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Isdore Guvamombe Reflections
It was my first day at Waddilove High School having enrolled for Advanced Level. I was burying behind me four years of Ordinary Level at St Anne’s Goto High School in neighbouring Wedza and seven years of primary education in varying schools back in the village, in the land of milk, honey and dust or Guruve.

Waddilove was a Methodist Church school while St Anne’s was Anglican and, and, and, the village I came from was very traditional.

Back in the village when the rhythm of a drum beat changes, the dance steps must adapt promptly. You really have to adjust to a new rhythm even when there is rhythmical madness.

Was it not Karitundundu the ageless village autochthon of wisdom and knowledge who always said every hill had its leopard? So I was in unfamiliar territory and indeed Waddilove was a jungle, every animal was represented by students. There were leopards, elephants, lions, gnu, tortoises, chameleons and everything.

The dining room, affectionately called the “Dimash” in student lingo, was the epicentre of life. There, we sat on tables of six to eight.

There were duties for dishing out food to avert starving each other. The spoon was a big issue.

Many of us came from the poorest of all backgrounds and did not have supplementary food in our dormitories, so we ate for survival. The senior Dimash was for Forms 3-6. There were two others for the junior schools.

The diet was modest boiled beans, cabbage and/or meat. If there was no boiled beans at lunch it was certain it was served for supper. You could not escape. It was beans, beans and more beans, somehow. Beans alternated with everything else. It was common to bite a stone among the beans. Sometimes weevils would also be part of the matrix to add to the ever-growing resentment of the legume. That was a common occurrence.

Senior boys dated girls too and food either gave one an advantage or disadvantage. If you ate too much in girls’ presence, you would be called a gormandiser and you were an unlikeable charac- ter.

After the opening food prayer we ate slowly and waited for the closing prayer, after which girls would leave, while boys remained behind specifically to comb through whatever remained in the plates and dishes, including leftovers from girls’ plates.

The first days were okay but as we ate into the term, metal trunks became empty of supplementary feeds and competition in the Dimash became stiff.

During those lean days, the crust from the huge sadza pot became a handy delicacy. At times the crust came out so big. The crust came out about 30 minutes before official eating time and boys milled around the Dimash area for it.

There was one particular boy, slim as a pencil, who always won the crust but would run on his spindly legs into Majeke and hide behind the dotted bald-headed stones, with other boys in hot pursuit.

It was the most dramatic part of this villager’s first days at Waddilove. Shy and raw from the village, running away with crust with other boys in hot pursuit was taboo. The munching of the hard crust that followed left jawbones painful. You needed the jawbones like those of a donkey munching wild nuts. The panting from the running too!

Many boys had scars from the crust fiasco. It was a daily occurrence. A struggle! Surprisingly, the boys who ran the fastest with the crust, never did the same during sports. They were not sporting persons, yet they outran everyone with the crust. They must have been using their stomach and not legs to run.

Then there was the doughnut from the school kiosk whose name was always vulgarised by the boys especially in the presence of girls. Of course the popular ice cream “Fatso” that came in courtesy of ice cream vendors from Marondera must not be overlooked.

High school was cruel . . . it took your heart and ground it into powdered stone – and no one but yourself minded but the same high school was less a wilderness than a repository of primary and fundamental values, and less a barbaric land than an unfamiliar voice that groomed many of us into what we are today. Waddilove, Waddilove, Waddilove!

From where this villager stands, Waddilove may yet prove to be the professional conservatory of the world when the civilised nations in consequence of their wonderful material development, shall have had their spiritual susceptibilities blunted through the agency of a captivating and absorbing materialism, it may be that they have to resort to Waddilove to get some of the simple elements of faithful professionalism who have made the world different through their contributions from their bases in many countries. Waddilove, Waddilove, Waddilove!