Far and Wide

As a ten-year anniversary present to Cheri, I sent myself off for a five-day excursion into the wilds of the country, leaving Cheri and Jonas behind to fend with increasingly long power cuts, a faulty home security system, and a short supply of groceries, half a roll of toilet paper, and cash that had to last us three more weeks until payday.  (You’re welcome, Honey!)  But since you’re more likely to want to hear about my week out and about than Cheri and Jonas’ week in (although they did have plenty of fun, too), here’s a rundown of what I got to experience.

Five high school teachers and 40 tenth-grade students boarded up onto three tour buses Monday morning at 8:30.  We were told to expect a four hour trip to our destination, with a bathroom break halfway through.  Thinking that this short trip wouldn’t be too much trouble, and having my iTunes and headphones to drown out much of the noise, I unwisely chose to board the bus that had ten girls and no boys on board.  Seven hours later (including two drained laptop batteries, twelve Justin Bieber albums sung by my fellow bus-mates at the top of their lungs, two fights about which girl was being the most annoying by screaming too loudly, four police stops to verify the legality of our tour bus, and three very costly wrong turns on deserted logging roads), we finally got off the bus at our destination and I kissed the first adult I saw.  (His name is John, and this action is illegal in my host country.)  Our trip wasn’t so bad until the last few hours (three hours to travel the final 19 kilometers on dirt roads).  In fact, the first few hours were quite lovely.   Here are some pictures of the landscape, including some of the misnomered Halfway House where we stopped two hours into our journey.

 

one of the few stores we encountered outside of the cities

 what my now vast experience tells me is a typical family farm

 

some of the freely roaming cattle—these were nice and weren’t blocking the road

 technology!

 

 Halfway House—an old farmstead now turned into a quaint shopping center

  one of a number of antique tractors on display at Halfway House

Aside from overly excited, screaming teenage girls, the trip was quite lovely.  It was fascinating to see the countryside that lay beyond the city limits that had confined my experiences up until that point.  Take my word that these pictures do not do justice to the views.  You’ll have to come and visit to see for yourself!

Once we arrived to our destination—Far and Wide Adventures, the students were shown to their cabins, and the teachers were shown to ours.  While the students had to rough it in sleeping bags on bunks, the teachers split two chalets.  I shared with two other guys.  We had a two-story chalet with a kitchen, living space, two full bathrooms, a sauna, a fireplace, and a second-story balcony that overlooked the forested valley below.  We each had our own bed with plenty of comfy pillows and heavy down comforters, and the staff would clean up after us and light a fire each afternoon while we were away with the kids.  We didn’t want to leave our lodging, but when we did, we spent the hiking through the forest, camping overnight on a cliff’s edge (~760 meters fall down to the valley floor), and watching the kids negotiate a high ropes course (emphasis on “high”—some parts were over 50 meters high in the eucalyptus trees!).  On the last day, the three male teachers teamed up to compete against seven other teams of students in an orienteering competition.  Lionel (40) entered with a torn meniscus, John (36) was an overweight Scott, and I’m still carrying my sympathy weight from Cheri’s pregnancy three years ago.  We had originally convinced our two female teachers to join in, but the 14 kilometer course convinced them that the sauna sounded better.  (To their credit, we had just hiked 12 kilometers that morning to see the water falls, so the sauna did sound rather nice.)  We kept running into one student group that we thought we were in stiff competition with, and we more than once nearly killed ourselves running up a steep, rocky incline to stay ahead of them.  But when we finished the course and found out that we were first, we were surprised that our time of two hours and twenty minutes was the best.  We waited for other teams, but eventually gave up and showered.  We got out of the shower and went back to the finish line to see the second place team finish 40 minutes after we had.  Not bad for three badly out of shape men!

Here are some photos of our time and the landscape at Far and Wide:

 

main dining hall

looking from the dining hall onto the student cabins (left) and teacher cabins (right), with a fire lit in ours if you look carefully

 part of the high-ropes course

 the aforementioned 760 meter cliff face

 Mutarazi Falls—either the first or second tallest falls in Zimbabwe

 a monkey—I swear

getting ready to swim at the top of the falls

Finding the Rules

As of noon on Friday, Kurt was leaving for a 4:30 flight to South Africa.  We arrived in this country on the second of August with a temporary, 30 day approval to be in the country.  Kurt's visa (applied for in April) is apparently still sitting on someone's desk. The school has been working these past thirty days since our arrival to get us extensions.  In fact, they've had weekly, unfruitful meetings with immigration for months. Jonas and I were granted thirty more days on Thursday, which we found quite humorous considering we were not the two that have employment.  Surely if any of us had to go, it would be Jonas and I booted back across the border for a few days.  At 12:30, after the plane tickets were bought and the hotels booked, Kurt got the news.  The department employee was too busy to deal with Kurt and five other teachers' passports; so they recommended (this from the Dept of Immigration themselves!) that Kurt stay in the country with his illegal unstamped passport, and they would try to get to things the following Monday.  It is Thursday and we are still waiting.  On Monday my illegal husband left on a week long trip with a group of students to the border of Mozambique, paper copy of his passport in hand.

