African dreams

Sitting beside the Zambezi, I listened to the sound of a hippo (or was it a crocodile) having an early morning wash. It was difficult to believe that here, eighteen months before, a war had been going on. This stretch of water had been used to infiltrate a guerrilla army into Zimbabwe. Now everything seemed incredibly peaceful. Just the sounds of the African bush waking up.

As the sky lightened and the patch of long grass between the lodge and the river became less mysterious, I made my way to the bank just in time to see the last of the hippo as it slid downstream to an early-morning rendezvous.

Across the river was Zambia, from there only a few years before the fighters in Zimbabwe’s long battle for independence had come.

We were in Zimbabwe with our friends Alison and Tony. They took us around the country in a Renault 4 – four adults and four children with the luggage on top. And within a couple of days of landing in the country we were beside the Zambezi in one of the National Park lodges. Tony produced his characteristic chillie dishes, which burnt on for days afterwards. And the Falls produced more spray than we were ever to see again.

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Into Africa – churches and farms

We landed without a work permit because the Diocesan secretary didn’t think it safe to send it through the post. You aren’t allowed into Zimbabwe without a work permit. Usually you are then sent out of the country till it turns up, but I think they took one look at David and took pity on us and let us in on visitor’s permits. Before we could do anything else, I had to get the work permit sorted out. Which was easy enough as it was waiting for us at the Diocesan Office.

As it had taken so long to sort out my recruitment by USPG and the work permit, the job at the university had been given to Sebastian Bakare, always more qualified than me anyway. I was then offered the parish of Banket and the job of examining chaplain.

I had left an English parish that I could ride around on a bike in half an hour. I went to 2500 square miles of African bush. Banket Parish is 75 miles long and 35 miles wide, with five main Anglican congregations. The We lived in Banket which is geographically in the centre of the parish next to an interdenominational church, St Andrew’s, where  English services were held. The  rectory was also midway between the town of Banket and the township of Kuwadzana.  There there was a church, St David’s, owned by the town council where services were held in Shona. I was supposed to have an intensive course in conversational Shona but it never happened and so I had to make do with what I could pick up as I went along.

In Raffingora, 30 miles north of Banket, is St Stephens, designed to look exactly like an English country church. At Darwendale, 30 miles to the south, was a church formerly owned by the Railway Mission with a small Shona congregation. At Muriel Mine, 20 miles to the north-east, there is a large Shona congregation using a Roman Catholic Church – St Mary’s. All the churches were used by different denominations at different times with occasional joint services. Lay leadership was also essential in a parish with churches spread so far apart. I could only get to three churches on each Sunday and the others had to look after themselves.

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Last respects for a friend

Sunday 5.30 pm

Stembile Mhonda has died. After fighting cancer for six months, the leader of Muriel Mine's Mothers' Union has died. On Friday I anointed her and gave her communion. I talked to the nurses of hospice care, knowing her death was near, but they, taught to preserve life, walked out defeated. The hospice movement is only just starting to spread to the rural areas, work with the nurses on palliative care seems to be a priority for the coming year. At the communion Mai Mhonda decided to go to her parents' home to die - over 150 miles away in a resettlement area. The chairman of the church, her husband, agrees to take her.

On Saturday the long journey was made in the bus lent by the mine. The road is long and dusty. In many places it crosses dry river beds on low bridges, a steep climb leading up the rocky slope out of the river. But Stembile doesn't complain. Her parents welcome her for her last few hours on earth.

At 2 am she dies. It takes most of the day for the news to reach Banket. The funeral is to be on Monday.

Can I supply transport for 20 people at 7 am tomorrow? The answer has to be no! Harvesting is still in full swing. All farm vehicles are committed. The mine bus will be available.

Monday 7.30 am.

The bus has broken down, only a Land Rover is available. Only eight people can go. My car, newly returned from repairs after I rolled it, wouldn't get there; another truck is off the road waiting for spare parts.

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Vincent’s Goat

It started as just an ordinary day, an ordinary job.

Vincent’s mother had died during Zimbabwe’s war of liberation.

Her grave, in the home village was unblessed.

So would I do it?

No problem.

So we set out in the Mazda 323 driving north.

An hour and half out of Banket, somewhere beyond Mvurwi,

Vincent said, “Turn right here.”

Me: “But there’s no road.”

“Well, this is where I get off the bus.”

So we turn through the field gate, just as if we too had got off a bus.

There were tractor tracks around the edge of the field,

we followed them.

In the second field, or was it the third,

the track was washed away,

just a big gap where it once had been.

So it was time to learn road building.

First some big boulders to fill the hole,

then smaller stones to fill in the gap.

Then jump up and down to see if it will hold.

And maybe some wood across the top just to be on the safe side.

Then edge the car slowly across,

hoping the whole thing won’t collapse

and leave us stranded, we knew not where.

After a mile or two across more fields,

we found a track.

This led to a village.

People seemed surprised to see a car.

I wonder why?

Then: “Turn left after the next house.”

OK.

There was, of course, no road,

not even a track,

not even much of a footpath.

Just six foot high elephant grass

across the vlei.

“My village is over there”

But what was in between.

Rocks maybe,

water perhaps – but it was the dry season so probably not.

Animals even.

In the grass it was impossible to tell.

