Music exams and Life Lessons

I have spent that last two days at the Zimbabwe College of Music, accompanying various members of the Royal Air Force band for their music examinations. One of them discovered that I play piano, and there aren't a lot of pianists in Zim these days, so I ended up playing for all of them. It was sort of nice to play some classical piano again, and the guys seemed to really appreciate it. Last Saturday I was playing the piano at the O.T.C. (Salvation Army Officers' Training College) and 4 young people walked in. I ended up giving a group piano lesson. I taught them some simple chords (C, F & G) and this one guy was just thrilled because he was able to sing a song he wrote using the 3 new chords (plus a little A minor). I must admit, all of those years and hours of piano practising had much more meaning as I saw this guy's face light up.

The examiner for the air force exams is a lady from the West Indies who has relocated to Zim. We had a great time together. Today she brought her adult son to the exams with her, because he really loves music. He is mentally challenged, and she said he really connects with music, and it soothes him. She also said to me today, "you know, people look at me with my son and they feel pity for me. But they shouldn't. Nicholas has made me who I am. He taught me to be gentle and kind and patient. I would have never learned those things on my own. I owe him my life."

Shame, Shame

Death has befallen us. When we came home yesterday we discovered that one of our banana trees had collapsed onto our herb garden. We suspect foul play. Sure, it could just be that the bananas were too heavy for the tree but the neighbourhood kids looked a bit too guilty for it to have been just an accident. There are these other Murungus (white people) who live nearby and are always chasing the kids away from their guava and mango trees. Most of the little kids are afraid of them, so I'm going to be relaxed about the whole thing. Kids will be kids. When we left home this morning my friend Va Mafigu was chopping the tree down completely for me. When my neighbours saw the fallen tree and my squashed herb garden, they said, "shame, shame." That's a common phrase here when something goes wrong. Like my mangled sage and basil. Shame. But there are three smaller banana trees that will hopefully mature soon so that they can produce fruit.

The good news is that after a few classic mess ups, my garden is doing quite well. It's been a great connection point with my neighbours and they've started telling Rochelle (or Amai Shoko - people have decided that her totem is monkey) that I'm a good farmer. They're exaggerating but it is exciting to see things growing. We now have carrots, onions, green peppers, chillis, eggplant, tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, covu, rape, green beans, pumpkin, butternut squash, beans, garlic, chives, basil, purple basil, rosemary, three types of thyme, mint, sage, strawberries and lots of flowers. We should be able to eat vegetables regularly from the garden within a month. We also have banana trees, a full-grown guava tree and a small avocado tree. We're planting a lime tree and a naartje (orange) tree this weekend. As you can tell, gardening is my new hobby. And quite productive. Rochelle said that I had to mention the sacrifice she made by carrying the naartje tree for over four kilometres. To be fair, I was carrying the much heavier lime tree. Rochelle got quite a few smiles and cheers by carrying it on her head most of the way. Unfortunately, I think she now has a headache. It will be about two years before we can expect fruit from the lime, naartje and avocado trees.

We purchased a small camping stove this week so that we can cook when the power is out in the evenings (usually at least three times a week). We've usually been eating peanut butter or avocado sandwiches when the power is out, but we can't keep that up. Especially since our breakfast and lunch normally consists of peanut butter sandwiches as well. The stove uses a flammable gel made of sugar cane that is supposedly cleaner than other fuel sources for the environment (David Suzuki would be proud). The gel and stove were imported from South Africa. It seemed a better option than cooking over a fire in our backyard. I cooked some onions and green pepper with the stove yesterday and it worked great.

I found a spiritual director to meet with once a month. He's a Jesuit priest who has been in Zimbabwe since 1964 and his parish is in the community where we live. We had a really great session earlier this week and I think meeting with him will be beneficial to my spiritual development. I also think it's healthy to have someone outside of The Salvation Army to speak with.  

Thanks to everyone who has been sending us e-mails. We've really appreciated hearing from you. And feel free to drop us a line through the blog as well as all comments get forwarded to Rochelle's email address.

Happy Canada Day!

Happy Canada Day! We decided not to set fireworks this year, just in
case... but we did listen to Avril Lavigne as we had breakfast, and
handed out Canada flag pins to all the neighbourhood kids.

And I thought I would tell a funny story to honour my homeland (even
though it has nothing to do with Canada). This week, our territory was
visited by the International Leadership and Development Secretary from
International Headquarters of The Salvation Army. So, our human
resources task force met with him to share ideas, etc. At one point,
this one very respectable, distinguished senior member of the task
group was talking about how the group had spent over a year working on
a policy document. And he looked at this Salvation Army Colonel from
England and said, "I've got to be honest. That shit took a hell of a
long time." The Colonel almost fell off his chair, no one else
flinched, and I did my best to suppress my giggles. Is it bad that I
found that really funny? The thing is, he really wasn't trying to be
rude at all - here they're just not considered to be bad words. Maybe
because it's in their second language? In any case, I guess people are
getting to know me a bit here, because It was decided on Friday that
my totem is "monkey" (whereas people automatically thought "lion" for
John! Hmmm...)