Zimbabwe Trip 4 - Final Chapter

Tuesday – May 30, 2006

The morning was perfectly lovely with a light breakfast, and meeting the WHO van, which was running late. I had to sit at Debra’s desk because the guy who normally sits where I had been sitting returned yesterday. Of course, he did not show up today, but that’s fine. I like being able to face the door. It allows me to do work, and surf the Internet without being spied on.

Couple of interesting items in the newspaper today. First, the government is announcing the release of the 100,000 dollar “bearer’s cheque” to complement the 50,000 dollar “bearer’s cheque” released in January. With inflation at 1042%, they have to release ever larger denominations to handle the rising costs of items. How does a “bearer’s cheque” and legal tender cash differ? It doesn’t really, except the “bearer’s cheque” is not legal tender outside the borders of Zimbabwe. You cannot exchange them for local money in any country. The second you leave Zimbabwe, they aren’t worth the paper they are printed on. With legal tender cash, I can exchange Zim dollars for local currency in other nations. It’s a clever way to diffuse the charge that they are “printing money” which is exactly what they ARE doing.

The other interesting item was an article by none other than CYNTHIA MCKINNEY, the “pride of DeKalb County”. See the article here: http://www.herald.co.zw/inside.aspx?sectid=3814&cat=10. One of the most racist members of Congress is now writing opinion pieces for Mugabe’s state-owned rag. All to promote some kind of conspiracy theory that the US Government had MLK killed. Actually, I’m not clear what McKinney’s motivation in writing this article is. Other than to say that during the civil rights movement, the government did some really crappy things to Dr. King and others. All that was exposed a while ago, and the lesson is that the government failed to stop a righteous cause. Eventually, all righteous causes in a truly free society will prevail. Yet here Cynthia is, spreading her bile to Africa where any news of “bad white people” is sopped up with glee. DeKalb should be ashamed of itself for having such a “representative” in Congress. Thank God I was redistricted into John Lewis’s district. That’s the one thing the GOP General Assembly did that I’m thankful for. At least now, I can proudly tell people who my representative in Congress is! He votes the correct way, and he’s highly respected…what more could you want?

I spent most of the morning waiting for the big meeting with Balcha. Casey and I went over everything again. Balcha was delayed, so Casey and I went to get sandwiches for lunch. Balcha came in around 2:30pm for my report. We spent a half hour talking about the records as they exist and the problem of reconciling various files and extracting useful information. We eventually came up with a suggestion that I write a memo explaining my activities and observations, along with recommendations. Apparently, I will need to present this to Deo tomorrow. Oh boy…can’t wait. At least I can be sure that I won’t be yelled at since Deo doesn’t yell at “visitors”. He didn’t think I needed to come in the first place, and I’ve increasingly seen my role as verifying everything Casey has been trying to tell these people for a while. Maybe my status as an outsider will convince them. It seemed to work for Balcha.

I came home and had one last nice dinner at La Fontane. I also had to make another payment on my hotel bill. This making payments thing is vaguely insulting, but I guess that is their system. As of today, I had racked up a bill of $368 Million Zim. Thank God CDC will pay the bill.

After dinner, I came back to my room, and finished writing my memo for WHO. Hopefully it won’t need much tweaking tomorrow. I apparently will be required to stay late to fit into Deo’s schedule. It’s kind of like waiting around to be summoned by His Majesty. Other than that, I watched movies on TV and went to bed. Of course, I stayed up entirely too late. First, it was a hilarious show from England called “2DTV” which is a political and social satire from ITV (see http://www.2dtv.co.uk/itvindex.htm). The depictions of George Bush and Tony Blair are classic. Yet, it also bashes the conservatives in Britain. The cartoon skits with Geri Holliwell, formerly of the Spice Girls, are hilarious. Last night, they had a skit called the “Bushie and Saddamy Show” based on a Tom and Jerry skit. Very funny stuff. See this still of Bush talking to a sock puppet: http://www.2dtv.co.uk/picture/bush.jpg. Why can’t the Comedy Channel or something produce a show of this quality? Then I watched this cute Jennifer Aniston/Jay Mohr movie called “Picture Perfect” where the girl has to lie about having a fiancé in order to get a promotion at work. Of course, the guy (played by Jay Mohr) was absolutely perfect, thoughtful, etc. I had dinner in a booth behind Jay Mohr in Atlanta once. Not sure why he was in town, but I kept thinking I recognized him. Then it hit me. I didn’t accost him because I think that’s tacky. Still, there’s something about him that I find very attractive.

Only one more day to go, and I can go home!