All about my recent visit to Zimbabwe

Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe entrance

I had a two-week visit to Zimbabwe during the festive season. I had last been there in 2013 and was looking forward to going back to be with family and be “home”. After this recent visit, I suddenly started believing that home is not necessarily where you were born and raised, or where your father, mother and siblings are. We should gladly embrace our host countries as real homes, and Zimbabwe as our first home, our other home.

I really did not feel at home this time around because commodity prices were way beyond what I thought was normal, especially for anyone carrying the South African Rand in their pockets, as we did. Many of my rand-earning friends cancelled their visits to Zimbabwe when the exchange rate against the US dollar fell to an extremely unfavourable 16:1. Others still went home, but shortened their stay after their pockets quickly became depleted. A can of baked beans, for instance, was close to a dollar, that means it was about R16 when converted, and a 2 litre of Coke was R32. We buy those commodities for about R6 and R18 respectively. It didn’t help that the usual Zimbabwean problems such as power-cuts and water shortages still persisted. I had huge adjustment problems because in Manzini we hardly have power-cuts or water shortages, although Mbabane is currently having serious water problems because of the drought and has started water-rationing.
The people with the longest faces, however, were most civil servants. They did not get their December salaries until January 5th and are still waiting for their bonuses. 

A week before we even left Swaziland, which was also a week before Christmas, I had been informed that there was no electricity at my parents’ house in Rusape where we were visiting first. A transformer was said to have exploded.  I assumed by the time we got there, things would have normalized, but alas… We stayed there for a week and never saw electricity once. A small section of the neighbourhood was affected, so we were able to charge our phones at my aunt’s house nearby. That’s also where we kept perishables. The other option was to also charge in the car. It was a hassle, and I usually didn’t even bother to charge my phone.

As they say, every cloud has silver lining. We actually were forced to have candlelit dinner every day J. Not having power in the house also meant there was no TV and there was minimal use of mobile phones. I thought we would have to go to bed at 7pm for lack of entertainment, but for the duration of that week, we slept at around midnight almost every day. There were so many stories to share, and I always prodded my father to talk about ghost stories. He always gets animated when he talks about ghosts, as he says there were many in Dowa, west of Rusape, were he grew up. Everyone, including myself, also had a story to tell. Read here for my ghost story.

Uncollected refuse at the Rusape Bus Rank

I had done my nails for the holidays but ended up breaking themL while carrying pots from the fire where we cooked into the house and from exposing them to the fire while pushing bits of wood into it. I got ash in my newly-done weave trying to blow the fire after it had rained and the wood was damp. Eventually we bought a gas stove. Power was only restored on January 2^nd.

Now I hear there are fears of typhoid outbreak and that doesn’t surprise me at all. People just dispose of their refuse willy nilly. I hope the outbreak is quickly contained, because given the water crisis in the country, many people would surely perish from it. My sister has stayed in the low density suburb of Mandara for the past three years, and through all those years, has not seen a drop of water come out of her tap. Word on the street is that council decided those living in low density areas could afford to dig boreholes so they would not have water channeled to their houses. When we were in Mandara, we had to use water very sparingly and only took a bath from a bucket once a day. They have to buy 5000 litres of water for $50 and it lasts about 3 weeks. They also have to harvest water when it rains, and their pool has become another storage place for water to use for ablution purposes.

I enjoyed the communal way of life in Rusape, which I miss sometimes while I’m here. My parents’ neighbours lost a relative and one other neighbour called my mom from behind the durawall to inform her. As soon as my mom heard, she called her other neighbours from her sink behind the other side of the durawall to also spread the word. In less than five minutes of word of the death coming, many people knew. They immediately joined each other on the street and made way to the grieving neighbours to convey their condolences. That’s how it has always happened even when I was growing up. News spread like veld fire in the township. It would get really hectic if the news wasn’t so positive for your family, because it spread faster than the funeral ones. Woe betide if your child got arrested or pregnant, or if your husband was sleeping with some known prostitute. Everyone would know and talk about it. Read here about life in the townships, as I know it.

Children playing on the street in Rusape

It was sad to note how, because of the economic quandary Zimbabwe is in, everyone has been reduced to a vendor. Everywhere you turn, somebody is selling something. The streets were lined with people peddling their wares ranging from vegetables, second-hand clothes, cheap products from Chinese shops, everything. They have even bought small loudspeakers to lure people to their merchandise, which results in so much noise. If you park your car or drive in town, you are mobbed by people who walk around selling small things like foot powder, air fresheners, Zimbabwe flags, pirated CDs and DVDs, and all sorts of things. Sometimes their efforts to make you buy are borderline harassment, but you have to keep telling yourself that life isn’t easy here and they are trying to send their children to school, pay their rents, and put food for on their tables. It’s heartbreaking. You feel really guilty when you decline to buy something from someone because you can see the determination to make a sale in their eyes, but you check yourself and have to keep repeating in your head, “I can’t buy from everyone. Someone else will buy even if I don’t.” I did buy a flag on the street for $3 and my husband negotiated from $5. Speaking of streets, the potholes on them have grown in magnitude, and it’s almost hilarious to see all cars from left and right driving at their very extreme side as they all try to avoid the middle of the road riddled with potholes almost as deep as bath tubs

Vending stalls in Mbare, Harare

Despite the semblance of poverty, there are also pockets of affluence all around. People are building big and beautiful houses while being overcharged for building material and services. Zimbabweans have amazing tenacity. Because they have become so used to being swindled, some of them have become spendthrift without even realizing it. People pay ridiculous amounts for something and you are just left flabbergasted. My friend says she’s struggling financially but bought a facial product for $29=R464! I would never buy anything that overpriced. The same product, when on special here, costs R116=$7.25, would you believe it!

Because everything is overpriced, many people have resorted to buying second-hand clothes and shoes, in some cases even underwear, which come in huge bales from Mozambican ports. I had a glimpse at the financial results of a well-known clothing brand and noticed how it had done very badly. I just assumed it was because people were now looking for cheaper options.

Notwithstanding all the challenges being faced at home, I’m still super proud to be called a Zimbabwean, I had a great time with loved ones and was able to recharge my batteries. I will keep praying for better days for Zimbabwe. They will surely come. God hasn’t, can’t have, forgotten us.

Read here for my traumatic trip back to Swaziland.