In the free world, we manage to live quite easily from one day to the next. We also have a little bit of money that allows us to enjoy life a little more, whilst we live in houses that have all the amenities that we would expect.
We have electricity and water.
We can walk into a shop and chose what we want to purchase, pay for it and take it away with us.
If we are ill or sick, we can visit a general practitioner and get help and medication to treat the problem. If we need surgery or specialist treatment, we can get that relatively easily - and I should know as I have been the recipient of specialist treatment and caring in the last nine years since my accident.
Children are educated here, and if our motor cars need fuel, we go to the petrol garage.
Even though the country is coming out of a worldwide recession, jobs are pretty easy to get - although quite a bit harder to secure for the handicapped and disabled.
Law and order seems to function well, and daily we read and hear of the criminal element in society being punished for their crimes.
In other words, much of our lives here in the United Kingdom is normal, affordable and quite comfortable.
Remember that Robert Mugabe rejects anything remotely English or colonial - but bleats loudly because he and his wife (and many of his senior followers) cannot visit here because of the targeted travel sanctions in place against them.
My family left Zimbabwe eleven years ago - before the rapid deterioration in the country began in earnest - and so my experience of a country on its knees is limited to the experiences shared by writers and film makers on the internet.
And you can’t argue with basic video evidence that shows the degradation of what used to be a beautiful country.
Don’t get me wrong - much of the natural beauty is still apparent, but it is the infrastructure that was built up to lend to the aesthetic quality that now works against that beauty to offer it as a grim reminder of what once was.
The roads in Zimbabwe are littered with potholes - potholes big enough to rip an exhaust system off, tear a wheel off, or cause other damage that few can afford.
The normal services such as garbage collection have virtually been forgotten, with waste being piled high in the streets, the neighbourhood dogs allowed free rein, fighting with the street people who dig anxiously for something to eat, to wear, to sell.
Electricity - produced at Kariba Dam - is severely rationed, with some coming from the Cabora Bassa in Mozambique. But it still isn’t enough with the country spending much of the day in darkness and without power - without warning or excuse.
Water is a problem, insofar as there is never enough of it, and what does get through is not treated and could carry all manner of water borne illnesses.
Shop shelves are full once again, but unless you have the South African rand, the British pound, or the American greenback, commodities are out of reach - and if you have the currency, you are probably paying over the odds anyway.
The problems in Zimbabwe continue to mount up, and, by way of comparison, here in the United Kingdom, we may spend our days in the comfort of our homes, warm, clean, fed and watered, whilst many, many people in Zimbabwe spend their days wondering how they can get through today - just so that they can do it all over again tomorrow…
That’s not a life!
Robb WJ Ellis The Bearded Man
