Pleasant language surprise and my birthday celebrations
on Z for Zimbabwe (Zimbabwe), 07/Mar/2011 13:15, 34 days ago
The weekend before last I went to Ruwa, a township about 20 minutes outside of Harare, to visit the family of a friend of mine (Ray) from the US. Ray is originally from Zimbabwe and currently works for Accenture and lives in Dallas. I've never met him in person but a mutual friend of ours introduced us through email late last year. Ray and I talked on the phone and exchanged several emails. He gave me some great tips and relevant information prior to my trip. When I arrived here Ray introduced me to his father, Peter. Peter and I spoke on the phone a few times but until that weekend I had not met him or his wife, Julie. They live on a farm in Ruwa - surrounded by serene nature with beautiful plants and trees everywhere. We had a great dinner that night and discussed all kinds of stuff. Btw, Julie makes the best sadza ever! :)Birthday peopleRay's parents took me to church with them on Sunday. The service was very interesting, dominated by music, singing and dancing. It was in Shona (the local dialect) so I didn't really understand much (aside from some of the more important parts which Peter translated on a piece of paper he passed for me). At the church, they have a tradition of inviting any guests to introduce themselves towards the end of the service. I did that and to my surprise several minutes later, I was approached by a nice gentlemen who addressed me in perfect Bulgarian! I was... kind of shocked :) As we spoke, it became apparent that he (Walter) had studied in Bulgaria from 1983 to 1989. He spent the first couple of years taking intensive language classes. It was so nice to have a conversation in Bulgarian, but I would have never thought that it would be with a Zimbabwean.My birthday was on March 3rd and it went great! Theonline fundraiserI was doing for EGPAFraised $246. Short of my ambitious goal of $500, but still a great success which will surely make a difference in the fight to end pediatric AIDS.On the night of the 3rd I had a nice birthday dinner with some friends, while enjoying a bottle of wine and listening to good music at the Book Cafe and later - The Mannenberg. The next day, I had a few of my friends over for drinks at my apartment - It was a great time, I think I have some pretty good friends here now :)The highlight of the birthday celebrations however was a trip to Mutoko to visit the Mother of Peace Community for orphaned and abandoned children. They hosted a big birthday party there on Saturday for three of their staff and me :) One of the ladies was turning 78 and her birthday happens to be on March 3rd as well! There was cake and drinks, and music, and dancing - it was a lot of fun!The kids at Mother of Peace teaching me to play the drumIt was great to spend time with the kids again. They seem to get so happy and excited when there are visitors, and they very much enjoy being held and hugged, in fact, when they are around, they won't let you walk alone without (at least) one of them holding your hand :) A few of the kids were also teaching me to play the drum (I think I'm getting pretty good) and most remembered me from the trip a couple of weeks before.This visit was definitely worth the eventful journey - on the way to Mutoko our bus broke down :) so we ended up waiting, then walking a little, trying (unsuccessfully) to hitchhike, and finally catching another bus. A trip that was supposed to take 2 hours, took us a good part of the day :) On the way back though, we were able to catch a quick ride with a couple of very nice Indian guys from Malawi who were on their way to Harare :)