This is the fourth in an ongoing series of posts that capture journal entries from my incredible trip to Zimbabwe in 1997. You can read more about my motivation for the journey and why I’m revisiting it now in the original post. I recently got all the photos from my trip digitized so this and future entries will have accompanying images.

Part 4
6/28/97, Chitungwiza, Zimbabwe
Jennie called me at Mark and Tony’s, she seems to be holding up pretty well compared to me. I cry every time I think about her. It’s hard to be so far away. Last night I told some cousins of Joseph’s that I had a boyfriend and that I lived with him. But I heard also that the CHIYSAP theater group has written a play about a relationship between two women. So maybe it isn’t such a big deal, but I probably shouldn’t say anything except to California Francis’ queer friends in Harare. One of them has already called the office, but I wasn’t there, we are playing phone tag (as best we can with the limited number of phones around here).

When I first arrived at the house where I would be living for the next 6 months, it was in the company of about 10 people. The house is actually pretty big, but it is surrounded by a tall fence and all the windows and doors have bars and locks. For my first meal, we all sat in the living room with the television on. Clair, the youngest woman, went around on her knees and poured warm water over everyone’s hands (mine and the men’s, that is), all the women were in the kitchen helping to prepare the food.

I guess that I am deferred to as a man because I am a foreigner. I have not been asked to prepare food yet or wash anyone’s hands, I hope it will stay that way. I prefer more manly conversations since most of the women want to ask me silly things about America and tell me that they want to be a movie star or a musician. Last night at Joseph and Talita’s house, I talked with one of Joseph’s relatives about the place of women, religion and the Bible. It was actually more of a friendly argument since he is a very traditional Zimbabwean male. He thinks women do women’s work in the kitchen and with the children. Some women do wear pants here so I’ve been wearing my jeans. A lot of the women and girls who are involved in CHIYSAP are very progressive it seems, but some of the things I tell them about America still shock them.

So after the hand washing, my first meal in Zimbabwe proceeded. It was alright except for the chicken feet floating in a reddish sauce that was meant to go over rice and some extremely unattractive looking pieces of chicken. I haven’t had sudsa yet (the “staple food” of Zimbabwe, it is something like corn grits), I think I’m still getting the special treatment. After dinner I got to see my bedroom which is actually about the size of my room at home, with the same sized bed, except that I am sharing it with Anna, the ‘maid.’ I don’t think she is too happy with the situation. She moved her clothes out of the closet to make room for mine and now she has to share a bed with a snoring foreigner, oh well. She does most of the housework: laundry, cleaning and cooking, as well as taking care of Kuda the baby. I think she is also related to Francis.

Additional food/drink notes: Bread and butter with jam is served for lunch, snacks and appetizers. It is just plain white bread, like Wonderbread at home. I do enjoy the beer. Castle Lager is like Budweiser here. Everyone drinks it and drinks a lot of it.
Continued in Part 5

This is the third in an ongoing series of posts that capture journal entries from my incredible trip to Zimbabwe in 1997. You can read more about my motivation for the journey and why I’m revisiting it now in the original post.

Part 3
6/28/97, Chitungwiza, Zimbabwe
Morning in Chitungwiza. I’m finally here. A few days ago, yesterday in fact, I would have said that I hated it here and wanted to go home, but now I’m a little better. I’m truly in the third world now. Mark and Tony were great, but their luxurious white life is not to be mine here. The bus I took to Harare was the size of a minivan, seating 6 of us comfortably. All other passengers were white South Africans or Australians. We stopped every so often at Ultra Shells, gas stations with restaurants bathrooms and convenience stores. We ate out of a picnic basket brought along by the driver. It was all very nice. we got across the border fairly quickly, although I was told not to mention the computer equipment. It was a 13 hour trip and I passed the time talking with an 18 year old South African boy named Jayson. He is staying in Harare for a little while with relatives and has a car there so maybe I’ll spend some time with him while I’m here. No one has a phone in Chitungwiza so I have to make my phone calls at work. The landscape was not so interesting, but still very different from home. Very dry and dusty, hot; we went over some hills or mountains. Zimbabwe has large rock formations in many areas so I saw a few of those. Mostly trees and dense brush. I saw a few large trees that looked like baobab trees along the side of the road. It is warmer in Zimbabwe than it was in South Africa. When I wake up in the morning it has been overcast, I force myself under the fall of the cold shower which causes me to see my breath hanging in the air in front of me as I stand between the cement walls of the small room that is both toilet (without a seat, my thigh muscles have been getting stronger) and shower.

The bus left Johannesburg at 6:00am and arrived in Harare at almost 7:00pm. I sat in the hotel for a while waiting, it took Joseph a while to find me. I realized later that his vision is not very good. He also has some interesting teeth, and I thought European teeth were bad! They brought two cars and I met everyone outside in the dark. Joseph and Talita, who run CHIYSAP, their daughter Claire (I thought her name was Cle for a while, but it was just the accent), Francis and his wife Florence, who I’ll be staying with, and their small son Kuda. We drove the 25 kms south to Chitungwiza. It is an all black town, like the townships of Sowetto and Alexandria in South Africa. I was told later that it was originally built to house 30,000 people, it now holds 1.5 million. Needless to say, the people that live here are very poor. This place is huge and right now it all looks the same to me, hopefully I’ll be able to find my way around soon. I’ve already talked to one of the guys in charge of motor mechanics to try and find a cheap motorcycle for me so I can get around on my own. Right now I am dependent on Francis’ failing car (it has questionable brakes), my own two feet or taxi/bus, very frustrating. I need to go into town (Harare) but won’t be able to go until Monday. I wrote some email though, so people wouldn’t be worried about me.
Continued in Part 4

This is the second in an ongoing series of posts that capture journal entries from my incredible trip to Zimbabwe in 1997. You can read more about my motivation for the journey and why I’m revisiting it now in the original post.

