected love to be seen at) sends money for her to be transferred to the capital. She has a lesbian friend who's recently given up on women and is engaged to a man old enough to be her father, and she has a Small House friend. Small House is the mistress of a man with several wives already, but he pays her rent and hairdressing bill and gives her money for groceries. Small House -- who recently lost one of the twins she was carrying -- tells Ms 30-something the secret to keeping someone else's husband: "She tries her level best not to behave like a wife. She plays her cards right, depending on the situation. If he needs a listener, she listens: if he needs an encourager, she encourages, if he needs a nurse, a massage, a bath...whatever it is, she gives it freely, without complaining..."
*the eastern city of Mutare was "moved" over Christmas Pass at the turn of the last century. According to old accounts, houses were dismantled and transported by wagon across the mountain range. Hence Old Mutare (where there's a mission, a school and a university) and Mutare proper, today's diamond-riddled city.
Ms 30-something, a top-level executive who comes complete with secretary, is torn between two men: Mr IT, who works in the IT section of her company and Mr Old Mutare, who comes from Old Mutare*, is from an apparently politically-powerful family (government, possibly though it's never spelled out) and has money (and a farm). Lots of money. When he and Ms 30-something quarrel, he sends her a "roomful" of flowers. The memory of that has her a weeny-bit scornful when Mr IT -- to whom she finally succumbed a couple of weeks ago -- sends her a bouquet of flowers by dint of an apology. An apology what for, you may ask, only a fortnight into a relationship? Mr IT has made the mistake of refusing to eat chez Ms 30-something (he prefers restaurants every night, which she concedes could be a problem if she married him: how would they save?). He says it's because she might put mupfahwira (love potions) in his supper so he'll never leave.
Ms 30-something has her fair share of drama. She was in a car crash earlier this year, was horrified when taken to a rural hospital (where she was left groaning on a stretcher) and relieved when her church in Harare (Ms 30-something goes to one of the trendy new monied churches the well-connected love to be seen at) sends money for her to be transferred to the capital. She has a lesbian friend who's recently given up on women and is engaged to a man old enough to be her father, and she has a Small House friend. Small House is the mistress of a man with several wives already, but he pays her rent and hairdressing bill and gives her money for groceries. Small House -- who recently lost one of the twins she was carrying -- tells Ms 30-something the secret to keeping someone else's husband: "She tries her level best not to behave like a wife. She plays her cards right, depending on the situation. If he needs a listener, she listens: if he needs an encourager, she encourages, if he needs a nurse, a massage, a bath...whatever it is, she gives it freely, without complaining..."
*the eastern city of Mutare was "moved" over Christmas Pass at the turn of the last century. According to old accounts, houses were dismantled and transported by wagon across the mountain range. Hence Old Mutare (where there's a mission, a school and a university) and Mutare proper, today's diamond-riddled city.
Friday, July 24, 2009
guessing
After eight years living here, I still find it impossible to gauge Zimbabweans' ages. The sister who takes blood from me tosses her ringlets as she writes my name on the test-tube. They're reddish-purple corkscrew ringlets, the sort you could thread your little finger through. It's an elegant wig, I realise (there's a tell-tale gape at the neckline)"Do you have children?" she says. "A boy." I've warned her I might faint. "I have two, a boy and a girl. But they were close together and the girl did whatever the boy did so it was like having two boys." We discuss night wakings, how if you've only had girls you'd never understand how exhausting it is having a boy. "How old are your children?" I ask as she corks up the tube. Her face is smooth, unlined, firm - she's not much older than me, surely. "Old," she laughs. "What, 8 and 9?" "No, 21 and 20," she says. I gasp. "But that means you are.." She laughs.
It works both ways. A few minutes later, hurrying from the vegetable shop with a sachet of cayenne pepper I hear a steady "Sss." And again. "Sss." Yes? "Please, come over here." I take a few steps towards a trio of well, what are they, youths? Not so long ago, this would have been an offer of sugar, US dollar change or diamonds. One of the youths steps towards me. He's wearing a cap and a white-striped polo shirt. Breathtakingly white. He probably is a diamond dealer, come to think of it. Definitely a dealer of some kind, anyway. "I just want to say," he says, staring into my face. ""that I think you're very beautiful." "Thankyou." I laugh. I've slipped to the wrong side of 35 now, if I'd started having babies at 16 I could probably be your mother. That's if you're as old as I think you are, which you probably aren't. I hold bag, laptop and pepper tight and turn to cross the road. His voice floats after me. "Please, are you married?" .
