Hamatika School

Gwembe valley

October 4, 2002

Dear Aunty Grace

Thank you very much for the food that arrived yesterday. Mother was thrilled to see

it. She cried because she had not seen so much mealie meal for months.

Straightaway she cooked a really big meal of nshima. We ate really well last night

and I still feel full today.

Some days when I'm unable to write at home, too lazy to make breakfast, or just need a better cup of coffe than I make around here, I head for a local Internet Cafe. Java Street is a very pleasant spot run by a gracious friend named Stacy and habituated by a generally interesting and diverse group of people.

Yesterday as I settled in, plugged in the laptop and ordered breakfast I spoke to a couple of the regulars who play chess most mornings trading quick coffee house greetings. As I opened the morning paper I noticed at the next table a very pretty young woman (I'm a professional, a trained observer, it's my job) wearing a headset, engrossed in her work and seemingly oblivious to the coffee aromas mixed with the lingering memory of burnt toast and the low murmur of breakfast banter wafting in her vicinity.

On the same morning, I can be both infuriated with my public radio station -- as when they parrot administration talking points on the port sale -- and tremendously grateful that they still get my $40.  This morning, I was grateful, because if it wasn't for NPR, I would have never heard about the film, Darwin's Nightmare, and I would have never learned this both fascinating and repellent story of people, exploitation, and a very hungry fish.

How weird is this story? Here's what so astonished filmmaker Hubert Sauper:

I witnessed... the bizarre juxtaposition of two gigantic airplanes, both bursting with food. The first cargo jet brought 45 tons of yellow peas from America to feed the refugees in the nearby UN camps. The second plane took off for the European Union, weighted with 50 tons of fresh fish.