Essy, my missus, flew home to Zimbabwe for 2 weeks on Thursday evening landing in Harare on Friday morning. I’ve spoken to her a couple of times on the ‘phone and she’s telling me that things are even worse there than she expected. In order to get the fuel to drive to the airport to collect Essy her brother had to spend the entire night in a queue at the filling station! Neither she, nor any of the family, have any cash ……. not one cent :-( Everyday her family start queing at the bank at 05:00 to try and get some cash, if they’re lucky they can get Zim$ 5 million but on Saturday they weren’t able to get even that. There is plenty (relatively) of money in their bank account it’s just that the bank don’t have the physical currency to hand out.

In the UK if we pay a money transfer agent in US$ they exchange it at 3 million Zim$ to 1 US$ and transfer the money to the recipient’s bank account – but what’s the point if it can’t then be withdrawn in cash? Essy took US$ dollar notes with her hoping to exchange then for Zim$ cash there – the best offer she got was 140,000 Zim$ per 1 US$ in cash, instead of the 3 million offered for transfer to a bank account. At that exchange rate it must be the most expensive place on earth. The place has gone stark raving mad!!!

Debit cards, as we know and use them, don’t exist in Zimbabwe, nor do cheques. What they call a cheque would be a Banker’s Draft, you go to the bank and join the general queue and then ask them to make out the cheque to a named party for a named amount, this money is guaranteed as it would be with a UK Banker’s Draft. It’s an OK method for paying sums of money which are known in advance like school fees etc. but useless for day to day shopping. Essy says the shops are totally bare, the day is spent moving form one to another to see if something has arrived. Her sister had great success yesterday and actually managed to get 1 loaf of bread.

Essy’s baggage allowance was 30 kg in the hold plus 8 kg hand luggage. She took two pairs of trousers and some tops (it’s summer there) so that she could take as many things as possible for the family. I think she had 5 kgs of corned beef in her case plus lots of other food items and some clothes for the family.

Before she went her mother had not been well but said that she was better, when Essy arrived she found that her Mum was still not well. She wants to take her to a private Doctor because there are no drugs and diagnostics available to medical aid claimants. The private Doctors want cash only because they too can’t get it from the banks and so the vicious circle goes round :-(