It works both ways. A few minutes later, hurrying from the vegetable shop with a sachet of cayenne pepper I hear a steady "Sss." And again. "Sss." Yes? "Please, come over here." I take a few steps towards a trio of well, what are they, youths? Not so long ago, this would have been an offer of sugar, US dollar change or diamonds. One of the youths steps towards me. He's wearing a cap and a white-striped polo shirt. Breathtakingly white. He probably is a diamond dealer, come to think of it. Definitely a dealer of some kind, anyway. "I just want to say," he says, staring into my face. ""that I think you're very beautiful." "Thankyou." I laugh. I've slipped to the wrong side of 35 now, if I'd started having babies at 16 I could probably be your mother. That's if you're as old as I think you are, which you probably aren't. I hold bag, laptop and pepper tight and turn to cross the road. His voice floats after me. "Please, are you married?" .
Sunday, July 19, 2009
power cut
Sixth hour of the power cut. The tractor battery linked to our inverter starts to screech. The charge is running low. Soon we will be in total darkness. Well, we do have three candles...The 'phone rings. It's Mrs H, my friend Siba's mother. Siba left for Zambia two years ago. Mrs H is not amused. "I haven't even seen Tapiwa." How old is the baby? "Eight months. Doesn't it bother Siba that her mother hasn't even seen her baby? If she's got a problem, she can tell us and we can send her 20 US." I fear 20 US won't be enough to get Siba here, partly because of the carload of groceries she'll be expected to arrive with. "T. talks to her from Bots. But I can't get through." Me neither but Mrs H is on a roll. "And it's cold and dark and the lodgers keep moving out without giving me notice and messing up my budget and I've got nothing for Tamara (the 6-year-old granddaughter who lives with her). What -- haven't you got power either?" No. We are on the same line. "I'm so bored," says Mrs H. "Haven't you got books you don't want, maybe magazines you've finished with?" I glance over to where my son is reading Zoric The Spaceman. OK, books I can do. Magazines too: I buy ancient copies from pavement vendors and store them in my husband's old school trunk. But the rest? "Paint," says Mrs H. "It all looks so dirty. Haven't you got some paint lying around? I want to paint the gate, and the garden wall.." "We haven't painted a thing for a good two years now and even then it was so expensive we only bought exactly what we needed. I'm sorry. "The bills," says Mrs H. "My rates are 800 US. I mean, who's got that kind of money...?"
Thursday, July 16, 2009
chivhu
The public swimming bath is on the edge of Chivhu, encircled by a crumbling white wall. It looks like a cemetery, especially with the pavement gravestone sellers who've set up shop outside the ornate gate. But if you crane your neck, you can just catch the flash of the blue walls inside. My mother-in-law remembers this place as Enkeldoorn, once an Afrikaaner farming stronghold. If you look in the 'phone book now -- the 2002 phone book, that is, no-one seems to have a newer one -- there are still lots of Afrikaans names in Chivhu. Few, if any, will be left. Max, a black mechanic, stops to chat through the passenger window. "Where are you from?" he wants to know. "What do you do?" "I used to be a farmer," my 70-something father-in-law says. "But then the government took my farm." "Look," says Max. He has, no doubt, looked at my mother-in-law's Pajero, the boxes of sandwiches and the bulging bags in the back. "Count your blessings. I was in UK with some of those white farmers. They were working in factories, working in Tescos." My father-in-law is silent. His own future looks uncertain: the rented house they were staying in has been sold from under their feet but he cannot leave his office job for another town or country: who else would employ a pensioner? "You will get all those things back," says Max. "If not your farm, then a business, something even more profitable." "You're right," says my father-in-law firmly. As we drive off and the border-bound trucks swish past us, there's a fresh breath of hope in the car. "Well, he was positive, wasn't he?" says my mother-in-law.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
sour taste
"But you said you were foreigners," the woman at the toll gate protests.
