Zimbabwe today

My local advisor D took me to the flea market at Avondale shopping centre where he had some contacts for buying Zimbabwean (Zim for short) dollars. Even though last week saw the legalization of buying and selling goods in foreign currency (US dollars), it only applies to 152 designated places nationwide. Many other shops and restaurants do accept US dollars, but for some items you need local cash.

Since the reform earlier this year the bills don't carry a ridiculous number of zeroes. Instead they look rather familiar to someone living in Zambia where the 50000 kwacha bill is the normal "big bill". For my fifteen US dollars I got nine billes valued 20000 Zim dollars each. Apparently the 50000 bill is to be introduced today, which probably will hike the inflation a bit more. Therefore D decided to wait with with his own money changing, to get the better rate that probably would have developed during the day.

Moving around town gave me the impression that the long lines in front of the atms were even longer than yesterday. The reason being the daily limit of a 20000 withdrawal per person being raised to 50000 Zim dollars.

The sad look of empty shelves greets you every time you enter a supermarket and so far I haven't been able to find bottled water in any of them. But imported Belgian beer in plastic bottles were plentiful.

Driving around Harare on a motorbike in October is lovely. Hot, but the breeze of speed is still cooling. Traffic is more intense than in Lusaka, but still relaxed. The medium-high risers in the city range from 70s to 90s design, very little of the socialist concrete seen in other southern and eastern african capitals is to be found.

The dickhead president isn't very present when you just glance at Harare and Zimbabwe, but the abandoned and partially burned big farms I saw on the way from the Zambian border constitute a distinct reminder. The motorcade passing on Borrowdale road when I had my breakfast at the peaceful Cocoa Tree Coffeeshop gave a surreal impression. When the normal police motorcycles had passed followed by a couple of black stretched Mercedes came two small trucks with the open backs filled with special police sitting sideways fronting me, dressed in camouflage, rifles in hands and wearing fully covering white motorcycle helmets. It made me think of starwars rather than a sunny country in southern africa.

There is still plenty of good life in Harare though. I ended up at my first horse racing ever and have enjoyed a three course dinner with pretensions for 35 US dollars in a beautiful villa with spotless service and no obvious shortage of anything. Internet is way faster than in Zambia and the croissant at the Italian bakery is fresh and cheap. Being one of the very few tourists in town I found myself completely alone at he bombastic monument at "Heroes Acre" with not even a bored guard sitting in a corner. No use in obeying the signs about vip parking and traffic prohibited :-)

I drove on good roads from Lusaka to Harare in nine hours including border crossing, lunch at the Twin Rivers Inn, a couple of fuel stops and one road block. Hassle free to say the least, which Harare itself also turned out to be. Go visit!