Matopos Painted Huts

-
Happy that my article on the beautiful Matopos huts made the front cover of the latest edition of Nzira. Thank you to Pathisa Nyathi for his invaluable help with the research.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

In Search of an Author: On the Track of Agatha Christie

-
Image
In a hot, airless little room in Bulawayo, an elderly man rummages through disintegrating brown envelopes and rusty files.   Faint labels carry captions such as: ‘Railway Staff 1932-33’ and ‘Wages March 1952’.   There are dusty black and white photographs on the wall of men in dark suits and hats.   Unsmiling, they all look alarmingly similar with their handle-bar moustaches and their arms crossed resolutely across their chests.                 ‘No.   I thought I might have something, but no.’ He reluctantly admits defeat, so convinced was he that he might be able to help me in my search. I am in the archives of the Railway Museum in Bulawayo.   The buildings themselves are run down and we are surrounded by the great hulks of rusting train carcasses. The museum, now a separate entity from the National Railways of Zimbabwe, is run by a couple of train enthusiasts, who are extremely kn...
Read more

Rhodesia's Forgotten Soldiers

-
Image
It is a hot, dusty day in early November.   Splashes of red, orange and pink bougainvillea line the road, like fireworks frozen against the vast blue sky.   Lady Stanley cemetery sprawls itself out as far as the eye can see: order has given way to expediency and every available space is taken.   Wreaths of fake flowers in garish colours spell out names; shiny foil ribbons flicker in the sunlight or wave limply in a stray wind. A minibus emblazoned with the words ‘Exodus Funeral Services’ bounces manically down a narrow road separating the Muslim part of the cemetery from the rest and, in the distance, a blue and white striped gazebo marks a current internment.                 The war graves are relatively easy to find, being enclosed by a low wall and demarcated by neat white lines of headstones, standing straight and tall. The heat beats down on me as I read the inscriptions: Labourer, Cepha...
Read more

Christmas in Africa

-
Image
 As I write this, it is 35C, the sky is miles and miles and miles of unpunctured blue, and the air is hot and still.  I am sitting in the coolest room in the house, escaping the heat outside.  As I look around me at the Christmas tree in the corner, the tinsel adorning the pictures and the stockings hung next to the fireplace, I think like I always think at this time of the year: wouldn't it be nice to be somewhere cold? And then I think, no.  It wouldn't be Christmas if it wasn't hot. I was ten years old when Band Aid brought out Do They Know It's Christmas? I remember my dad, who was very cynical of western do-gooders, scoffing at the lyrics,  And there won't be snow in Africa this Christmas time.  Of course there won't, he said.  There never is.  It is generally very difficult for people in the northern hemisphere to imagine a hot Christmas and I don't blame them.  What is strange though is to try and have a cold Christmas in a hot country...
Read more