With thanks to Diana Hirsch for her amazing blog on life in Que Que - see http://www.oncecalledhome.com

The following is one of her recent postings

The Little Town That Could 

The Beira and Mashonaland Railway Company completed the rail link south between Salisbury and the Globe and Phoenix Station, later called Que Que, in 1901. The link to Bulawayo was completed a year later. Now coal fired boilers could be introduced on the Globe and Phoenix Mine, meat to the market and women arrived in Que Que.  The daily passenger trains from Bulawayo and Salisbury still passed through Que Que, at the ungodly hours of one and two am respectively a half-century later.

Umniati River in flood with the new bridge under construction

The Little Town That Could

In January of 1953 clouds hung low and heavy like wet blotting paper while thunder rumbled ominously across the sodden land.  The heavens opened and torrential rain for the eighth day bucketed down.

Riverbeds that had been sandy wastes for the past two years were now raging torrents, carrying away precious topsoil, uprooted trees and the bloated carcasses of cattle and goats.  Roads were impassable in many places. The railway bridge over the Umniati River, linking Que Que to Gatooma and the towns to the north, collapsed.

Holidaymakers were returning home in time for the new school term. Behind the hissing Garrett steam engine passengers looked anxiously out of rain-streaked windows.

“What do we do now?”

“How long before the bridge will be repaired?”

“We are pretty low on cash.”

Dad, was mayor.  He reassured the crowd on the platform, “We’ll make things as easy for you as we can.  The railway engineers and their gang are already on the job.”

A rota system was organized.  The large kitchen at the boarding school was opened.  The Red Cross provided food; the Women’s Institute brought hot meals to the elderly on the train as well as magazines and books.  The ladies stayed to chat and give cheer to the worried folk.

The school bus ferried groups of passengers to the school for meals.

The welfare bus took others to the mine shower block for a hot shower.  Soap and towels were provided.

The Globe and Phoenix Mine Compound Manager, pith helmeted A. J. Liebenberg, cranked his car into high gear and arranged housing and food for the third and forth class African passengers at the First Aid Pavilion.

Much to the Hirsch children’s consternation, their home at #1 Silver Oaks Road was opened to families with young children, who had the run of the very large, long verandah.  They had use of our toys!  My Rosebud dolls suffered broken limbs and  torn clothes.  Brian’s Meccano set lost nuts and bolts, levers and gears and David’s golliwog disappeared altogether.   Mom was impervious to our complaints.  How could we be so selfish?

Our commodious kitchen was opened to mothers with babies to feed and bottles to sterilize late into the night.

Stranded motorists occupied all the rooms at Sloman’s Que Que Hotel.  Mattresses were put down in the lounge to accommodate the overflow.  Homeowners opened up their homes as well.  One family had measles.  Dad found a similar family in town.  All were sick together.

Teperson and Malkow’s Midlands Bakery did a roaring trade sending their “boys” down in their plastic capes with trays of hot sausage rolls, meat pies, chips and sticky buns for sale.

Mr. Cloete of Vernon’s Café, not to be outdone, provided enamel jugs of hot coffee and tea, packets of biscuits, sweets and Willards chips, as well as cigarettes and matches.

The Medical Officer of Health did a splendid job with sanitary pails.

Telephone lines were down, but news still came over the wireless at six in the evening.  A daily bulletin was posted on the station notice board chronicling progress on the damaged bridge.  Bets were laid.  The town’s rallying to the stranded passengers plight and the cheerfulness of all was catching.  A festive air developed.  Soccer matches and other games were played on the platform.

Extra food and hot drinks in thermoses were sent to the hard working railway engineers and their gang.  Ribald jokes were shouted across the turbulent river to folk on the far side who had come to watch the river and monitor progress.

After four days the bridge was deemed safe.  The Garrett was unhooked, the fire stoked.  Smoke rose in the soggy air.  With a few optimistic hoots the engine rumbled its way out of sight to test the bridge on its own.

For what seemed like eternity the swelling crowds waited and listened for the returning Garrett.  Youngsters put their ears to the line…then they heard it: the engine’s whistle, a whistle of success.

The whole town turned out to bid farewell to the passengers.  Dad wore his red robe with its ermine collar and mayoral gold chain.  There were tears of happiness and relief.  The most enthusiastic cheers were from the three Hirsch kids.

In response, the spokesman for the passengers concluded “Que Que is the little town with the golden heart, the little town that could.”

A big thank you to Eileen Underwood of New Zealand for this picture of the Umniati River and to Dora Dunkley (Candy) for details.

In face of desperate African poverty, Ruth Feigenbaum provides a beacon of hope

By Suzanne Belling · March 1, 2012

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (JTA) -- Two years after moving to Zimbabwe from South Africa 20 years ago, Ruth Feigenbaum noticed that her gardener, James Phiri, was losing weight and looking ill.

With the help of a physician friend, Phiri was diagnosed: Like nearly one in seven Zimbabweans, he was infected with HIV. Feigenbaum and her husband, Alan, were about to leave for a trip, but they left Phiri with money and food.

Three days later he was dead.

“It upset me beyond belief,” Feigenbaum told JTA. “Who would support his family and so many of the relatives and orphans of those who died from AIDS-related illnesses?”

