Mhondoro

Last week I ran into Mark Hoskins, whom I meet every year at Zimfest; he was about to head out to Mhondoro to visit Cosmas Magaya - a noted mbira player and teacher who's visited us a number of times - so I tagged along. Mhondoro is an area of communal lands south of Harare, named for a big lion spirit. We met Cosmas' son Muda, a very good mbira player in his own right, and he took us down to Mbare Musika, where the big bus terminal is. We found a kombi heading our way... then waited 3 hours for it to fill up. In the interim we were solicited by an endless stream of vendors selling hats, knives, cosmetics, rope, candy, eggs, cigarettes, pop, sausages, combs, bread, popcorn, maize cobs... from one of the more engaging women, carrying a veritable tuck shop on her head, I bought a toothbrush I don't really need. I did need a rope, so bought ten metres, plus some rubber straps cut from inner tubes, to lash things to my ghost motorcycle, should it ever fully materialize. And I did need a knife to help peel my cucumber...

                                                  Hat and scarf vendor.

   Passed the usual police roadblocks - they tend to pull over kombis a lot, as there's usually something amiss that can turn into a fine - or bribe.

                      We arrived in Mhondoro at sunset, and walked a short
           distance down to Cosmas' grandfather's compound, here he now stays.

In the morning we went off for a tour of Nhimbe For Progress, the NGO that Cosmas co-leads.... but first he had to stop by his kraal to get a report on his cattle from the herdmen. Forty-five, mostly Hard MaShona Type, with a Brahmin bull. As in much of Africa, cattle are a Zimbabwean's bank account.

At the Nhimbe centre - the staff and children. Nhimbe runs a pre-school program, a health post and medicinal herb garden, a library, and a music program, and pays school fees for many local children who would otherwise be unable to attend school.

        The women at Nhimbe also sew to help raise money. All the staff  are
    currently working on a volunteer basis; there is a general shortage of funds.

    We finished with a performance by the Nhimbe youth marimba project,
                         with  the centre staff joining in the singing.

As we were leaving, two members from the CIO (Police Intelligence) unit of Mubaira Police Detachment, 27 km away, showed up - they had heard that two white people had arrived the previous day, and wanted to question us "about our mission in Zimabwe." I stifled a perverse desire to embark on a shaggy dog story about our CIA backers; they were just doing their job, and it was all fairly casual - they had had to take lifts down to see us, as their detachment probably didn't have a car, and they had no uniforms... in fact they were probably bored to tears most of the time. It does appear as though things are tensing up in anticipation of an election, though. In the end we played marimba and mbira for them, and they left with smiles.

We went home and spent the afternoon unwinding with some mbira. Cosmas, Mark, and Muda.



                                           Fetching water from the well....

                                                  Inside the kitchen.

                                                          The granary.

Playing a last song in the kitchen before departing. This kitchen has seen many famous mbira players pass through, and been the scene of many ceremonies (biras). Cosmas and his son Muda.

Thats MR. Elephant to you.

Usually I don't end up doing anything 'touristy' on my visits to Zim, but I've been intrigued by the canoe safaris offered on the Zambezi ever since Robbie (my Muzuva bandmate) did one during our 1994 trip. This was a three night trip called Tamarind, led by our guide Cloud and guide-in-training Takesure, and consisting of myself, 3 Norwegians, and an Australian family. We put in at the Chegundu border post after a three hour drive from Kariba.

 

It was fairly leisurely paddling, with a current running at 6-7 km/hr to help us along.

The big (literally) thing to watch out for were hippos; they can weigh up to two tons, and seem to be habitually crabby. They generally hang out in family herds of 4-12 animals, claiming one area of the river. As they often sleep on the bottom (their specific gravity means they can't float) and come up for air without waking, the lead canoe must knock a paddle on the canoe every so often to alert them that we're coming, so that they don't come up underneath the canoes. Then they watch you from the shallows, with just ears, eyes, and nostrils visible. (sorry, my ipod isn't really cut out for wildlife shots.)

Did I mention they were big? Hippo track by our first campsite.

                                                   Weaverbird colony.

Storm moving in from the Zambian side of the river.

Second night's camp. A huge wind came up that night and our tents started to migrate down the sandbar...

Hippo avoidance: single file along the bank. The idea is to not get between the hippo and it's escape route to deep water. Because they generally only feed on land at night, during the day we weren't worried about them piling down on top of us from the bank - but Cloud did tell us of a friend who had a juvenile elephant mock-charge them, then lose control at the bank edge and come crashing down into the centre of the canoe, smashing it in two. Everyone survived... but I was just as happy that the elephants we saw were at a distance. 

Sunrise on the river, last morning.

We pulled out at Mana Pools National Park; this is a hippo skull on display at the park office.

