October 20

John takes Helen to get the 8.30 bus to Victoria Falls.  Twenty minutes later, they are back.  The 8.30 bus has been cancelled, as has the 9.30 bus, due to a lack of passengers.  She has bought a ticket for the 10.30.

Wales is playing France today.  By the time we leave to go to the gardening club meeting, Wales is trailing.  My mother was a huge fan of Welsh rugby.  She would be on the phone to the manager by now, telling him who to send off and who to bring on.  Seriously.

Bulawayo, like Zimbabwe, is an eclectic mix of different things and different people.  The gardening club, the classical music concerts and the yearly pantomimes are part of that mix.  Unfortunately, things like these tend to appeal to a certain audience which is very much in decline: elderly white people.

The lady pouring tea says that anyone wanting to see the end of the Welsh game is welcome to go inside and watch it.  The most important match, however, she stresses, is at 12pm - the Springboks vs Japan. 'Oh no,' I respond with such vehemence that a number of people turn to look at me. I am certain I felt a sharp dig in the ribs from my mother just then. 'The main match is on now.  Wales is playing.' An elderly lady asks me what my connection with Wales is and it turns out her mother was also Welsh.  She offers to sing Bread of Heaven with me.

One of the oddities of white Zimbabweans (just one of the many) is that they take umbrage to being described as South African and yet when it comes to supporting a team, they don their Springbok jerseys and sway to the sound of the South African national anthem.  All these people of British descent identifying with players with names such as Lood de Jager and Faf de Klerk.

I have often thought of writing about my Welsh connections. They are quite tenuous really.  My mum always said she was Welsh, although her father was Scottish. She was born in Swansea but lived in India until she was five.  When she was fifteen, my grandparents moved the family to Rhodesia. When I first went to Wales, I felt a really deep connection with everything.  I really did feel that I had somehow returned home.  England was different; England was recognisable.  Everything was like I imagined it to be from books and films.  In Wales, I connected through my bones.  Interestingly, Sian, who has never been there, has decided she will live there as an adult and has even started teaching herself Welsh through a language app on her phone.

The talk today is on garden birds.  We are in one of the most beautiful gardens I have seen in Bulawayo. The grass is so green and lush that I sit on it rather than on a chair.  There is a captive audience of 'twitterers'.  I am completely out of my league.  When it comes to gardening, I can identify some of the more obvious flowers (like petunias!) but I am not one of these people who can reel off Latin names.  I am considerably less knowledgeable when it comes to identifying indigenous trees (unless it's a mopane) and, when it comes to birds, I am absolutely useless: Yellow Bird, Fat Yellow Bird, Blue Bird, Bird With Long Beak.  Do not use terms such as the Crimson Breasted Warbler or Violet-backed Starling with me.  Even worse are names such as Jameson's Firefinch.  

There are people who take their birds very seriously.  One must never make throw away remarks when it comes to identifying birds.  Did it have a small white stripe just above its left eyebrow or not? You cannot say things like 'maybe' or 'it might have been yellow'.  Not only do these people discuss the size of the bird, its mating habits and where it nests, but also, horror of all horrors, what sound it makes.  If you are like me, you will struggle to replicate the sound of a bird you have just heard.  

'It goes woo-oo, woo-oo, woo-oo.' 

'Do you mean woo-ou, woo-ou, woo-ou or wooo, wooo, wooo?'

'It's more woo-oo, woo-oo, woo-oo.'

Look of consternation. 'You see if it's woo-ou, it's the female Emerald Eyebrowed Shrike. If it's wooo, it's the European Long-necked Swallow.'

'And if it it's woo-oo?'

Slow shake of the head.  'Well, it sounds like a Stevenson's Lapwing, but it's unlikely, highly unlikely.'

'Why?'

'It's only found in the Eastern Cape. In April.  And it hasn't been spotted since 1972.'

At the end of the talk, a lady in the audience clears her throat and asks if anyone else has had the red-eyed bulbul visit their garden this year.  There is a gasp, followed by a deathly hush.  Like a bird herself, the lady plumes her feathers with pride. Not the red-eyed bulbul.

I am interested to hear about the Indian Myna bird.  Indian labourers who went to work in Durban are thought to have brought the bird to South Africa over a hundred years ago. Homesick for India, they wanted something to remind them of where they came from.  The Song of the Myna Bird sounds like a good title for a story.