Hard Times

I try and walk every morning for at least an hour, weather permitting. Fortunately, I'm staying on the outskirts of Bulawayo which is bordered by 'bush'. I enjoy traversing the numerous little worn ochre paths that weave through the bush because it offers a sense of adventure (have to watch out for snakes) which pounding the road doesn't. I also love walking too because it gives me time to think. The thought process combined with exercise seems to produce a positive outlook and generally fires me up for the rest of the day. (Must be the endorphin release!)

You also notice things when walking which you wouldn't otherwise if driving in a car. To get to 'the bush', I have to pass through what was once middle-class white suburbia. I notice many of the houses now stand empty and that many of the once pristine gardens have been turned into vegetable allotments. Ian, my host, says that many people have just upped and left, part of the great Zimbabwe diaspora over the past decade.

Some people have emailed me and asked me why I didn't blog for the past three months. To be honest, it has been an unsettling period. Moving to another country as well as a new relationship has not been easy. Like moving to two countries at once. Trying to find work in one and trying to work out the other. It has been very difficult and insecure period in my life. Not knowing where I'm going to live, what I'm going to do, how to have a relationship with someone who lives for the most part of the year in a tent in the bush etc. All vexing questions still without answers for the time being.

Fortunately, I thrive quite well on the move and have an army of welcoming friends in this part of the world with spare rooms and guest cottages. None of whom seem to mind having a increasingly pensive Irishman pacing about the house for a few weeks at a time. As for work, I've had to go back to journalism again at a time when the profession has never been more unwelcoming. Global recession, a huge drop in advertising and a general loss of appetite for foreign news in the UK has made things increasingly tough. Finding and writing the stories has never been the problem. It's finding newspapers and magazines willing to publish and pay for them. But I have little choice. Apart from film-making, I'm not really qualified to do anything else.

Elle is having it tough too. She's dependent on raising funds to continue her Hyaena project at a time when funding has receded worldwide. She needs to raise a minimum of fifteen thousand pounds just for her research alone (not counting a salary!). It doesn't sound alot but in the present economic climate its a small fortune.

She's back in the bush now, living in a semi-collapsed tent besieged by mosquitos and constant rain. We haven't seen each other since we parted company in Cape Town about a month ago and have kept in touch by text and email. She's about 600km from where I'm staying and I planning to visit her in the next ten days. It's hard being apart sometimes and not without its doubts and concerns. But then again they say 'absence makes the heart grow fonder'. I hope so.