And an elephant femur...

After a buttock-deflating 5 hour drive back to Kariba in the back of a Land Rover, I unpacked at our backpacker's lodge and then went for a walk up the driveway, hoping to see an elephant we'd spotted on the way in. Unfortunately it spotted me first.... and charged. This taken from behind the biggest tree I could find.

I thought it would be content with scaring me off, but it kept coming, although I slowed it up by deking through the small trees.

At the lodge, it decided to take out it's frustrations on the garbage bins...

And then, satisfied, left. Ian, the lodge manager says there are regulars who visit 2-3 times a week, more in the dry season, and they tend to be grumpy. Grumpy elephants, crabby hippos... I have new appreciation for the quiet Zongororos that inhabit Kufunda.

In Chinhoyi with Patience

Stopped in on my way to Kariba to spend a few days with Patience Chaitezvi in Chinhoyi. Patience is a wonderful teacher of traditional music (mbira, ngoma, singing), as well as a secondary school teacher (history, religion). She lives in Chikonohono location in Chinhoyi, having bought a stand (lot) and built a house with earnings from her teaching trips to North America. It's a new area, and the infrastructure is still a work in progress.

Patience' house is on the right. She hopes to be able to afford to buy a car sometime in the next year.

Sign near the Chikonohono bus terminal, advocating a peaceful vote - a great example of Shonglish (mixing Shona and English.) There will be a referendum on the constitution this year, and Zanu - President Mugabe's party - is also pressing to dissolve the unity government and hold early elections.

  On my last day we went to visit the Chinhoyi Caves. Chinhoyi was the first site of armed resistance during the liberation war, and freedom fighters hid in these limestone caves. This is looking down through the entrance cave to the pool, which is up to 300 ft. deep.

Approaching the pool.

Zongororo

So in my first post I wrote about these little critters, which I kind of think of as the oompa loompas or doozers of Kufunda. They roam around the grounds doing their own thing, except when someone comes along and tries to convince them to hold still for a photo, in which case they roll up into a tight ball and poop. (That is zongororo poop at the top of the above photo.)

Usually they're on the move though, their myriad legs weaving in a beautiful pattern beneath them.

Zimbabweans will often refer to trains as zongororo...

but real zongororo can climb as well.

Chingodza Bros.

Headed back out to Murehwa on the weekend for a bira ceremony, stopping at Musekiwa's kumusha en route (if a 2 hour walk in and out can be considered en route) to record some ngoma with his brothers.

Jiti style ngoma like this is usually played by youths at night, most often during a full moon. On Saturday it was mid-day, and hot, but they went for it. Below, left to right: Tapera, Musekiwa, Musekiwa's son Tinashe, and Tapiwa.

We were supposed to record marimba as well, but ran out of room on the SD card.

At the end of the walk out on Saturday evening, approaching the Chigogodza shops to get a lift to the ceremony.

Travels with Musekiwa

 

Left Christmas Eve day for Marondera, about an hour east of Harare, to visit Musekiwa Chingodza.  (Musekiwa has come to Vancouver Island a few times now, and will be with us again this coming summer at Nhemamusasa North)

We spent a few days hanging in the Chipinda hi-density district of Marondera.

 

Mhofu (antelope - Musekiwa's totem) wanted to go to his father's home to consult before he leaves for his trip to North America in February. We caught a lift north.

Mhofu's father farms a piece of land at the base of a small hill covered in kopjes (rock formations common in much of Zimbabwe).

Many of the rocks have bushmen paintings from the period before the current bantu population migrated into the area.

Tuning the mbiras that stay in the dare, where ceremonies take place. Mhofu's father has two spirits, and people come from all over to consult with them.

The dare. The smaller building to the right is a ganary, where grain is kept for the spirits, which is then used to brew seven-day beer for ceremonies. 

Mhofu's father's place -- right of the photo is the new house they are building.

From Musekiwa's father's place we walked a couple km's across the hill to catch a lift to Chigogodza, the closest drop-off to walk to his kumusha (rural home). It's a 7km walk from there.

Nyagambe River bridge.

Mhofu's kumusha. His brother Crispin and oldest son Tinashe have been staying here. Tinashe is going to be starting Form 1 in Marondera this month.

Inside the kitchen hut..... most kitchens have a cooking hearth in the middle, and built in adobe shelving, as well as a built in bench along one side where the men sit.

Hanging with Tadiwa, Mhofu's third-born. His fourth-born Tanatswa was born three days before I arrived.

And then back to the city life for three days of errands. This is in downtown Harare, unusually quiet on New Year's day. Kariga Mombe is a centuries old song from the mbira, the first song most mbira players learn, and means 'to take down the bull', i.e. tackle your problems head-on.