Part 2
6/22/97 9:40pm, Johannesburg, South Africa
I am safely ensconced in a clean white bedroom in an affluent white South African suburb with Mark and Tony (friends of Francis) after a fairly hectic day. I slept most of the day before in Malaysia, going down for meals alone. Strangely, they always sat me at the same table, must have been a special place for unescorted women. I sent a fax to Jennie and put it on my credit card. Later in the evening I got a call telling me that my flight had been ‘retimed’ to 8am. I panicked for a bit, then left a message on Francis’s answering machine asking him to call Mark for me as I didn’t have his number. In the process my credit card stayed in my address book and caused me another panic when I went to pay the phone bill (about $3.00 US) and I couldn’t find it. I finally did get it back into my hands but for a moment there I was feeling pretty low. I got across the street to the airport in plenty of time to check in and find my gate. They let us all into the waiting room at 7:15am and we sat there for 1.5 hours, then they announced that the flight wouldn’t go until 10, when we finally got on the airplane we sat there for a while. We were not in the air until noon.

It took 9.5 hours to get to Jo-burg (1 hot moist towelette, several glasses of juice, 2 meals, 2 trips to the bathroom, 2 movies, a long nap, many games of solitaire, 1 letter and the creation of 1 friendship bracelet for Jennie). I sat next to a nice white South African couple who were very polite. The airport was not complicated, I got my bags and went right through. I guess they had a sign but I didn’t see it. Tony recognized me from a description and I was found. We drove in their BMW around the city center, stopped for a beer at an Irish pub (all the people in there were white), went to the grocery store which wasn’t much different than ours and came home to dinner and a shower. I’m now in bed. It’s dark and I can’t see much of the surroundings, definitely a suburb, strip malls and big malls all around. The black people I see here are walking along the streets and working in the grocery store. We passed by Alexandria on the way here.

Flying over Malaysia and Africa, looking down at a very different landscape. I mostly could see the areas around the airports; housing tracts, vegetation, dirt roads, mines or other manufacturing close by too. All sort of spread out, some paved through-ways to and from the airport. In Malaysia, there were vast tracts of what looked like palm trees from above, growing fairly neatly. From above it looked like a carpet made of green stars squeezed out of a frosting tube, a very dark green. Maybe they just grow that way. On both the South African and Malaysian coasts, there didn’t seem to be much transition between the sea and the land, there were no waves and no beaches (no surfing?). The flat blue of the sea met the flat green of marsh, only extending shiny tendrils of water into it. Once above the ocean it was flat and only slightly textured with tiny ridges. I thought it would be choppier I guess. The sun was dazzling and the small puffs of clouds cast shadows on the blue water.
Continued in Part 3

In 1997, when I was just 21 years old, I lived in Zimbabwe for 6 months. I worked as a project manager for a non-governmental organization called the Chitungwiza Integrated Youth Survival Alternative Programme (CHIYSAP) and lived with a family in Chitungwiza, just south of the capital city Harare. I planned this trip with the help of my friend Francis, who had been to Zimbabwe before, and the International Development Exchange which was one of CHIYSAP’s donors at the time.

This trip wasn’t part of any specific program, it was just something that I decided that I wanted to do. I paid for it with my own money and made the arrangements with the help of Francis and IDEX. Looking back on the trip, it now seems like a very brave thing that I did. I’m not sure that I would embark on such a journey now. To remind myself of the risk-taking person that I was and can be again, I’ve decided to start posting excerpts of the journal that I kept during that time. This will one, get me to type up the journal (something I’ve been meaning to do for a long time) and two, serve as a reminder that I can accomplish anything I set my mind to. Here’s the first entry:

Part 1
6/21/97 2:50pm Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
It’s overcast and heavily humid outside and in the corridors, but my small room is a potential icebox with high powered air conditioning. My hotel is directly across the street from the airport which is convenient but a 40 minute bus ride from the city center. Not being quite the seasoned world traveler, I’m opting to stay in my nice room in the comfy bed, napping and reading. Boring, but safe. I’ve already been accosted by men eager to carry my bags for me and do other small favors(!) I suppose I need to learn how to say no and really mean it. The meals on the flight (12 hours LA to Tokyo, 6 hours Tokyo to Kuala Lumpur) gave me terrible gas so I’ve been eating very cautiously. The hotel has buffet style meals combining western standards and local foods, so far I’ve been sticking to familiar starches like dinner rolls and pasta but there are lots of interesting fruits which are very fresh and sweet. CNN is on the television with world news, the shower is almost hot (I practiced washing my underwear in there, which I’m told I’ll have to do in Zimbabwe) and the toilet won’t flush no matter what I do. My legs have been itching, I hope it’s not a food allergy.
Continued in Part 2

This month you can find Hedonist Artisan Chocolates listed in Fast Company magazine’s Best of Artisan Chocolate write-up.

This is our second mention in a widely distributed national magazine, the first was in Country Living, March 2010. Someday soon we’ll have a full article!