A breeze whips across the tufts of grey grass like hair. It is not a difficult climb up to the grave: an elderly Mrs Prescott laboured up here the day Rhodes was buried, he reminds me.
The moss has turned yellow and papery on the slabs of stone. High up now in the afternoon light, the balancing rocks look other-worldly. It's not hard to imagine throngs of people toiling their way up to bury the man. Not far from him lies Jameson, then, on an outcrop, Coghlan. "It's a kind of Heroes Acre* for colonials," he says grimly.
The children chase a giant blue-headed lizard. "What's that box?" asks Bella. At the edge of the ledge is a memorial to the Allan Wilson Patrol of 1893. There's a carved frieze of the men round the edges. "To Brave Men," it reads. "That's where they've put the two brave men," says tow-haired Hunty, whose ancestor Huntsman W was an early settler.
"Don't run," we call after them.
I break off a piece of Resurrection Plant. If you sink one of these dark dried twigs in water, it turns green. My father-in-law turns to his cousin on the way down. "How much did they make you pay for this?"
"55 US," she says. "10 each for adults." We confront the woman at the gate. You pay one fee to get into the Matopos National Park, extra to visit Rhodes Grave. Foreigners pay 5 times the price of locals. We produce our Zimbabwean identity cards. "But you said you were foreigners," the woman protests. Why on earth would we do that, we ask. A riot policeman in a faded uniform appears. "Look in the receipt book," he says. We do -- and see we've been carefully entered in blue biro as Zimbabweans. So where's our change? "You can't have the money," the pair say in unison.
"It'll look like there's been fraud."
* Heroes Acre: burial ground in Harare where black fighters from the war for independence are buried (almost all ZANU-PF)
A breeze whips across the tufts of grey grass like hair. It is not a difficult climb up to the grave: an elderly Mrs Prescott laboured up here the day Rhodes was buried, he reminds me.
The moss has turned yellow and papery on the slabs of stone. High up now in the afternoon light, the balancing rocks look other-worldly. It's not hard to imagine throngs of people toiling their way up to bury the man. Not far from him lies Jameson, then, on an outcrop, Coghlan. "It's a kind of Heroes Acre* for colonials," he says grimly.
The children chase a giant blue-headed lizard. "What's that box?" asks Bella. At the edge of the ledge is a memorial to the Allan Wilson Patrol of 1893. There's a carved frieze of the men round the edges. "To Brave Men," it reads. "That's where they've put the two brave men," says tow-haired Hunty, whose ancestor Huntsman W was an early settler.
"Don't run," we call after them.
I break off a piece of Resurrection Plant. If you sink one of these dark dried twigs in water, it turns green. My father-in-law turns to his cousin on the way down. "How much did they make you pay for this?"
"55 US," she says. "10 each for adults." We confront the woman at the gate. You pay one fee to get into the Matopos National Park, extra to visit Rhodes Grave. Foreigners pay 5 times the price of locals. We produce our Zimbabwean identity cards. "But you said you were foreigners," the woman protests. Why on earth would we do that, we ask. A riot policeman in a faded uniform appears. "Look in the receipt book," he says. We do -- and see we've been carefully entered in blue biro as Zimbabweans. So where's our change? "You can't have the money," the pair say in unison.
"It'll look like there's been fraud."
* Heroes Acre: burial ground in Harare where black fighters from the war for independence are buried (almost all ZANU-PF)
fuel
Fuel shortages irritate me, but not in the same way they irritate my husband's family. I will let the gauge sink down to empty and then happily drive for what I estimate to be another 50 kilometres with the red light flashing before reluctantly consigning the car to the yard. This horrifies my mother-in-law, who makes a habit of stopping "to top up" at every garage she passes. Those blackboard signs in Zimbabwean garage forecourts that say Petrol: No. Diesel: No are the stuff of her nightmares. I thought it was just one of those: we-do-it-like-this-and-you-do-it-like-that things until a weekend with the extended family in Bulawayo. "We always keep the tank full," says my father-in-law's cousin thoughtfully. "Always have done. It's from the war days.
"You had to be ready to leave at a moment's notice."
"You had to be ready to leave at a moment's notice."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)