18 AUGUST 2011

GREAT ZIMBABWE RUINS

Leaving late this morning because Fin has locked his valuables in the safe here at Packers Paradise and can’t r retrieve them until the Boss arrives and they have had a car breakdown. The taxi is waiting half an hour for us and he kindly doesn’t charge us!

Eventually we get to the bus station, find the correct bus, it’s nearly full and soon enough we’re off to Masvingo, arriving to get a local taxi out to Great Zim by 1pm. We walk 1500m first to the hotel, then another 1500m to the park gate then another bloody 1500m to the accommodation where we get to check in. We are kindly offered a small lunch by the staff before we walk further still to be shown the dormitory, which has a very strong chemical smell. The lady assures us that it’s only the cobra and will soon dissipate. THE WHAT? I am imagining a poison to get rid of snakes and Fin imagines that it’s the smell of the cobra snake??? We ask again a couple of times and eventually she explains that cobra is a floor polish! Soon enough we settle in to our powerless gulag with promises that the power will return later. But we still have enough time this afternoon to explore our surrounds. We begin at the museum but don’t find it too enlightening in there.

Basically any investigations completed have not revealed any purpose or history of the ruins, nor why the Great Zimbabwe collapsed, just suppositions! But I did witness 4 zimbabweans replacing 1 light globe that still didn’t work. We try the café for a cuppa – no tea. They have coffee. We will have coffee. No, no power. Do you have anything? Yes tea and coffee. Just not now – no electricity.  We laugh at the incongruity of the responses, imagining what a gas bottle and ring could do someone enterprising. We head on into the ruins using the modern path to ascend the Hill Complex. A Geckos tour group are here and returning downhill, all 22 of them and at times like this I am grateful to be an independent traveller choosing how long I will stay here and what I will see. Fin and I spend a few hours clambering over the rocks for gorgeous views of the surrounding countryside, alas Fin didn’t bring his camera. We hear drumming and Fin is adamant that it’s genuine and from that real village below. 

We walk down the Ancient Path to investigate and meet up with a woman also walking there. After consulting the map we find it’s a ‘reconstructed’ Karanga village, purely for tourists. They start dancing to welcome us but thankfully Fin assures them that he has no money. I confirm this and the non- commercial, traditional dancing sadly comes to an end. 

We check out the woman’s pots, leave as soon as is polite and find ourselves very close to The Great Enclosure. Still enough daylight to make it around these lower parts of the ruins, more rocks, bricks but here is the only recognisable construction other than a wall – probably a granary. Fin decides to try running back to the Gulag to get his camera because the light is lovely now at dusk and I dally about looking for shortcuts. Fin reappears – no time to get his camera but he shows me the next shortcut back to the Gulag. Still no power here but we both have enough food for dinner without having to cook, especially Fin who cooks double quantities for himself and travels with a tupperware container for the leftovers! Not bad for an 18 year old, eh?

As we sit in the fading light I go back to get a knife to cut my apple but the thieving monkeys are quick and grab some of my fruit! Fin takes chase and just about catches the thief! The monkey only got away with a tart and Fin saved my apple. What a hero! As night falls we decide to walk to the hotel for a few hours of modernity and on our return we find we have power, it’s not freezing in the gulag and in the morning the power is still with us.

I get a hot shower, we boil water for a hot breakfast and all is good in the world again. Suddenly the gulag doesn’t look so bad and I briefly consider another night here but know that time is against me now. Fin returns to the ruins for photos and I slowly pack, get my change from the office and meet a canadian who knows a great shortcut out of here that misses the hills back to the road, completely! We get to the road and within five minutes we’re picked up to return to Masvingo. I walk to the bus stop and catch Zim’s slowest bus to Harare – a four hour trip turns into eight hours and we finally arrive at 4pm exhausted.

My seat partner was a lovely young lady returning home from boarding school in Masvingo who was lovely to talk to during a long trip interrupted by numerous police roadblocks and checks. Ahh memories of Nigeria

FACT: The papers are reporting a suspected  case of witchcraft, where a family in Bulawayo have been left dumbfounded and in distress after their six year old daughter developed a ‘mysterious’ disease that resulted in her left hand falling off. And her remaining hand has since desiccated and is at an advanced state of decay! The report goes on to describe the efforts of her mother taking her to a clinic and being referred to a hospital where the girls hand fell off. The mother lost hope with scientific methods and then sought the aid of ‘prophets’. Mrs Ncube says her daughter is no longer experiencing pain, and “it is clear that this is the work of the devil, this is the worst kind of witchcraft one can ever experience. What sort of disease results in arms falling off?  It is really queer and we are finding it hard to come to terms with it.”  I have to say that in the photo, the young girl does not look distressed, but is certainly short one hand and about to lose the other!