Looking For Hope
Dear Family and Friends
If you grew up in Zimbabwe you may remember those rainy seasons where you told the time by the rain storms! It rained at 7:00am when you were walking to school, at lunch time when you were going to the dining room and again at 2:00pm when you were walking to the sports fields. And then, if it was a ‘real’ rainy season, it rained again at 4:30pm when you were going home.
We are having one of those ‘real’ rainy seasons this year and in this horrific time of war in the Middle East, of mortars and missiles, death and destruction, I find myself overwhelmed with sadness and needing to look for hope. Walk with me today.
Along Zimbabwe’s highways rain water lies in deep puddles and pools in the grass for days, so clear you can see the bottom and for so long that you even see the swirls of newly hatched tadpoles. Puddles where Water Boatmen and Backswimmer bugs move in, swimming in crazy circles, instantly reminding you that a bite from a Backswimmer burns like a bee sting. Beyond the pools and puddles the Cosmos flowers are in full bloom, pink, mauve, purple and white, swaying in the breeze and helping you to exhale, to smile for a moment, to forget for a moment and to see hope.
In the plains and valleys, the wild grasses are tall and golden, heavy with seeds, waiting to disperse their bounty into the wind and let the cycle of life start again. Outrageously long-legged blue and red grasshoppers click and jump in the tall grass and down below on the ground the Finches and Waxbills endlessly peck at fallen seeds.
Closer to home, hope is in the rain gauge, watching the drops climb into double and then triple digits, replenishing the water table, bringing life back to wetlands, filling rivers, dams and lakes. Hope is in the grey rain clouds which are full of water and not oil.
Hope is in the brief windows of sun in these rainy days, a sun which dries the birds as they feast on newly exposed worms and insects: African Hoopoes, Arrow-marked Babblers, Bulbuls and Thrushes and the noisy, cackling, bowing Green Wood Hoopoes.
Back at my desk I find hope in a 2-minute video of two senior school boys at Prince Edward School in Harare performing a musical Marimba Duet. Again and again, I listen and watch and in them I see hope and know exactly why they received an Honors Exceptional Grade (95% and above) from the National Institute of Allied Arts.
Three months ago, struggling to breathe and crippled with bronchitis, I yearned for the beauty of Zimbabwe and began to think of how best I could share this beautiful country with you, the people who love Zimbabwe and have been long-time, loyal and dedicated readers of my books, annual photobooks and calendars and my fortnightly Letters From Zimbabwe. I knew the answer was in photographs and so I began to put together a special collection of 45 photographs, chosen from five years of images in “Zimbabwe’s Timeless Beauty”, nine pictures from each year.
I am pleased to advise that my new book: “Zimbabwe’s Timeless Beauty The Photographs 2021-2025” is now available. It takes you to winding rivers and cascading waterfalls, sandstone cliffs and rocky gorges, secret pools and remote wild areas. For me these are the images of hope and of peace. Please visit my website to find out more and order your copy https://cathybuckle.co.zw/ .
As the war enters its 20th day and now affects us all, regardless of what we think or where we live, I can only say: Find hope if you can and hold on to it wherever you are, and never forget the innocent people who are alone, grieving and lost, caught up in the hell of war.
There is no charge for this Letter From Zimbabwe but if you would like to donate please visit my website.
Until next time, thanks for reading this Letter From Zimbabwe now in its 26th year, and my books about life in Zimbabwe, a country in waiting.
Ndini shamwari yenyu (I am your friend)
Love Cathy 20th March 2026.
Copyright © Cathy Buckle https://cathybuckle.co.zw/
To see the photograph accompanying this Letter, the archive of my previous Letters and to see and order all my Books, Photobooks and Calendars, please visit my website https://cathybuckle.co.zw/ or my publishing spotlight: www.lulu.com/spotlight/cathybuckle2018