I will keep my promise to my daughter, Janine, this week and produce a shorter blog, I am sure to her delight and also the readers. When I reflect on past Christmases, it invariably goes back to my childhood. I think this is typical of most people with a British background. I can still remember avidly trying to stay awake in the hope of catching Santa delivering the presents. Of course, we never did, although on occasion we were convinced we had stayed awake throughout the night on more than one occasion. My earliest remembered debate was, “Is Santa real?”
Thereafter I have trouble recollecting Christmas for many years until those spent with my own children. There is one exception, which I will recount below. I particularly remember the joy of Isobel and Derek Belinsky when they spoiled their grandchildren, Storm and Janine. I also witnessed it when Selby was equally spoiled by his grandparents Shirley and Bob Cary. So although Christmas was memorable in my own childhood, it also brought much happiness to those elderly adults who had the good fortune to share it with their grandchildren. Sadly, many Zimbabweans are so widely spread across the globe, few parents let alone grandparents can enjoy this unique experience. I am not religious but this deemed Christian holiday has meant so much to families, especially in the past. At Christmas, you tried to forget your hardships with everyone feeding off the traditional good spirit within the family. Often family feuds are put aside just for that day to exhibit solidarity. Christmas has brought me many joyous memories.
“I say, please do not take away Christmas’s identity. It has always been much more than a Christian holiday. It was the one unfailing reason to bring families of different generations together. No other celebration I know does this.” - Peter McSporran
This year we were hoping to have Selby, our son and his partner Maggie along with Storm and her fiance, Duncan, with us for both Christmas and New Year. Covid-19 put paid to that although we are thankful to have had Maggie and Selby with us. Janine who married Nathan in America had backward immigration hurdles and Covid-19 made it impossible to share Christmas with us.
Both Rozanne and I came out of our isolation following our trip to Africa just before Christmas and decided to spend Christmas in the milder Algarve. We had been invited to a Christmas Eve dinner with Jane and Sophia Crossman near Alvor. So, after struggling to get the “kids” up and in the car, we set off thinking a quick five-hour trip, including lunch, was ahead of us. Not to be! About 50 km from home, all sorts of warning lights flashed on the dashboard of my expensive, to me, British car. Although five years old, we had only done 50,000 km preferring to subject our seventeen-year-old Nissan X-Trail to our daily wear and tear local trips. That is, we looked after ‘the Jag’ to ensure a reliable car for long and regional trips. More fool us! The breakdown vehicle took four hours to arrive and by the time the taxi dropped us back home, six hours had passed. Rather than putting off our trip, we loaded our trusty X-Trail and set off again, arriving four hours later with ten minutes to spare before dinner in the Algarve. Ten hours after our initial departure. Of course, this incident will not only be expensive to fix, it will also attract much ridicule to me on our next “Old Farts” drinks evening.
That evening we forgot about cars and after an excellent meal, we played a new game to me, called Articulate. Adrian Eves, Jane’s friend, was particularly amusing. He described a salamander as a large fish. He is from London after all. So I may well remember this Christmas for the good and bad for the short term, but like all memories, the good times always squeeze out the bad.
Reflecting on the year, it has been one of really good fortune for me. This time last year I could not climb up ten steps on a stairway without exhaustion, being dizzy or experiencing nausea. In January they operated on me and since then, I have been in remission. We have had a wonderful trip to Africa with the pleasure of our eldest daughter, Storm, being with us. A year of so much adventure, so much love, so much support and despite Covid-19, one of my most memorable. I am due for my medical reviews over the next four weeks, having already benefited from a bonus year.
“For a life worth living always have something to do. Spontaneous or planned. The completion of the most wearisome tasks can give much satisfaction, even more than those you looked forward to.” - Peter McSporran
First Christmas in the Bush
I will revert my life story back a few months next week from what I am going to write about now. I think we often forget about those that have to work through Christmas and New Year. Some as a duty, some as volunteers. Mostly on behalf of others providing some sort of essential service.
