I grew up in Zimbabwe (or
Rhodesia as it was for much of my time there) and had an amazing
childhood. We didn't have all the latest gadgets or toys but we did
have incredible freedom to roam far and wide. Our house was in the
suburbs of the capital Harare (then called Salisbury) and our garden
backed onto open bush. Ironically, given the country was locked in
civil war for most of my childhood we were completely safe to wander
off on our own, miles away into the bush or wherever we chose. The
people of Africa (at least of Zimbabwe) are friendly and open and as a
child I assumed that everyone in the world must be like this - imagine
my shock when I moved to London!
My schooling was based on
the British system but stuck in a time warp from the 1950's. I did
exceptionally well in my studies but was, like most boys, full of
mischief too and as a result received regular canings from my school
masters. Beating a young boy with a 4ft bamboo cane would land a
teacher in prison today but then it was regarded as "essential". I
can't say I ever saw the positive side of it and to this day can
clearly remember the sense of injustice and indignity I felt ever time
I was caned (not to mention it hurt like heck).
Science and maths were far
and away my favourite subjects at school although I fared well in all
subjects. On the sporting side I was never a star but played rugby,
cricket, basketball and water polo in their respective seasons. Playing
rugby on hard baked clay that has not seen water in 6 months was
"character building" to say the least. I was never a fan of long
distance running and so the required participation in "cross country" 5
mile runs in the heat of the African sun was not the highlight of my
sporting calendar.
My
natural curiosity was
overwhelmed with the diversity of wildlife from elephants to matebele
ants and everything in between. I have a natural defence against
mosquitos in that they just don't seem interested in biting me (my wife
says I am too thick skinned!) and apart from the huge spiders that used
to come into the house when it rained I really loved all the
fascinating creatures I encountered. Somewhat lacking in the "self
preserving" fear department I often came off worse in encounters though
- for example when a group of large hornets (those black ones about 2
inches long with the narrow thorax) built a nest on the gable of our
house I promptly set to with my trusty catapult to remove the nest. I
succeeded in knocking the nest down and immediately set off at a fast
clip across the garden. Remember that I said I wasn't much of a
runner, well in this case I was truly flying, having been on the wrong
end of a hornet's sting several times previously. I was a good 150
yards from the stricken nest when the first hornet caught up with me
and set about exacting its revenge. I must say that following that
incident I was a little more circumspect when dealing with hornet's
nests.
Another incident involved a
snake (I have no idea what species but they are almost all pretty
lethal in Africa). I found the snake when moving an old tent in our
store room. It was about 3 feet long and dark in colour (friends of
mine suggested it was a black mamba but I can't be sure). I managed to
get the snake into an old fertilizer sack using a rake to "guide" it.
Thinking it would be a novel pet I put it into an old fish tank that I
had in the house and threw some crickets and grasshoppers into the
tank for food, finally covering the tank with a plank of wood.
Naturally I neglected to mention any of this to my parents. Luckily for
me (in hindsight) the snake managed to escape in the night and so I
never got to find out if it was deadly or not!.
I have many other great
memories including accidentally starting a bush fire near our house,
camping with friends and having all our food stolen by vervet monkeys,
catching mole rats for my A level Biology project and being most upset
that my mother would not let me keep the dead rats in the fridge until
the next day ("mothers - they just don't understand!" was the response from my Biology teacher).
I
spent a wonderful childhood in Africa and, much as I have grown to love
London, I still miss the wide open spaces, the ever present sunshine
and the friendly people. The smell of the first heavy drops of rain
hitting the hot, dry ground. The cool stillness of the dawn broken
only by the soft, rhythmic call of doves, the first rays of sunshine
already hot on your face. The incessant chirrup of the crickets at
night, their sudden silence alerting you to the presence of something
moving in the darkness nearby. And the colours...the red brown of the
dry earth, the yellowed stalks of grass, long since devoid of all
moisture, the inky black of the night sky pierced by a million stars.
In the rainy season, the white topped, grey based cumulus clouds, heavy
with the promise of rain that boil up into the sky in the early
afternoon, unleashing a torrent of water and ripping the sky apart with
spectacular lightening, only to vanish an hour later leaving the ground
steaming and the air, still and heavy. If you have not spent time in
Africa then, if you can, I encourage you make a point of doing so, it
is a truly magical place.
