Dearest Friends and Family,
Epic… According to the Oxford American Dictionary the meaning of
Epic is “heroic or grand in scale or character, such as: his epic
journey around the world.”
Well, I haven’t been around the world, just a bit of it, so I can’t
relate to that definition in particular, but I feel it’s a righteous
word to describe the last two months of my life. Other words of
description could be, chaotic, instructive, melancholic, exhilarating,
blessed, adrenalified… Ok, now I’m starting to make up words, but
hopefully those few paint a picture, for the experience has been all
those and everything between.
When I last communicated from Harare I was certainly in different
state of existence. My mind and heart were still fresh and raw from
my arrival; conjuring questions that I could not yet ask. I broke the
silence a few weeks later feeling more and more confortable in my new
home. Not more than a day after is sent out that email, I fell ill
after a late night out in Harare with Promise, Lemukani and
Kudaqwashe; the flu that had been following me since July had finally
sank its teeth deep into my throat, sinuses and frontal lobe. With
little option, I forfeited myself to it, sleeping away the following
day, not wanting to take any food and rendering fear in my host Mai
Reachi, Balance’s sister, who pole vaulted to the rooted conclusion
that I had contracted some African illness and I was going to die in
her home. Despite my reiterating comforts, she was only consoled the
following morning when I woke with enough strength to eat up a full
bowl of porridge and pack a bag, preparing for a night trip to a place
called “Kufunda Village” (www.kufunda.org).
I came into contact with the folks at Kufunda for the first time, when
I arrived in Africa in October. I had been invited to take part in a
workshop around “The Art of Hosting and Participatory Leadership” in
Johannesburg and was told that there would be a few Zimbabweans
attending. Intrigued, and with the help of Nathan Heller, I jumped on
board and was rewarded with what is promising to be a very fruitful
relationship to a living community based outside Harare, working with
many of the themes that I am attempting to introduce in Rimbi. While
there, for a short night and day, many conversations were had about
forms of support and collaboration between the Balance for Zimbabwe
Project and Kufunda Village. These possibilities have yet to be
deeply explored, but in the coming weeks I have faith that something
fertile will be unsheltered.
I made the eight hour bus trip with Lemukani back to Rimbi after
completing an order for the shop of twelve, two kilo packets of
self-raising flour, twelve two liter bottles of cooking oil, a twenty
kilo box of laundry soap, twelve two kilo packets of rice, a box of
pain-killers, four boxes of biscuits, two kilo’s of baking soda, some
razors and two bottles of cane spirit (not so much for the shop). It
was crammed in the bus along with copious forms of anatomy, but
comparatively comfortable to the trip bound for the city, where
Lemukani had to stand for half the trip and I only found a seat on top
of the partially exposed and steaming engine block, singeing my
buttocks for eight solid hours.
In the next few weeks leading up to Christmas, I was happily engulfed
in work for the project. I could really feel that things were
beginning to take form and after several conversations with some
enthusiastic people, I made a trip to the DRC chaperoning a Mr.
Phineas Mundeta and Mrs. Tariro Chibangwa, collaborators in our
initiative, to make a proposal for land. No, we didn’t travel to the
Democratic Republic of Congo, I can see now that might be confusing.
Instead it was to the Rural District Council in Chipinge. My bad.
The DRC is the one responsible for allocating and distributing lands
in the area for business, commercial or personal use. With the
support of Mr. Mundeta, I had written up a proposal asking for an 80
by 40 meter stand (roughly 34,442.6258 square feet, roughly). When we
arrived we had an incredibly successful meeting and made an
arrangement to meet in Rimbi within the next two weeks for them to
show off a few options for land. As per the arrangement, they came by
the shop around 3 o’clock on a Tuesday while I was selling with
Tariro. We hopped in the back of their pickup and zoomed about
checking out a few different locations and settled on one about two
kilometers south of the township and about four k’s from where I live
on the eastern side of the tarred road. It’s a brilliant piece of
land with a few nice, old shade trees. It’s right next to underground
piped water and a set of power lines bordering the western side.
Mr. Manjoka, the one leading the parade, explained that his job at the
DRC is to develop the rural areas; he said that this project at its
core is a development project, which I agreed with heartily, wondering
where he was going with all of this. He said in a sense the project
is actually supporting the DRC to do its job; so, in turn, the DRC
would like to support the project. “Meaning,” he concluded, “if
everything goes as planned, we would like to give you this piece of
property free of any cost. Mahala, in Shona.” SCORE!
This land is in addition to the one hectare that the Chief has
promised. The plan as of now is to establish this stand as the
project’s base, a foundation to work out from. After much
consideration, those of us involved decided it was smart to apply for
the stand in the legal way, through the DRC. Though it is a very
generous offer from the Chief, he will always have sole power over the
property he allots to us, and if we rub him the wrong way for some
reason or another, he could easily sweep it out from under our feet
with no window for questions to be asked. This way, the land is
legally in the hands of the Balance for Zimbabwe Project and its board
of directors and can only be seized by government authorities, which,
at this point, seem very much to be on our side! The other hectare
will unquestionably be utilized, but for now we will focus on
developing the stand.
