Anyway, so in the newsletter, they go over some of the projects they’re working on, and this one I just love:

Village Banking

To reduce hunger while elevating the most vulnerable families out of poverty through the conversion of an on‐going micro‐lending program to one based on goats as the currency.

The Africa Centre had launched a village banking program that eventually served 500 women who used the profits from their microenterprises to feed their families and send their children to school. By using livestock as the currency ACHM could more than match Zimbabwe’s inflation: not only do they maintain their value, they also produce offspring, thus outpacing inflation. Five banks, of 20 families each, have been formed following six weeks of training in the three pilot communities.

Each family has been loaned 10 goats (a minimum of 9 females) for three years. Interest is due annually (3 goats per annum) until the loan is repaid. (Interest payments provide the goats needed to start new banks). Goats were selected as the currency because they often kid more than once a year and can also produce twins. In theory, this reproductive rate should allow families to grow their herds, while consuming some animals, selling others, and repaying their loans.
 

That’s genius — Zimbabwean currency is worthless, they’re suffering from crazy superinflation, so there’s no point in giving cash loans. But goats! Who doesn’t love a goat-loan? I would like to deal in $Goat, please.

Wait a minute. If I got paid in goats, I’d be getting a small herd every two weeks. Um. Wait. No, nevermind. I’ll stick with $CDN.

Yes, the picture is a donkey, not a goat. I didn’t have one of a goat, except for my silly dog, and I don’t think that would have fit. But it’s a LITTLE donkey. Roughly goat-sized. Cute, too.

This post is possibly inspired by the fact that I love the word “goat”.

Sept 27th – Early mornings, water, and flat tires.

For the last two days, we haven’t had to get up til breakfast (at 8)… and yet, I’ve been up before 7 both days. Damnit! I hate waking up when I don’t have to.

On Wednesday night, the water stopped. The power went out, too … but that’s back on, so it’s not much of a concern. The lack of water, on the other hand, is a bit more disturbing. We have some brought in (Gladys, who likes to think of us as her children when we’re here, wouldn’t DREAM of letting us go out without full water bottles) but showers are at a premium. Hell, being able to flush the toilet is at a premium. I thought it was a pain in the butt when we had that boil water advisory last year… but turning on the tap and getting nothing? THAT’S annoying.

The water ended up being intermittent for the rest of my trip. According to the staff, they had discovered the problem, (a broken underground pipe… somewhere) but the town couldn’t afford to fix it permanently, and even if they could, where would they get the supplies from?

Still, there are hand-operated pumps here and there, so water could still be had. Just not from the tap.

We also have flushing toilets, after a fashion. The ladies who take care of us so wonderfully get buckets of water from the swimming pool, and pour them into the tanks. Of course, each flush required another bucket of water… but I’ll take what I can get. Yep, we’ve got the “if it’s yellow, let it mellow; if it’s brown, flush it down” rule.

The “run for the showers” is pretty hysterical. “We have water?” “Yes.” “HOT water?” “Yes.” *insert stampede here*

Given that it’s bloody hot during the day, and we’re often doing manual labour all day… showering is good. You start to feel pretty disgusting after a few days without a shower. A few people hopped into the swimming pool to at least rinse off, but while I wasn’t terribly comfortable being ridiculously hot, I also wasn’t going to be comfortable jumping into a freezing cold swimming pool. Yow. (Yep, the pool was cold — it’s winter, so the temperature at night dropps down pretty low, and with the shaded back yard.. it never really had a chance to warm up.)

Yesterday, we headed into the park — my fourth trip, so nothing terribly new to report, except that halfway through the day, we blew a tire. Great. 54 km from civilization (I was watching), and we’ve got a flat… we were able to change it no problem, except one of the other tires was looking disturbingly low. If that one blew, we’d be in for a long walk through a lion-infested park. And yes, we saw two more lions on the way back. The tires held. Phew.

How depressing is that?

Current black market exchange rate: $20,000,000 ZIM to $1 USD.

Black market exchange when I left: $320,000 ZIM to $1 USD.

Official exchange rate: $33,000 ZIM to $1 USD.

…yeah. Wow.

I dreamed I was on an overlander tour, and evidently had no idea where I was… but things started looking familiar. So, I asked. And it turns out, we were near Hwange Natl Park. I got terribly excited, and begged to be able to stop at Miombo, and quickly gave directions to get there.

And it was absolutely awesome. I got to see Nathan & Kailos… Simon & Gladys… all of the kitchen staff & groundspeople & housekeepers and I was simply so excited to see them that I could barely connect words together.

