We even pay to queue!
Inflation is such now that you can now add a zero every month to prices.
With prices running mad there is once again a massive cash shortage. Gono has announced that the new currency will only be introduced next year, so it is going to be pandemonium at Christmas when people will be fighting for cash.
It is now common that commuters have to pay to queue. If you do not pay for a spot in the queue the touts simply shove you out the way for the person who has. Their retort is that if you have money to travel you have money to queue.
November 9th, 2007 01:33
I’m not sure how I came here but I think I’ll be regular (and if you don’t mind will add your link at my blog).
Reading (and watching photos) your posts I was back in Serbia (then Yugoslavia) the last decade of the 20th century. I’m SO familiar with all economical disaster you are writing about. I remember that people were getting their salary in the morning and by the night with all that money they could buy only box of matches. It was horrible. And supermarkets were precisely like the one on your photo.
However we had richer neighboring countries so people were smuggling gasoline from abroad or was purchasing stuff there and that’s how they managed to survive.
I’m vaguely familiar with Mugabe’s regime so I’m not too surprised with the devastating situation in your country but not nearly familiar with the full image. Therefore I’ll surely be back.
November 10th, 2007 18:00
This picture and the one below remind me of when i came to what i regarded as my home in 2003. I was in the que at the Standard Bank, Main Street, Bulawayo from 08.00 am to change my £s to Zim $s so as to buy a ticket from Bulawayo to Harare. I was still there around 2pm when Mugabe’s police attacked us in the que. Pandamonia is what i saw, because for a start i did not understand why i had to que for my own money, and 2nd i did not understand why the police were belting the hell out of those in the que. I was so angry that i went to the house i was staying, changed from my affluent jeans to a tshitenge, head gear and i walked bare feet to rejoin the que and fight these bastards. Thank God for my cousin who is now dead who told me off and stopped me from going. Instead, she changed my £s at a black market and i bought my ticket and went to Harare, where i also witnessed Mugabe’s brutality.
There comes a time brothers and sisters whereby we have to leave our pride, egos, religion, cultures, tribes, languages, colours behind and join hands to fight oppression from which-ever angle it comes from. Look at me and i will look at you. If i see infront of me a brother, you must also see infront of you a sister. I have no crystal ball, but i can assure you that i see unity among the oppressed in Zimbabwe. That is the first step. The second step is fighting together for a common cause. Rich or poor, black or white, Shona or Ndebele, if Mugabe is oppressing you, a Shona must be a Ndebele, a Ndebele a Shona, a white person must be a black person and a black person must be a white person. Before you know Mugabe and his entourage will be gone. Then and only then, you will be able to choose your leader without prejudice.
Remember that in Mugabe’s wars since he came to power, I lost my only reason to live. Not only did he wipe my people off, but he destroyed my soul by killing my one and only brother. Yet i am still here, alive and fighting with you. There is nothing in Zimbabwe for me. Mugabe made sure of that. Yet i am still fighting with you because i believe in humanity and oneness in God.