December 15, 2008

I am a 70 year old white widow living in Zimbabwe. My husband died in May this year and apart from the house, I was left destitute because his only child, from a previous marriage, did not want to share any inheritance. Suffice to say, I had no option but to survive and the only way I could do so was to sell my furniture, jewellery and anything else I had, just to earn some valuable US $ and with careful economising, painting, and selling my work, growing my own vegetables and limiting myself to one meal a day, I’ve kept going.

I am luckier than most, but only because I still have the ability to ‘make a plan’. I couldn’t afford a dentist, so I pulled out my own teeth. I couldn’t afford a doctor, so I stitched a dog’s bite on my arm with needle and thread. I look after an African family who have nothing - all seven of them - trying to ensure that they get food and whatever else I can find to keep them going. I have a young white family living in a cottage with their two babies, and a young bachelor living in a thatched hut, whose salary doesn’t even cover his basic needs and together we form a ‘family’, looking out for each other and doing the best we can to keep going.

The only thing I have plenty of is loneliness and spare time, and I have put out feelers to try and join some Non-Government Organisations to go to the rural areas to help with the cholera epidemic. I am not a qualified nurse - but I care deeply and I know how desperate the situation is, but have not had any luck, because possibly they think me ‘too old’. But I am not! My whole life has been directed towards looking after disabled servicemen, orphans, and now the indigenous folk of this country. There are those of us who are fighting not only for our own lives, but for those of our countrymen. The fancy cars seen on the roads today belong to Government personnel and Party officials who live in luxury.

I heard of two elderly white people who lived in a disused shed. They used to own a house and a car, but found themselves with nothing when they had their land and home stolen. A kind African let them live in a shed on his property. On their wedding anniversary the wife went out and sold her wedding ring. She and her husband decided they would have one last night out on the ‘town’ so they went to a hotel and had a great dinner and shared a glass of the wine they had left over from their night out, curled up into their blankets on the stone floor, and  died. They had poisoned themselves and were found holding each other in their arms as they couldn’t bear to suffer another day.

Every story is different. I am still here and refuse to let go. There are too many people left in this country who need compassion, care and hope to go on. Although there are organisations and charitable groups who try to help, there aren’t enough of them. But the solution lies with all of us here - black , white and coloured, to start caring for each other. It takes more than courage, it takes fury and grief to explode into action.

I have taken in people who have had their families murdered in cold blood, and experienced such fear you cannot imagine the enormity of it. I have sat up through the nights watching the house and listening for intruders. There are so few of us left now - maybe 2000?

Today, I ventured into Harare city, and I saw a populace of ’stick figures’ robotically going about their business, faces closed and dull. Starvation, AIDS, cholera, anthrax and extreme poverty has robbed them of all hope. It was not all those years ago, we saw glossy fat women with their babies. Today, I did not even see one baby on the back of a mother. The High Court was empty. No staff, so I could not get on with the Estate of my late husband, but that no longer seems so important. Everywhere we see the portrait of Robert Mugabe in every government building, but nobody looks at it much any more. Fly speckled and faded from the sun, he just hangs there as a reminder of the horrors he can impose. I live not far from his residence, Government House, and in the past we could hear the screaming sirens of his cavalcade proclaiming ‘the master’ is in our presence. Today, there is no fanfare, just secrecy of his journeys, because he is afraid - good! We’ve all been afraid for too damn long.  Our fear has persisted as babies, children, men and women are murdered.

I have no intention of leaving this land in which I was born. I belong here as much as my darker skinned country man. I love this country, and the people who inhabit it. And that is why I am a proud Zimbabwean. Every day we receive a small gift - be it a couple of tomatoes from someone’s garden, or a small bunch of wild flowers and that’s Christmas. We are poor - but we are richer in other senses nobody can understand unless they go through the torments this country has faced over these last few many years. We yearn for light at the end of the tunnel, but refuse to pick up arms and kill others as we have been killed. We wait for justice,  not from them, but from a Power beyond our capacity. It will come!

To all those who live elsewhere and who have never experienced the deprivation that just one man can dole out to millions, let me tell you, it is a testing experience. There are many here who do what they can to make the ‘oldies’ leave this vicious world, feeling loved, regardless of their colour. This is just my story. Multiply it a thousand times - and include the human greed that makes it harder for us to withstand the hardships, but which is prevalent in all humanity regardless of race and creed. Above all, learn from it, because - but for the Grace of God there goes You.”

With warmth, from an old white Zimbabwean woman,

Sue.

(Source: by email)