So we started across,

The tinder dry grass flattening under the bonnet of the car,

I hoped the exhaust wouldn’t set it alight.

Needless to say,

ours was the first car seen in the village.

After that, the blessing was routine.

A mile or so’s walk into the bush,

a kopje, some rocks, and among the rocks the grave.

A short service, well short by African standards,

just an hour or two;

then back for sadza and chicken at the village.

In the end, just as dusk fell, I decided it was time to leave.

We still had that elephant grass to get through.

And the round of goodbyes would take a good half hour.

And as we reach the car,

there in the back, behind the back seat, is a goat,

a live goat.

A present for the honour I had paid them.

There was no point in saying the honour was all mine.

I had to accept,

it would be insulting not too.

This time we found a road after the elephant grass.

But for a hundred miles or so,

The goat watched over my driving,

and just as it grew quiet with the steady hum of the engine,

the passengers dozing,

suddenly it would bleat its approval,

or disapproval there was no way of knowing.

Back in Banket, my catechist Weston,

was pleased to be offered the goat,

enough meat for a month.

Into Africa – personal and family

We landed at Harare airport fifteen hours after leaving England. USPG saved money by sending us out on Ethiopian Airways; which meant a stop at Athens and then transit at Addis Ababa. David was sick all the way which didn’t make travelling any easier. But the stop did mean we crossed central Africa in daylight and got brilliant views of Mount Kenya and Kilimanjaro.

For a few days we stayed with Jack and Mary, a farming couple. This gave us a chance to acclimatise before moving to the Rectory and starting work. The rectory was fully furnished for us and the parish supplied transport and paid most of the bills. Quite lucky really as my official pay was £75 a month. Tony had gone to meet the wardens before we arrived and had laid down what the “new Rector out from England” would expect. He laid it on a bit – we had expected hardship and poverty – and we were well looked after, even if it was a bit paternalistic.

They put a freezer into the rectory and then kept it stocked over the next four years. I would go to a farm and have tea with the farmer and his wife and then get back to the car to find a sheep in the back. After the first couple of times I discovered that if I then drove to another farm, even before the car stopped, the door would be opened and the sheep killed by the farm workers. I could return in a day or two and collect freezer bags with the meat and the workers shared out everything else.

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Dramatic events

Dramatic events

For some reason I was not invited to take part in the coronation. Indeed I was not even given a part in the St Albans pageant that followed. Forced to stand on the sidelines I am pictured watching Boudicca (who spelt her name Boadicea in those days) rallying her troops against the invaders; the first Battle of St Albans; Queen Margaret, who led the looting of the town by the Lancastrians; and more strangely a fire breathing dragon. All this in an attempt to match the regal spectacle taking place elsewhere.

My own entry onto the dramatic stage took place later in the year. Holes were cut in an old pillowcase for head and arms, a pyjama cord tied round my waist and my opening lines of the school nativity play ensured there was not a dry eye in the house. I've been playing to the audience ever since. Often they've been rolling in the aisles - especially during the more tragic moments of Shakespeare. Some would say I still leave the audience in tears.

Over the years I have done most of the jobs in the theatre.

In school plays I was usually put in a dress - either to play women in my all-boys schools or in the miniskirts of the Roman citizen. I brought the house down every night during the most tragic scene in Antony and Cleopatra as, in my squeaky half broken voice, I exclaimed “all dead” over the final scene of carnage. The peak of my Roman career was to carry a spear alongside Colin Blunstone who went on to international fame as a singer first with the Zombies and then solo. I keep threatening to take the photo of us for him to sign next time I see him perform. Colin has a far better memory than me and always asks after my brother, they were a couple of years ahead of me, and also claims he gave me a prefect’s detention, though I can’t remember why.

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The heart of the Lakes

The heart of the Lakes

Six months before we were due to return to the Uk from Zimbabwe in 1987, I flew back to do the rounds of the Bishops and try to get a job. My name was on the circulation list put out by the Archbishop’s Appointments Secretary and that in theory put me in touch with every vacancy. In practice, as with my appointment to Hatfield, most posts were filled much more informally.

I went down to Exeter to see Peter Mumford who, as Bishop of Hertford, had been my area Bishop before I left the UK. He gave me lunch at a hotel in the cathedral precincts but told me that Truro were over their quota and were having to lose clergy. But he would contact his friend David Halsey who was Bishop of Carlisle. So a few days later I found myself driving up to the Lake District to Rose Castle. The Bishop greeted me at the door and ushered me in for the compulsory glass of sherry and said he had three groups of parishes and I could choose between them.

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Dear Stalkers…

When we arrived back in the Uk from Zimbabwe we had a car full of luggage and a few scattered belongings with friends and relatives around the country. After six years in the Lakes it took two removal vans to shift our furniture down to the Midlands.

And we arrived to find that the only power in the house was a jerry-rigged light in the kitchen. As usual the Diocese had done an incoming survey on the house but had deliberately failed to spot that it needed rewiring. The churchwardens weren’t so gullible and they got the MEB to check it out as well. They refused to supply electricity to the house unless it was rewired. So for a time there was stalemate. And then just before we were due to move down, the diocese accepted a quote from a local one-man band electrician, Jim, who reckoned he could rewire the whole house by himself. And he started just three days before we moved.

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