Midway through a social (in all senses) experience in Zimbabwe
Two weeks ago the 12 of us landed in Harare, full of excitement and with very little idea of what expected us in the next 4 weeks.
Now half of it has gone by in the blink of an eye, and we’ve become family by living “Big Brother” style: sharing a house (with our separate rooms, thankfully), all of our meals, spare time and having our laundry done all together (please don’t tell me you think they separate it!).
Each of us come from different places of the world. We have different cultures, tastes, backgrounds, histories, genders, emotions, moods and differ on everything else that you can think of, being connected just by working for the same employer and the desire of doing some good — which is the primary reason we are all here anyways, participating on a sabbatical supporting local NGOs.
By now, we had a chance to explore around a little and see the beauty of Zimbabwe. Harare, the capital, is an interesting city, gorgeously colored in purple by Jacarandas, full of life with the crazy drivers and the kids walking around with their uniforms after a long day of school.
For me, it was love on the first sight. Despite all the problems that these people seem to face, with hours-long lines in the gas stations, fulls days without power, sometimes no water, and so much more, they still carry around a smile and resilience that I don’t seem to find in most other places, specially in more developed countries (including the US, where I chose to live), where we are so spoiled and clueless, complaining about tiny little things that here would be considered luck.
We’ve also paid a visit to Mbare, the old town, a place where poverty will hit you as a punch in the face with no mercy, and spreading fast with kids running around barefoot. In Mbare I could see another side of Harare, maybe the real side of it. Saying the life there is challenging doesn’t even start to describe it. I can’t imagine how hard that reality is and it seems very unfair that we have so much, while they have so little. At least in material possessions.
After seeing that, I’ve decided to start a fundraiser on Facebook to try and help just a bit, and next week we’ll go back to Mbare to deliver the donations in form of food and school supplies, but another post on that.
For now, I’m glad that our temporary family is having fun. We visited Victoria Falls this weekend and had a blast. We keep sharing our meals and laughs every day and have a lot more planned in the next, or last, 2 weeks starting today.
The balance so far has been of a very positive social experience, both for us co-existing as group, and for the NGOs that we are supporting. Hopefully that will still be the case after Oct 26! ;)
