Livingstone

Saturday 18 September: I had arranged to contact Fumbelo Chinyama from the Zambia Homeless and Poor People’s Federation in Livingstone. The federation is of local organisations of savings groups in an area which help, support and plan the development of houses for poor people in Zambia and with whom PPHPZ’s work closely. I arranged to meet Fumbelo in the market and he took me to his ‘stall’ which was a small area with a sewing machine where, he told me, he repairs clothes. We agreed first to go to the Victoria Falls and then to visit a housing development on the edge of Livingstone. We hired a taxi driver who agreed to drive us round for the morning.

The Victoria Falls lived up their expectations as the most amazing series of waterfalls – or maybe a waterfall one mile wide. Visitors have a dilemma. Go in the dry season and see the falls and the gorge into which they empty and get only slightly wet – or go in the wet season for a dramatic experience, get very wet and see not much more than spray. I got the dry option but it is still dramatic and a quite amazing experience and an incredible gorge.



We left the falls and drove to the housing development. The federation works to help poor people save and borrow to build a home. Members can start with a one room house (at a cost of about $1,500) and then expand it as they can afford to. Fumbelo had asked if I wanted to meet some of the federation members and I had said I would love to but was concerned that they probably had better things to do. When we arrived they were together and immediately leapt up, started singing to welcome me and in turn came up and shook my hand. I was then introduced to them formally after which (through someone interpreting) I said a few words about how impressed I was with all the work they had done etc. I then asked if they would mind my taking some photographs and Fumbelo said they would be very happy for me to do that and would like to be in the photos of their houses. So I toured the development taking photos of proud owners and their houses. I have promised to send them prints of these when I get home.



I was then given a brief exposition on how to make a loo without running water and finally returned to Zig Zag.

The morning tour of the falls was a bit rushed so in the afternoon I went back to them and had a more leisurely walk around. This time I also went to ‘the boiling pot’ – a walk from the top of the falls down to the river to where the Zambezi is squeezed into the Batoka Gorge. It was a steep walk down and towards the end I rounded a bend to find a monkey (sorry, I am no expert on species) blocking the path. Its youngster on seeing me ran over, sat on a branch and (I think) posed for the camera. I know what to do when you meet sheep in strange places – and I have been briefed on responding to rattle snakes, bears and mountain lions – but I was not expecting a monkey. So, stiff upper lip, I walked towards him and gestured for him to move aside and he, grudgingly, moved his leg enough for me to get past.