It has become quite clear.  Most of the country's departments are being run with a pair of die.

We were told to expect power cuts upon arriving in the city.  But in America, that means that something has gone wrong, weather or transformer issues, etc, and someone is out there hanging from a power line trying to fix the problem.  In this country, power cuts are a daily way of life.  These cuts occur because the country supposedly has a limited amount of power and different neighborhoods are cut off at different times so electricity can be used elsewhere.  (Of course, certain important homes never lose power.)  Power cuts last anywhere from six to ten hours, and can range anytime from 5 am to 11 pm. In the month we've been here, we have had one day without a power cut.  Generators, inverters and spoiling food are a way of life.  (Funny that we just cram in using more power when we actually do have it!) Citizens are constantly told there is a schedule to outages.  But in the thirty days we have written down the timing of our cuts, not a pattern can be found.  There is a vervet monkey sitting somewhere behind a switchboard waiting for me to put something in the oven so it can erratically flip a switch that cuts our power.

We know of two people here who started the adoption process for their two children five years ago.  For five years while papers have been processing they have bonded with their kids, caring for them and seeing to all of their needs.  But five years later, they are still jumping through hoops trying to clarify what more they must do to officially be the parents of the children they've been raising so they can return to their home country.  Among other things, they have been told that each child will cost them $50,000.  Now desperate, the father has had to return to the home country, visa denied, while the mother has managed a small extension to stay with her two a little longer.  They don't know if this is their last year together before she is deported.  (Apparently we will not be adopting any babies here after all!)

For police officers, who make the equivalent of some housekeepers and gardeners, it is understood: most of their livelihood will come from demanding bribes.  It is not uncommon for people to be pulled over for imaginary traffic violations before being threatened with going to jail if they don't pay.  Police stops are more than common, and usually result in a large pay-off.  On Kurt's trip with his students, his bus was stopped three times within the first three hours of the trip alone.  Just don't let them ask for your passport, Kurt.

I could write another fifty paragraphs of examples.

Power here, is not just in the hands of the person who has money.  It is in the hands of any public official, company, or organization that spins a wheel.  Arbitrary rules are dependent upon the official trying to make them up and enforce them, whether it is the police, airport security, immigration, garbage men, or even the bus driver.  It is hard to learn to navigate in a world of changing rules.  We keep our fingers crossed. And carry extra cash.

Pieces of Learning

-Everything from socks and underwear to towels and sheets are ironed here.  It seemed insanely meticulous until we learned that flies lay eggs in wet clothes drying on clothes lines.  The ironing is not to straighten things; it is to kill the fly larvae.  It must be done to everything, much to the horror of my two year old and his newly-washed stuffed puppy.

-Speaking of eggs, eggs here are never refrigerated. Not at the grocery store, and not in people’s homes.     People keep their eggs in cabinets here, despite the fact that there are egg spaces in refrigerators here, too. 

-Birds of Paradise flowers are everywhere.  I can’t control myself; I walk down the street and keep estimating how much they would cost if I were buying them in a US flower shop.  We have had at least one cutting of them in the house since the day we moved here.

-Shopping bags are a luxury. Many stores do not provide them; those that do charge for them. 

-It is very consistent.  No matter what time of year, there are approximately 12.5-13.5 hours of sunlight. Parties often start around 4:00 in the afternoon so hosts can have some hours of daylight outside before people need to go home. Likewise, things start/open very early here to make use of the sunlight. Schools most often start between 7-7:30 am, and shops most often open between 7:00 and 9:00 am.

-Drunk driving is a huge problem in our city.  It is advised that people never go out after dark. But that’s okay; 6:30 pm here feels like the10:00 pm we just left in the US.  Things are pitch black at 6:30 and hardly anyone is out.

-“Teatime” is sometime between 9:30 am and 10:30 am here.  For most low income locals, it is like a snack time consisting of tea with bread and butter.  For higher income individuals, it is a snack time with tea and treats like muffins, bars, and specialty breads. Lunch then usually happens sometime between twelve and two.  It is followed from 3:00-4:00 by another tea time.  Does anyone work around here?!

- The country has amazing fresh fruits and vegetables.  However, we can’t find a green or yellow banana to save our lives.  Every American we've talked to is desperate for a banana.  Oh, there are bananas here for sure. In fact, there are carts people push around the city selling only bananas. But they are all sold brown.

Score!  The yellowest banana we've ever seen in this country.  We took a picture for some friends.  Who would believe us?!