September 11

I cannot believe it is 19 years since the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre.  Time really does go by so quickly.  It was my first day of teaching at secondary level.

About a week ago, I won a bid on Bidding Wars for a pile of books.  I only really wanted the William books in the pile, but I had to get the whole thing.  I love the Just William series; when I was a child, I used to have a whole lot of old hardback editions and four of the books in the bid are the same type.  Richmal Crompton was an interesting lady - many people assume she was a man because of her name.  She was very clever, but suffered from various illnesses, such as polio and breast cancer and so spent a lot of time either in bed or convalescing and turned to writing to fill her time.

Her William stories stretched over four decades, but William is always the same age, whether he is planning to fight Hitler or wondering how to deal with his sister's hippy friends.  The stories are very cleverly written, but are not so popular these days.  

One of the other books in the pile is called In Search of England.  It was published in 1920.  The author is travelling through England, noting different customs, accents, traditions and stories.  John reads anything and he is quite taken with the book.  He says it makes him want to go to England and find out if the places described are still there.  We are in shock.  John never says that he would like to go to England, for any reason. This is the closest he has come to showing any sense of patriotism for his country.  

'Only if it's still 1920,' he adds, before we all get excited and think he may be planning a holiday. One thing I have noticed about the white community in Zimbabwe is that those born and raised in the UK are the most reluctant to leave and go back there, despite the economic woes here.  Those who are most keen to leave are those born and brought up here.  Sometimes the most Zimbabwean of people - those who love the bush and braais and wear khaki like it's the only choice of colour available - have ended up in the middle of London.

Like my dad, John is content with being English from a distance - and the greater the distance, the happier he is.