Morning at leisure and transfer to the airport where out faithful KLM Boeing 747 is reassuringly waiting on the tarmac.
It is the end of another trip to Africa and again I am left with the desire to return. A trite, banal remark, but so true. More than that, I have an ardent desire to see a better Zimbabwe, one in which blacks don't have to regret having won their freedom because the previous racist regime ran things better. Zimbabwe is a rich country but its people are poor. Especially blacks. This need not be the case and hopefully won't.
17 August 1999
16 August 1999
17. - 16 AUG: Flight to Harare
Relaxing morning at our cliff-edge hotel before we have to start to get ready to return to Harare for a couple of days of shopping and visits, it's the end of this trip.
Uneventful flight, only a long annoying delay at the Vic Falls airport.
After check-in at our new hotel I asked for a recommendation for dinner. The hotel's driver takes us to a local restaurant and during the trip I asked him what he thought of the situation in his country. He is a very very black Shona. He is quite upset. Very upset in fact.
He says it was better during the Rhodesia times, when whites ruled the country.
I am flabbergasted, how can he possibly say that? I ask him whether he misses being discriminated against in business and education, not being able to patronize some restaurants and shops, and of course not being able to vote. He says, calmly, that yes now they can vote but there is only one party to vote for, really. More importantly, in Rhodesia they had no status but had jobs and were paid real money that could buy real goods and services. Now they are "free" of discrimination by the whites, but jobs are scarce and money is worthless. It was better before.
I was shell shocked during the whole dinner.
Uneventful flight, only a long annoying delay at the Vic Falls airport.
After check-in at our new hotel I asked for a recommendation for dinner. The hotel's driver takes us to a local restaurant and during the trip I asked him what he thought of the situation in his country. He is a very very black Shona. He is quite upset. Very upset in fact.
He says it was better during the Rhodesia times, when whites ruled the country.
I am flabbergasted, how can he possibly say that? I ask him whether he misses being discriminated against in business and education, not being able to patronize some restaurants and shops, and of course not being able to vote. He says, calmly, that yes now they can vote but there is only one party to vote for, really. More importantly, in Rhodesia they had no status but had jobs and were paid real money that could buy real goods and services. Now they are "free" of discrimination by the whites, but jobs are scarce and money is worthless. It was better before.
I was shell shocked during the whole dinner.
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