And then I woke up, and was obviously NOT in Africa, and hell, even the Zimbabwean art that has graced my walls for the last little while has been taken down and carefully packed so that I can move. So, I snuggled with my dog and wished I could dream of Africa…

My savings are still pretty depleted at the moment. I think I’ve got … like, $100 in my savings account. Woo-boobly-hoo. I desperately want to go back, but god knows I’m terribly financially irresponsible, and getting there is going to be hard. I don’t have RRSP’s to cash in this time around, nor do I know of any windfalls coming my way. And… in the last few months, thoughts of Africa have been sliding further and further away as I think of more immediate things I want to spend my hard earned cash on. Like moving, for instance.

But… I really, really need to knuckle down and start saving. I won’t forgive myself if I don’t.

To take that particular serendipity a little further… read their page on the Painted Dog Program:

The Painted Dog Conservancy employs local people to carry out anti-poaching efforts. Over the past several years, the Anti-Poaching Team has been extremely successful in reducing the mortality rate of the African Pointed Dog by collecting the snare wire in the conservancy. Once the wire was gathered, however, there was the issue of successfully disposing of the wire. The PDC developed an arts and craft centre in a nearby town called Dete. The Iganyana Arts Centre has developed local artisans to create beautiful intricate art from the snare wire. This serves two purposes. It removes the wire from the country so it doesn’t make its way back into the park and it provides income to the artisans and the local town from sales abroad. The transformation to the town of Dete has been significant. This small town was fading fast but thanks to the Iganyana Arts Centre it is thriving once again. Mountain View Gift Shop is one of the locations that carries snare art from Iguanyana for sale to our supportors and visitors.
 

Yeah. I helped collect some of that snare wire. I purchased gifts from the shop they mention. I was living in Dete. We even went to see the kids bush camp facilities. I was at the new conservation centre the day it opened.

You want serendipity? Now THERE’S some serendipity. It’s a little bit of my African trip… about 15 minutes away from where I grew up.

That’s Angela — one of the resident painted dogs at the rehabilitation center in Dete. I am completely blown away that this organization who has helped THIS DOG SPECIFICALLY (and more!) exists so close to home.

Sometimes I’m not sure I believe in coincidences. I mean, how likely is it that I would discover this organization only 4 months after visiting the Zim center? I don’t necessarily believe in signs either, but … I’m thinking I should definitely volunteer there.

(See more of what I wrote about visiting the conservation center here and here.)

The exchange rate in Zimbabwe is now 5 million Zim to one US dollar.

That’s. Fucking. Insane.

The downside of thick accents and odd spellings is … well, I often get things spelled wrong. So, I was quite pleased today while looking at the Wild Horizons elephant page to find information about both orphans I met… evidently it’s Chizi, not “Cheesy” and Tembi, instead of “Tambi”.

Chizi , the orphan from Chizaria national park, is doing very well ! Enjoying the walks and spending lots of time playing with Tembi both on rides and also at the stables in the morning. Both are almost 9 months old now but Chizi remains very small in comparison, only half the size, yet double the stubbornness and determination of Tembi. Chizi had a very bad infection on one eye and we are not sure yet if she has lost the sight but she is a survivor and will cope fine even if she has!

Tembi is a runaway train on the morning walks – all the pent up energy has her flying from Gavin to Chizi to Mum for a drink and rushing and stumbling and falling over continuously – what a brilliant sight it is to have them both on a walk plus the bonus of Izibulo . Izibulo now almost three years old, has been trained with nothing but affection and rewards. He responds to “trunk up”, “salutes”, “head shakes” and “talks” to Gavin with rumbles when asked – the perfect example of how with love and devotion one can get a perfect response out of an elephant. Tembi at only 10 months old, is already “trunk up” to Gavin for her cubes!
 

So. Cute. Still think I could keep an elephant in my apartment. Chizi’s just little! She’d fit! Right? Hello? Hello? Anyone?

One learning child. One connected child. One laptop at a time.

The mission of One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) is to empower the children of developing countries to learn by providing one connected laptop to every school-age child. In order to accomplish our goal, we need people who believe in what we’re doing and want to help make education for the world’s children a priority, not a privilege. Between November 12 and November 26, OLPC is offering a Give One Get One program in the United States and Canada. During this time, you can donate the revolutionary XO laptop to a child in a developing nation, and also receive one for the child in your life in recognition of your contribution.
 

I tend to be a bit hesitant of a lot of the “western” aid given to developing countries. But this just seems really awesome. It’s not a handout, it’s an educational tool.

