In my view , life is about making the most of the opportunities presented to us along the way. At times, we may come across challenges that turn into opportunities depending on how we approach them. I personally have encountered many obstacles along the path that actually worked out to my advantage. Although it was not easy at the time, I experienced the benefit in the end. Throughout my life, I have been able to relate to the words of David.
“Surely your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life,” Psalm 23:6
About Life in Zimbabwe
I was born in Zimbabwe, which seems very far away now. Just before turning eighteen, I left and never returned. Looking back now, I wish I had not been so dismissive of its unique beauty and the rare opportunity it was to grow up there.
Although Zimbabwe is such a remote and desolate place, it has a wild, abandoned grandeur that I have only come to appreciate now.
About My Parents
My parents emigrated there from South Africa in 1962. They drove all the way from Cape Town with four small children and everything they owed in a dilapidated Hillman. After staying briefly in Salisbury, they finally settled in Bulawayo, where my father found a job as a factory manager.
My mother was originally born in England and sailed from Southampton to South Africa on the Queen Elizabeth II in 1948 after serving in India during the Second World War.
My father’s ancestors had also sailed from England to South Africa, arriving in the Cape Town with the 1820 settlers. Their descendants travelled to Stellenbosch where my father was born. His father worked as a blacksmith before he dying in the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic.
My father was about five years old when his mother took him and his two older brothers to live in an orphanage. He said she visited them a few times and then he never saw her again. When he turned fourteen, my father was sent to an industrial school in George where he was trained as a tailor.
During World War II , he was stationed in Egypt and then Italy as part of the Allied Air Force. He met my mother after returning to South Africa, and they settled in Cape Town before leaving for Zimbabwe.
I was born a few years later and grew up in Bulawayo. After I finished high school, I boarded a train to Cape Town with parents and older sister. My other siblings had already left in previous years for South Africa, England, and Canada.
We left one morning in December, each with a suitcase and a cardboard box. Everything else in our rented house was left for the cleaning lady and the gardener.
About Life in South Africa
After staying for a year with my family in a small dingy flat in Muizenberg, near the railway line, I moved to George, where I found a job at a resort.
Most of my adult life was spent in George, where I met my husband and had three children. After the children were born, we bought an old house with a large garden where they could play. By the time I started working again, we lived on location at a resort surrounded by natural vegetation overlooking the ocean. I am grateful that the children had the opportunity to grow up in a very scenic and temperate part of the world where the sun shone throughout the year.
About Life in England
We emigrated to England in 2020, exactly two hundred years after my father’s ancestors sailed to Cape Town in 1820. After selling most of our furniture and giving the rest away, I was again faced with the prospect of packing everything I had into two suitcases and a box. It is ironic that my mother, myself and my daughter were all about the same age when we left our home country with only what we could carry.
We have found that the quality of life in England is better than it was in South Africa. Our two sons and our daughter have all been able to progress successfully in their careers for which I am very grateful. I am reminded of a verse in Joshua regarding the faithfulness of God.
“So the Lord gave to Israel all the land he had sworn to give their ancestors, and they took possession of it and settled there. And the Lord gave them rest on every side . . . Not a single one of all the good promises the Lord had given to the family of Israel was left unfulfilled; everything he had spoken came true.” Joshua 21:43-45
England is similar to South Africa in certain respects. In both countries, a disparity in living standards is clearly evident where areas of lavish opulence lie in dramatic contrast with deprived overpopulated environments.
The imbalance in quality of life is further accentuated by the weather. The beautiful parts of England are even more magnificent on warm summer days, while the squalid areas appear more depressing and miserable when the weather is cold, grey, and wet.
Since our three children have now left home, we will also be relocating to more picturesque surroundings.
We are excited about beginning a new chapter of our lives in a new place!
We have continue to experience the faithfulness and generosity of God in every aspect of our lives.
In essence, what I have attempted to do in my articles and poems is reflect our ongoing story and how we encounter the kindness of God in every situation.
I hope you can find some value in them.