In December 1974 I was some 6 months into my year of National Service and our company had been deployed from its base in Wankie, in the far north-west to Rushinga the far northeast where the war was heating up. This operational area was called “Hurricane”. I presume the name was meant to mean the operation would be like a hurricane, short and violent followed by calm. “The best-laid schemes of mice and men…..”
On our way north of Mount Darwin, the troops we were relieving revelled in our mobilisation throwing hard-boiled sweets and other more deadly missiles at us as we passed in opposite directions in open RLS. We were going to the war zone for the first time, they shouted fervently at us, “Tough luck, fresh puss!”. They were happy to be heading home for some Christmas leave, little did they know that a cholera outbreak had just been identified in the area they had left and to which we were moving into. To their disappointment and our amusement, they were ordered into isolation at the Salisbury showgrounds within sound and sight of the bright lights of the city for Christmas and New year.
We arrived at our first company position at Marymount Mission, where much death among the local population was evident due to the cholera epidemic. Despite the medical care and comfort offered by the mission staff, there were many distressed families visibly suffering from loss.
My platoon was dispatched to the Mozambican border but just days before Christmas we were moved south of the Mazowe River into the Pfungwe Tribal Trust land to undertake one of the most difficult operations I was to take part in throughout my days in service. It had been decided by the powers that be, that the area had become a haven for terrorists and for their safety and to aid us in combating the terrorists, the population of the area should be moved into a protected village (PV) to be placed at Nyakosoro dam. PVs were a British concept used successfully in The Malayan Emergency.
Our company headquarters relocated to Nyakosoro while our platoon had the job of moving the people, albeit many unwillingly under the guise of ‘for their own safety.’ While some were reluctant, many were relieved as they had suffered or witnessed atrocities in the area, many of which were credited to a violent gang leader named Comrade Vuu. We had come across teachers who had red hot bayonets shoved up their rectums as an example while women who were sexually assaulted suffered the same in their vaginas. We never caught Vuu who suddenly disappeared at a later date. It was said his violent cruel ways were turning the people against their cause rather than remaining sympathetic. His demise was put down to his own side although later in the war these atrocities would have been deemed moderate. We called the dam at Nyakosoro, ironically Lake Vuu. Ours was a dreadful job under constant threat in the pouring rain without shelter throughout. Animals were moved with the people but many dogs, cats and chickens remained as the operation was done in haste. The animals remaining had to be put down with a bullet. At that time there were no brick houses in the area, only pole and dagga (mud) huts which had to be destroyed so people could not return nor offer shelter to the terrorists. They were allowed to continue to till the land but the distances involved did not cater for this, although in theory part of the program.
On Christmas day we had a delivery by RLs, which had struggled to us through the mud, of a Christmas lunch. Much donated by the good people at home which consisted mainly of tinned goods including chicken and Christmas pudding, condensed milk and cream. Lots of chocolates and cake. We feasted as much as we could quickly leaving much to waste in the rain as we could not carry it. I have never been sure whether it was cholera, the Christmas meal or the task at hand that made us so sick. Many of us a few days later found ourselves sleeping under individual bivvies in the rain at Nyakosoro with the “screaming shits” and vomiting. There were too many of us for it to have just been a stomach bug. Lying soaking wet in the rain with little shelter, being only able to crawl a few metres before your bowels lost control was a very unpleasant experience. Our Medic Sammy Moll deserved a medal for the job he did over that period. My New Year was further spoiled by our CO leaning into my bivvy saying with his boozy breath, “Happy New Year sergeant Mac, chin up.” What a dick head.
This was one Christmas and New Year I will never forget for the wrong reasons. A car breakdown is nothing in comparison to this, so why get upset about minor incidents? Think of others not so lucky or those who have to work.
“The past makes you what you are, the future always holds fresh hope”- Peter McSporran
Happy New Year to you all!
Disclaimer: Copyright Peter McSporran. The content in this blog represents my personal views and does not reflect corporate entities.
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