More Oddities of Zimbabwe from Readers

I do have another view of Christmas time in our city, though: back in the 60's and 70's, Christmas time in Bulawayo was so exciting and thrilling for us. Meikles and Haddon and Sly were decorated so beautifully. With the thunder storms during those months, the lit windows and Santa's sleigh were particularly exciting; including the lit-up Selborne Avenue. It was entrancing for a child to behold. I loved seeing the big billowing grey clouds outside, and the twinkling lights in the stores.

Mum used to put up a beautiful tree; a special friend of ours came by with her annual Christmas decorated cake with Santa and a sleigh on top. Our cook used to make a super Xmas pudding.

Our garden was very green from the rain; that special light (only in Bulawayo at that time) made the holiday very, very precious.

In its way, this was how we celebrated Christmas in Southern Africa, and it was so special.

- Gretchen Gordon Henry

-The ice cream vendor cycling down the road in Malindela! I can still hear his bell and remember my brother and I rushing to beg some money from our parents to buy an
ice cream (they usually had one too!)

- Christmas decor - I agree - although we had a traditional (although artificial) Christmas tree in Bulawayo, it was always exciting, when we were children, to haul it out and decorate it, and then wait, in excited anticipation, for the day. Here in New Zealand, I decided a long time ago, that, as we are in mid summer (like Zimbabwe) at Christmas time, we are going to have different Christmas "trees". We have had:

- suitably shaped branches of trees;
- dry flax flower/seed stems (with gold spray-painted blotches on them);
- three bicycle wheels (attached to a post and spray-painted green);
- pieces of wood/driftwood picked up on the beach;
- a road cone(!) painted green, with holes cut in it, for sticks to support decorations

etc.!

- thunderstorms - they were frightening, but we remember them here - where sometimes it seems like endless rain with no drama!
- chongololos!
- snakes and blue-headed lizards in the garden!
- we remember riding on the running board of my Dad's old Prefect car from the gate, round the back to the garage!

What wonderful memories - thank you very much.

Barbara van Ryn (nee Cornish)

Marcel Proust had his madeleine cake to evoke past memories whereas I have your weekly periodicals.Your 9th September was a fine example of this.

Ice cream vendors (I can hear the cowbell clearly) even although I live several thousand moles away. As for the British Christmases,I can see my mother in the 1950's decorating the tree with cotton wool balls to simulate -yes- snow! Ironically, the Panamanians (you should see the malls) do the same, down to strings of lights, despite the tropical weather. At Christmas in the 1970's I can remember the TV specials, some of which I appeared on, including the first ( I believe) outside broadcast, when my previous wife and I performed Cinderella Rockerfella. And yes,I can smell the rain and hear the boom of the thunder, as well as driving through the water drainage dips in Bulawayo.And afterwards, when the rain ceased, the haunting call of the rain bird.

Thank you for another slice of madeleine cake and for, as Rudyard Kipling put it, a few 'old memories that gather in the smoke.'

Importantly, it is worthwhile remembering that Zimbabwe has the advantage of being, as it were,far from the madding crowd of international politics that is causing an exceptional level of uncertainty.(To be clear: I do not forget the domestic travails that Zimbabweans are suffering.) On that theme, please allow me to share my own smorgasboard of views on this and other subjects, seen through the lens of history Curmudgeon's Corner - Topaz Services

Thank you for stirring up old memories for me through your writing.

Derek Sambrooke