Posted on 04/18/2010 9:27:39 AM PDT by greyfoxx39
Dig your own grave
Saturday 17th April 2010
Dear Family and Friends,
Three months before Zimbabwe's 30th anniversary of Independence I happened to get lost in the vast urban sprawl that characterises the outskirts of the capital city, Harare. A huge shanty town lay on both sides of the road and stretched as far as the eye could see. Shacks and shelters made of tin and plastic were surrounded by mounds of rotting garbage which had even been scraped into contours in an attempt to demarcate little vegetable plots. Stinking streams of sewage ran right outside people's shacks and children ran barefoot through the waste and the filth. Hand painted signs were everywhere, on pieces of battered, rusty tin and written in charcoal on strips of warped cardboard: 'Floor polish,' 'Cement,' 'Tyres,' 'Abattoir.' One sign said: 'Hot Recharge' and a line of people with cellphones in their hands stood waiting for their turn to plug onto a car battery and get a precious top up of electrical power into their telephones. A near naked man with no legs was dragging himself by his hands along the road and I looked away but his image has stayed with me. How can this be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence, I keep asking myself.
Two months before Zimbabwe's 30th anniversary of Independence I went to the local electricity supply office to hand in an up to date reading of my electricity meter. I needed to bring accuracy to the wild guesstimates they kept making on my monthly bills and the even wilder amounts they were charging. The man at the desk was eating a sausage and when I told him I had a reading I would like entered into the computer record, he looked wildly around at the piles of papers covering every inch of his desk. Eventually he chose one pile and placed the sausage on top of the papers. He looked at his greasy fingers for a moment, picked up a piece of paper from another pile on his desk, wiped his fingers on the paper and entered my figures into his computer. Can this really be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence?
Last month I went with a friend who needed to have fingerprints taken at a government office. One by one each finger is squashed into the black ink pad and the digit then rolled onto the paper record. 'Wait for your form,' the government official announces and you stare at the filth on your hands and look around - no taps, no water, no cloth, nowhere to remove the ink all over your hands. When you ask if there is a public toilet you can use, the official mutters angrily that they are locked, they don't work anymore. People wipe their inky hands in their hair or in the sand. Can this be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence?
Last week a friend got a quote for a new garden tap but decided against installing it because they get stolen so regularly. Stolen to be melted down and made into coffin handles. Talking about coffins, I attended a funeral a few days ago and was reminded that you have to dig your own graves now as municipal workers don't, or won't do it anymore.
Can this really be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence? Can this really be a free and independent country when unarmed women are arrested and held in Police custody for handing out yellow cards in protest over electricity prices. Happy birthday Zimbabwe.
Until next time, thanks for reading, love cathy
It would be helpful, at least to me, if you would explain the cause and effect of your two sentences.
As I think you know, I believe our Statists think they are behaving morally, no matter how deadly they are, they just have standards different from people who are less noble than they.
FYI
This would have never happened when those awful “Colonists” were in charge. Thin line, isn’t it?
Hope he's OK. Please add me to the list.
-
You’ve been added to the ping list.
thx
HOP: “That doctrine is ethical socialism - founding morality on what is believed to be good for society as a whole. This false belief is at the root of why such projects always result in mass death.”
AS: “It would be helpful, at least to me, if you would explain the cause and effect of your two sentences.”
I cannot fully explain that link - I only see it displayed in real-world tragedies. My assumption is that false beliefs adhered to by those in power eventually leads to accepting, or demanding, the death of masses of the population rather than admit error.
As to the “why?” of it all, I admit ignorance.
If I were to request of you to turn-off that projector of yours, could you do it? It is the one where you project your own decency upon those whose judgment you are openly questioning.
If you can do that for just this exercise, how might this temporary you alter old you’s most troubling observation?
“accepting, or demanding, the death of masses of the population rather than admit error.”
You got exactly what you voted for. Now reap it, good and hard.
Best,
L
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