Days before Christmas, I made the first official purchase from the
money I had fundraised over the last year. It was for 20 kilo’s of
mealie-meal, 5 kilo’s of beef, a bag of tomato’s and onions, cooking
oil, salt, some Royco, and four cabbages. With this we built a
snowman. Just kidding. I held the first public meeting for the
project under the mucha tree at the secondary school. After some
biting and lashing of wires from a makeshift power converter,
connected to a broken out lit, plugged in through the window of the
schools store room, we connected it to a pair or speakers. I had
gotten a fifth grader named Tenashe, who has more refined English
skills than myself, to translate what I had to say into Shona. He did
an awesome job much to the support and amusement of the people as I
spoke about the project for about twenty minutes before opening the
floor for questions. Tenashe and I were interrupted several times by
supportive ululations. After that we invited the fifty or so people
gathered, mostly woman, to eat a meal prepared by the Chibangwa
family, who I paid each ten dollars for their work (a grand amount
seeing that a teacher makes about $5 a day). While we were finishing
our food, I played some few songs on the guitar, to which many of the
women began to jive. After that we blasted some of the favorite local
music before the crowd broke up.
Christmas was brilliant. We set up a solar panel, a small amp and a
set of speakers, blasting Zimbabwe’s own, Alick Mucheso (
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BytGPqlcoxU ). The cattle at the top of the
mountain were likely jiving to it as we ate some of the best food I’d
consumed since my arrival. We drained the bottles of spirit we had
brought from Harare and got worse and worse at the makeshift game of
Horseshoes I had taught them how to play (or
‘throw-the-rock-at-the-stick’ as I ended up dubbing it). The
following day I slaughtered a goat in celebration of the
thirteen-year-overdue payment of labola (payment for a wife) for
Memory Chibangwa, Mai Chibangwa’s youngest daughter. Soon after
washing the blood off my hands we ate supper, goat included, dressed
up and headed to the nearest large town, Checheche, to attend a
concert for Alick Mucheso. I was one of two whites in the crowd of
four-hundred or so people and on account of that (and my madd skills)
I was invited onto the stage to dance with Mucheso’s crew who, I want
to add, ended up copying one of my dance moves! He played solidly
from about 10PM up to 6AM and everyone, including myself, danced
through the night.
The rest of December flew by busily with project and family related
business and the preparations for my father’s arrival. He came on the
1st of January after an eighteen-hour combi ride from Johannesburg.
He arrived, escorted by Promise, with swollen ankles, a suuuuper sore
ass and two huge bags with clothes and soccer balls to give away to
the community, all of it accompanied, as well, by a huge smile. His
time in Rimbi was a balanced mix of busyness and rest. I gave him a
good tour of the township; he saw the newly allocated stand and
approved it wholeheartedly; we visited many members of the community
who have now become my friends; we visited the shop a few times and
observed how we sell; we took a two day trip to Chipinge and Mt.
Selinda to see a few beautiful landmarks and get a tour of some UCC
facilities by a reverend Mutsumbei, with whom my father had some great
conversations and possibilities for future Ukama collaborations.
The only sad part of his visit was when it came to an end. We boarded
a combi heading for Johannesburg around 11AM on the 13th of January
and arrived around 6AM the following day. My cell phone was stolen
somewhere on our journey along with the 250+ contacts stored inside
and both my Zimbabwean and South African SIM cards. This made our
plans for the day much more difficult and we were forced to hang
around in the Park Station bus terminals until things began to open
around 8AM. Finally I tracked down the phone number of my friend
Lesley, who manages The Hub in Johannesburg
(www.johannesburg.the-hub.net) and boarded a taxi to 171 President
Street where we met a crew of people gathering for a communal meal
onto whose bandwagon we happily hopped. A couple hours later, after
my father had fully chatted off at least four pairs of ears, we were
offered a ride back to Park Station, crossing Nelson Mandela Bridge,
for my father to board another his last combi heading for O.R. Tambo
International Airport in Pretoria. I was sad to see him go. He had
brought a good deal of insight into some things I was struggling with
in adjusting to rural Zimbabwean life and had instilled me with the
inspiration to rock on.
So, now, two days later, here I sit, in The Hub again, writing this
eternally long email to all of you blessed souls out romping somewhere
on this green earth. This afternoon I will be meeting up with another
brother, Julian Mackay, who just happened to swoop down upon
Johannesburg during the few days I am here. Within the next day or
two, we’re going to head up together to Zimbabwe where I’m hoping to
employ him with a few duties (haha, doodies) on our newly acquired
stand.
If you have not sneakily skipped to the final paragraph of this epic
(there’s another use of that word!), and did actually read through
from its commencement, I commend you on your efforts and hope that it
only took you one afternoon. Know that I love you all. Know that I
am safe, happy and healthy. Know that with the good vibes you are
sending, and the support that you all have shown me in this endeavor,
massively cool things are happening in Rimbi. Keep them coming, and
I’ll do my best to keep you posted.
With a love that could fill all the barrels of oil that have spilled
into the gulf,
Peace,
Silas