A funny thing about Zimbabweans

Zimbabweans, and I guess I'm talking mainly about the whites here, let their children walk around everywhere with their shoes off. Have I mentioned this before? I mean, I'm from the South, but rules (laws?) about wearing shoes in restaurants and stores and such are pretty well enforced...or rather, there seems to be a general consensus that it's a good thing to wear shoes.

But here you will see moms taking their kids grocery shopping in proper grocery stores with no shoes on (gross!). Or in the nicest neighborhood steakhouse, you will see families having Sunday lunch, and the kids will be walking around in the restaurant...in and out of parking lot, back yard playground and bathrooms!...with no shoes on! (Double gross!)

It never ceases to amaze me.

Another funny thing about Zimbabweans is that pretty much all the kids wear uniforms to school, and in the case of big high school boys, they are still wearing what amounts to a short-sleeve button down, with a tie!, tucked into a pair of elastic-waist cotton shorts made from the same material as the shirt, and I'm talking above the knees shorts, knee socks the color of the shirt and shorts pulled up to the knees (always!), and brown or black leather shoes. And kids put up with it! Can you imagine anything more humiliating for a strapping 16-year-old young man than to wear that? Girls have sensible, cute little dresses, but the boys look like total idiots.

And what's even a little sad is that a lot of grown men continue to dress that way. Having been in Muslim countries for 5 years before coming here, I still cannot get used to seeing a man in a pair of short-shorts...at work! Even shopping, I'll just see a grown man out of the corner of my eye, his big belly almost completely concealing what is probably his old school boy shorts. It's too much!!

But it's just the way things are here.

random man at work lunch... You should have seen the other guy.

From Global to Local: UN Day & Halloween

...does Halloween count as local?

Harare International School Celebrating UN Day 2010

This was our first UN Day at the school. A big part of it is a giant food festival with parents from all corners of the world setting up festive tables with favorite dishes from their country.

As a member of the PTO, I volunteered to take on an additional little project for the elementary school. There had been complaints...can't we do anything that is related to the UN or is somewhat more educational than experiencing food? Thus, the UN passport project was born.

It's funny how a little idea can turn into a month-long endeavor involving hundreds of people. We made fake  little  passports with each page being a flag of a country represented at the school.

We set up immigration stations with middle and high school volunteers who represented a few countries each and had flags waving. The kids had to find the flag that matched the one in their book and answer three questions: 1) on which continent is this country? 2) what language do they speak there? and 3) what is a typical dish you could eat there? Either they got the answers themselves or they got a little help from the immigration officer. Then they got a stamp in their passport and moved on to the next flag in another area of the world/campus. There were different passports with different flags, so there were nearly 25 different countries. After visiting 6 countries and getting 6 stamps, they came back to passport control for a prize which was a small gift from the embassies like flag pins or origami kits or whatever.

And every child got a t-shirt...it was pretty cool, if a tad bit chaotic. More than 150 kids participated, and they really seemed to enjoy it which was frankly luck...who knows what kids older than mine like these days?!

In addition to the food and passport game, there was a flag ceremony in the auditorium where a flag from every country represented at the school was carried in by a student from that country who then went up to the mic and said "hello" in their native tongue. Not sure why, but it is strangely moving, especially for the adults who were fighting back tears. Me, too. Funny.

Halloween was celebrated on that same day. We went straight from school to a friend's house for a quick beer and to change into costumes before heading to the Marine's House. Luckily, we were invited by our "buddy family" (Sheryl & Vaughn) to the marine's halloween party which they throw for kids of embassy staff. Yes, the marines. They provide security for some of the embassy staff.

(One of Miles and Eliza's friends from school is the daughter of the head marine. And yes, I do find him a wee bit intimidating. One of his marines bar-tending at the party said he'd almost rather be in Afghanistan where you are ready for danger. "Here, people get complacent and let their guard down." "Right, can I have another beer?" Sheesh.) 

The marine house brought back memories of fraternity houses, except this one had zebra skins and POW banners in addition to the foosball table where Miles spent most of his time until the contortionist/magician showed up. Talk about cringe-worthy. Nothing like a bunch of small children watching a man pretend to make another kid (his assistant) swallow a large object that then magically popped out his rear. (Don't try this at home!)

My Husband These Days

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For those of you who need another glimpse of him in his hat.

