Zimbabwe journal: 2005 part 9

This is a journal from my trip to Zimbabwe in 2005. I stayed with my friend Louis in Harare.

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Yesterday was a humid, hot, violent weather day. Thunder and lightning disturbed the sky, and the wind blew fiercely in the afternoon. I went outside just to feel the approaching storm. I looked up in the sky and saw what looked like long-necked, long-legged paper airplanes soaring on the wind currents, black silhouettes against the dark grey clouds. One after another of these swooping cut-outs cut across the sky above me, finally coalescing into a flock of 12 or so who hitched a ride on the violent air currents to ride to the east.

This morning I was walking back from the gym and on the grass in front of the gate was a white bird, all white, with a yellow bill, long spindly legs and a curved, long neck, and I recognized one of the paper airplanes, though now domesticated, on the lawn. It was such a beautiful sight.

In the middle of the night a storm roared in, crashing and banging, with torrential rains pouring down. There is a hole in the thatch of the roof, with a catch basin below it usually used to carry the laundry, but left there by habit to catch the rain. They have tried several times to fix the hole in the thatch, unsuccessfully, and were waiting for a more thorough review of the situation. Last night the rain was pouring through onto the living room carpet. I got another basin, but it did not begin to catch all the rain, it would splash into the basis and hop out onto the carpet.

Water also poured in under the kitchen door to pool in front of the sink. I thought maybe it had come through the wall, but there is a gap between the bottom of the kitchen door and the floor and water came in through there. Must be cold in the wintertime.

The electricity went out for a few hours, but the lightning flashes lit my way through the house.

Coming back after arranging the basins in the living room, I noticed a red light flashing on the unit with the buzzer for the security gate. I wondered if the security gate was left vulnerable when the power went out, as it operates electrically. I learned this morning what I of course suspected – a person could never afford to have the security gate not functioning, it reverts to battery power when the electricity goes out.

This morning the earthen V’s between the road and the walkway are full of water, the small streams are pouring water, there are little lakes of still water settling into the lawn, and the storm is over.

Fall is beginning to come to this part of Africa, as I read of snowstorms and freezing cold in the northern hemisphere.

The next day another torrential rainstorm created more havoc. Water overfloweed the small creek between this house and the next, pouring under the steel gate and creating a torrent of water coursing along the back fence, pooling in the open “garage” (just a roof) and on the lawn, and creeping up the concrete base of the verandah. Close inspection showed that the house was safe from flooding, though the neighboring houses, on the back side of the property where the torrent was flowing, had water pouring through them. I called Louis to tell him to drive in the other gate, since the gate he usually came in would have flooded out his truck

It went away the next day, leaving behind worms, whose lives had been deeply disturbed, squirming along the wet grass. I saw one of them disappear into the mouth of a pigeon-like bird.