Apparently some people can't "Forgive and Forget"

For those of you who don’t know about the Zimbabwean land reform program:

10ish years ago (I forget the year – I was little ok, gimme a break) the Zimbabwean Government decided to enforce something called “The Land Reform Programme”  I’m not going to go into the detail of what the land reform program entails or how it treated the farmers that were forcibly and violently removed   of their land. 

I felt that with all the studying and diligent student activities I have been participating in recently I would instead of watching Jersey Shore Re-Runs, Jerseylicious, or any trashy E! Entertainment programmes go for a walk around the farm.  So I head out.  I decide to do about 5kms and head up to the top land that boarders with “The War Veterans land” (I put it in inverted commas because it is actually OUR farm but it just got stolen from us and is now his).  So there I am with my iPod on (I am scared of bushes that make noise – hence the iPod instead of enjoying nature) and I see the War Veteran out with his family ploughing his lands.  Oh and also crops are supposed to be put in in November and reaped in May obviously he is a thief and an idiot who doesn’t know how to farm. Back to the War Vet. They are all staring at me so I made a decision to way and shout “HELLO! HOW ARE YOU?” to which he replied to with giving me the bird and shouting “BURIYAKO”.  For those of you who don’t speak Shona, saying Buriyako to someone is the harshest form of abuse or swearing you can say to someone it’s like shouting “EF YOU” at someone times like a million. 

I don’t know why that jerk faced idiot yelled Buriyako at me but surely if ANYONE should still be angry it should be me?  This is the same prick who along with his gang of War Vets attacked our house (when I was all of say 13yrs old) when my sister and I were fast asleep inside with neither of our parents in the house and then held us captive for hours and then set fire to our house so we couldn’t escape, luckily we managed to get evacuated but if we hadn’t I doubt I would be here to write this blog.  AND HE IS STILL ANGRY? 

So much for forgive and forget. 

Johannesburg to Harare

Any drive over 2 hours is never pleasant.  Maybe if I drove a Ferrari or an Aston Martin driving long distances would be a pleasure, I don’t know?  (If anyone wants to lend me, or give me a Ferrari or Aston Martin now would be the time to step up, just saying).

 Punky gets car sick. I have tried ALL the wives tales and hard drugs to try and fix this but the fact of the matter is no amount of sitting on newspaper to rubbing the pressure points on my wrist to popping pills will or has worked, however I am always willing to try new ones so if you have any motion sickness remedies, comment away or tweet at me and I’ll be the dummy who tries them out and lets you know how it goes.  That being said if I am not driving then my whole trip is a blur of nausea and trying to concentrate on not blowing chucks all over whoever is driving. 

My big sister is moving back to Zimbabwe from Cape Town we shall call her Punky Snr.  So my Dad drove down to Johannesburg from Zimbabwe to escort my sister and I home encase my sisters car broke down or anything on the drive home.  Little did we know the drive was the least of our problems – Beitbridge Boarder Post was!

Now I love my sister, she is my favourite person on the planet, but good gawd, i HATE her music taste.  She has to have been reincarnated , she has to the be only 26yr old I know who has EVERY Kenny Rogers Album and actually listens to country music not just the more commercial  likes of Taylor Swift, she listens to ALL of it.  1hr in and we have already had a fight over the choice of music.  I spent 3 hours the night before while EVERYONE was sleeping to compose the most AMAZING compilation of music to make our drive into the greatest road trip ever. I take music VERY seriously!  I had made sure there was a perfect mix of all our music preferences it went from Black Eyed Peas to John Mayer to Rise Against to 30 Seconds to Mars etc etc it was spectacular.  Punky was proud of her mix.  I really was!  3 songs in Punky Snr “WTF is this music, it’s so heavy I hope we aren’t listening to this the whole trip, when can I put MY music on”.  We were listening to 30 Seconds to Mars.  Heavy? Really? REALLY! I will not be listening to Kenny Rogers for the next 6 hours.  However I won and by the time I got to the Zimbabwe when my sisters took over control of the radio i changed cars and carried on jamming – I will NOT risk my ears bleeding.

So the Zimbabwe side of the Beitbridge boarder is a Pig Fest.  You literally arrive and your car gets swamped by agents who can to quote “Get you through immigration no problem boss, we do it quick quick”.  It is so bad that you actually start feeling scared.  There must have been around 15 men surrounding each of our cars trying to shove blue immigration forms into our faces.  However the queue to get into immigration is about 1km along so we thought “Hey we’ll pay more and get it done quickly without having to stand in the queue”.  How naive we were, they totally hit the mother load when they saw us coming.  We got conned, totally and utterly conned.  The guy disappeared with the roughly the equivalent of R5000 of our money to pay to get clearance etc.  Livid!  My parental unit nearly has a fit he was so angry and threatened everyone and anyone until the slimy little twit slithered out of the dark room, threw our cash at us and ran away faster than Usain Bolt with my father chasing after him.   Viva Dad Viva!

And that was our welcome to Zimbabwe.  God.  Nothing like being home huh?  5 minutes in the country and someone has already asked for a bribe and tried to steal for us.  You all really MUST come on holiday its fantastic.  Note the sarcasm