I played with kids at one of the schools in Dete, in rural Zimbabwe… and y’know, these are some smart kids. By 8 or 9, they’re functionally bilingual — far more than your average Vancouver kid taking french classes. (French immersion aside — ask me in a few years how bilingual Carol Ann is, I’m not sure how well that works yet.) They can read, write, do math, have good geography skills, and so on and so forth. They’re not uneducated by any stretch.

What they are is poor. They lack resources. The books in the school are ragged and out of date. Their uniforms are old and falling apart, and many of them don’t have shoes. A lot of the kids are orphans. But they still go to school every day, eager to learn. They’re not lacking the drive… they’re lacking the tools.

Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Give a kid a laptop… and who knows?

I love this project.

Zimbabwe Travelogue Index

September 24th – Red Cross

The Big 5 group is here (5 of the people who joined us for the Pathfinders course two weeks prior), and they’re getting their orientation today. So, since Tara & I had that a few weeks ago, they had to find another way to occupy us. And, since it’s Monday… well, Red Cross it is.

We were dropped off at the Red Cross at about 10am, which is entirely too early, since nothing really needs to get started until about 11. We both had brought books, so we were reasonably well occupied. Around 11, we started helping with the cooking — sadza & baked beans. (Are they baked when they’re done in a cauldron? Hmm. Boiled beans? Who knows. Cooking isn’t really my thing…)

I’m always amazed at how incredibly strong the women are here. (Well, the men as well, but this relates to the women, so…) These are full on cauldrons, like a stereotypical witches cauldron — double double toil and trouble style — and they first get mixed in with a long handled whisk. It looks quite easy, but … sadza is bloody thick. It takes some serious muscle power to get that whisk to spin. These women do it as though they’re stirring tea.

Once the children arrived, we started handing out plates. They get absolutely gigantic portions, as far as I’m concerned. Very filling food, too. But they devour it like nothing else, not a single one leaving anything behind on the plate… from the smallest child to the largest. The age range tends to be around 8 months to about 12 or 13, and they generally all get the same amount. There’s one child who’s 16 who comes (but due to illness, appears barely 12) … they feed him, but he’s not allowed to eat with the other children — they put his food into a tupperware container and send him on his way.

It’s just as heartbreaking as it was last week.

One woman brings in a little girl… the woman has a wooden leg (with an obviously snapped-off missing foot) and the child is the skinniest baby I’ve ever seen. She appears about 10 months old or so (but could very well be older — judging ages is nearly impossible) but her neck is so thin I’m amazed she can hold up her head. Her legs are like sticks.

I’ve met a lot of picky eaters before — my sister being the one that comes to mind first. It’s funny… when I was growing up, there was always the line “Eat everything on your plate, there are children starving in Ethiopia” … and before that, I’m told the line was “children starving in China”. And so on. Regardless of how old you are… there were always starving children in some far off place. Well… there are starving children in Zimbabwe, and now that I’ve seen them, fed them, played with them, and taken pictures of them… it seems like a much more valid reason to eat everything on your plate than it did when I was a kid.

My sister is a bit of a picky eater. I want to show her these kids and make her understand why it’s such a shame to leave so much food behind. But hell, she’s not-quite-six. I didn’t care about theoretical children in other countries when I was six.

The problem is… they’re no longer theoretical to me, and it breaks my heart.

—

Ok, this was seriously funny, and really ruined the “somber” mood I was in while writing: As I was writing up this journal entry, sitting on my bed in my room with the door open… a monkey popped his head in. I was a bit startled — when the curtains started moving, I was expecting Tara, or maybe one of the cats. Nope! Monkey. In retrospect, I should have taken his picture… but I was a bit too shocked, and instead shooed him off. Cheeky monkey.

I’m really starting to understand where the term “cheeky monkey” comes from. They really are cheeky little bastards.

September 23rd – Back to Miombo

We said goodbye to Bethany this morning (She’s off to Antelope Park), and Tara & I (along with most of the people from the Big 5 group we’d done Pathfinders with) went back to Miombo. It’s good to be home.

Last night, we went to Shoestrings, a backpackers hostel/local drinking hole in Vic Falls. We had the best pizza I’ve had in a month … heck, the ONLY pizza I’ve had in a month. It was delicious. There’s nothing like comfort food. Along with the ice cream we had on Thursday, the diet coke I got from Wimpy’s, and the bath I had at Villa D’Afrique, all of the “comforts of home” that I was missing have been fulfilled.

It’s Sunday, our usual day off — for whatever reason, Sunday’s tend to make me a touch melancholy. I usually spend them as much by myself as possible. This is my last full Sunday in Zimbabwe — I leave for Johannesburg next Sunday, and then for home on Monday. I’m not ready. I really don’t want to go home yet…