Little by Little

We moved into an unfurnished house in May. I had about 3 weeks before we left for the States in June to figure out how to fill the gaps. Nights looking at Home & Garden by the fire. Ah. Some furniture of ours was shipped here: couch, our bed, an end table, a couple of kid chairs and dressers. I wanted to make this house seem like ours and not just a temporary residence, but most things we will probably not be able to bring with us, so no point in investing in something terribly nice or unsalable. So here's some of what it looks like thus far (a work in progress).

The "lounge"...our living room / den...is the largest room and is both the formal and informal family gathering place. 

We need something bigger over the fireplace and more on the walls. The teak coffee table and wicker seats are new. We have a matching love-seat in the office. The bookshelf is one of a few things we had made by a local carpenter...by far the cheapest option.

Replacing the curtains was my least favorite project - but here they are.
Better than rose polyester with silky mauve tasseled trim. 

Kid's corner.

Love seat in the office.

One of our new local paintings,

Veranda off lounge...where we eat meals, do homework, socialize. Life in Zimbabwe is spent on the veranda.
All this furniture is locally made: simple and cheap.

We bought this old wicker set, had it patched up and stained, then reupholstered the cushions.

We were going to rip the bar out and make a den, but then we had a big party and decided it was useful.

We moved the bed under the window which means no view of the garden but morning reading light.

And space in the bedroom for the art deco vanity with cane chair, essential equipment for playing dress up.

Domesticity

I feel like I'm just playing house half the time.


Me in my robe, house-shoes and glasses helping the kids in the car, checking that backpacks are remembered and everyone has clean faces. Kisses all around. To Miles: remember to be considerate to others. To Eliza: be a good listener and do what your teacher says the first time. To David: be productive; don't play computer games.

I carry a large flowery cotton tote that can serve as a shopping bag. I purchase a vase for cut flowers from the garden. I make bar cookies for guests of the soccer tournament at the school as part of my PTO responsibilities. I wear an apron on the weekends. And yoga pants. 

I organize play-dates in the afternoon, coffees with other stay-at-home-moms late morning (after the early morning workout), and make arrangements for dinners and parties. I ensure the children make birthday cards for their friends. I pick them up at school and drive them to swimming lessons.

I make dentist appointments for the whole family. (Well, in theory...I'm working on it.)

Most of the time, I'm on autopilot. I make my lists. I drive around. I draw lines through the items on the list. I check the schedule. Have I forgotten something? (the groceries in the trunk again? the meeting with the school counselor? pick up time?)

But sometimes - like when I'm wearing the apron and stirring muffin mix, and my husband comes in and gives me a kiss on the cheek, and I say, how was golf? - I think WTF. This is hilarious. Somebody get the camera.

Winter Garden

Make a Plan

This is the motto of Zimbabwe. When you can't get what you want, you "make a plan."

Today, I was with my Austrian friend, Bettina, who has lived in Zimbabwe for six years. She checked her mailbox. Curious, I asked what she was expecting to find there. "A parcel," she said in her German-Zimbabwean accent. I've never lived in a country outside the U.S.A. that had reliable postal service, so I was intrigued. When I'd had my Mom send a test package, it never arrived, so we'd given up on it as an option here.

"Oh, it's quite easy," she said. "A month after it's sent, you just follow up with a petition. We get parcels almost every month from my parents." Follow up? "My parents file a report with their postal service in Austria, and that usually gets things moving on this end. I think the Zim postal service can assume all unclaimed packages after a certain period, so they just hold on to them unless a petition is filed." Right. "But you mustn't let your family send anything during the holidays. It's too tempting. Usually a few things go missing. My parents always write the contents of the parcel on the inside of the carton now so we know if anything's missing."

"And there's customs. They only allow $75 worth of goods to be mailed in per month per family, and anything over, they start charging 40% tax. We made the mistake of leaving some price tags on some toys once. Now we make sure everything is roughed up, and my parents put fake price tags on them for 25 cents or 50 cents. We can always say they were sold at a clearance sale or yard sale. As long as it adds up to no more than $74, it's not a problem. It was quite a hassle getting the trampoline in. My sister unpacked the whole thing, rolled all the pieces around in the dirt and packed it up again. You know, during those years when it was crazy and you couldn't find anything here, you just had to make a plan. But it works quite well. We get parcels every month."