A veteran of the fight against apartheid in South Africa -- Feigenbaum was an active member of Black Sash, an advocacy organization that Nelson Mandela once called “the conscience of white SA” -- she responded to Phiri’s death by founding a support group for families affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

Ruth Feigenbaum with Rabbi Moshe Silberhaft, aka "The Traveling Rabbi," in the library for AIDS orphans in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, July 2011. (Courtesy SGOFOTI)

In the years since, Feigenbaum has become a major player in helping care for Zimbabweans affected by the disease, working her international Jewish connections for financial and other support she uses to alleviate suffering in a country that the United Nations considers the poorest in the world. Life expectancy there is just 47 years, and one in four children are AIDS orphans.

With assistance from World Jewish Relief in London, Feigenbaum launched the Support Group of Families of the Terminally Ill, or SGOFOTI, an apolitical, nongovernmental organization that provides emotional and psychological support to the families of HIV/AIDS victims in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe’s second largest city, where Feigenbaum lives.

Along with partner Patricia Tshabalala, a woman Feigenbaum calls Zimbabwe’s Mother Theresa, Feigenbaum has built SGOFOTI into an organization encompassing seven constituent groups serving a cross-generational spectrum, from children orphaned by the disease to grandmothers struggling to support families who have lost their breadwinner -- all this in a country with weak civic institutions and a culture of fear cultivated by the iron fist of strongman President Robert Mugabe.

“I don’t play bridge or go to tea parties, so this gives me something to do in Bulawayo,” said Feigenbaum, who visits each group on a weekly basis. “But I get just as much out of it as the people. It has also taught them that not all whites are racist, and they have learned something about Jews and Judaism from me.”

One of the SGOFOTI’s member groups is Vulindlela Guardians, located in the Bulawayo suburb of Mpopoma. The group provides orphaned children with school fees, clothing and a place of refuge.

In 2009, Feigenbaum helped provide the group with a library through her connections to several Jewish South African expatriates living in Australia. Two women -- one a former student of Feigenbaum’s from Johannesburg -- had been distributing recycled books to African children through the Union of Jewish Women of South Africa. Feigenbaum persuaded them to donate a shipment to establish a library for the children at Vulindlela Guardians.

The books were delivered personally by South Africa’s “Traveling Rabbi,” Moshe Silberhaft, for whom the library was named. At the dedication last year, a South African television crew shot footage for a documentary titled “Shalom the Beloved Country.”

“The library will help inculcate a culture of reading for the children,” Bulawayo Mayor Thaba Moyo said during the ceremony, according to text of the mayor’s remarks provided by Silberhaft. “You have equipped our city with great ammunition, which is education. We note that education is vital in spearheading development in our society.”

Ruth Feigenbaum with Patricia Tshabalala at the facilities of the Support Group of Families of the Terminally Ill. (Courtesy SGOFOTI)

Feigenbaum and her husband are among the last Jews in Bulawayo, a community that once numbered more than 1,000 and is now down to a few dozen. The couple manages to keep a kosher home only with help from Silberhaft, who sends them necessary supplies from abroad.

In her work with local Zimbabweans, Feigenbaum has introduced some Jewish teachings. During the library dedication, she had tears in her eyes watching the orphans sing songs in the two main indigenous Zimbabwean languages, Shona and Ndebele, as well as in English and Hebrew.

“They greet me on every visit with a ‘shalom’ and thank me by saying ‘todah rabah,’ ” Feigenbaum said. “At Pesach time, with the matzah sent to us by Rabbi Moshe, I arrange a third seder so they can learn a little about our customs.”

Feigenbaum’s efforts have helped engender warm feelings toward the Jewish community in a desperate place where few people have any firsthand exposure to Jews or Jewish customs. Following the library dedication, Tshabalala wrote an earnest letter to Silberhaft thanking him for his efforts.

“Please tell the Jewish community I thank them for their love, care and support,” Tshabalala wrote last year to Silberhaft, “and for making me and my people part of their family.”

Ruth Feigenbaum, founder of the Support Group of Families of the Terminally Ill in Zimbabwe. (Courtesy SGOFOTI)

From Greenwich to Zimbabwe, a gift of fire trucks

From Greenwich to Zimbabwe, a gift of fire trucks
Christine Negroni, Special to Greenwich Time
Updated 07:16 p.m., Tuesday, January 10, 2012

HARARE, Zimbabwe -- When the Fire Brigade in Zimbabwe's capital city of Harare took delivery of two new fire trucks just before Christmas, it doubled its number of working fire engines.

The trucks didn't come from the government. It was a gift from an unusual source: an Old Greenwich travel agent who specializes in sending tourists on safari and her Zimbabwean-born husband.

Diane Ebzery Lobel and Peter Lobel decided to make the contribution to the southern African nation after the particularly deadly summer of 2011 when fires destroyed homes and killed people. Among the fatalities was Solomon Mujuru, a national war hero and husband of the country's vice president, who was a longtime friend of the Lobels, who split their time between New York City and Zimbabwe.

"We have a commitment to uplifting the people of Zimbabwe," said Ebzery Lobel, a Riverside native whose parents still live there. "One of the ways is through providing better services, and this happened to be a need that became very apparent in a concentrated period of time."

Ebzery had a business reason as well. Her travel company, African Portfolio, specializes in sending well-heeled Americans on safari vacations. About a quarter of the tours she arranges include a visit to Zimbabwe's Victoria Falls.

As it turned out, making the decision and buying two rebuilt Volvo fire engines was the easy part. Getting them from Kent, England, where they were purchased, to Namibia, where they arrived by boat, and then to Zimbabwe more than 1,300 miles to the east, required many of Lobel's travel-planning skills.

As his wife organized from America, Peter gathered five friends and headed overseas to take the trucks on a movie-worthy road trip across sub-Saharan Africa.

"Shipping is inherently unpredictable, and it was a logistical nightmare," said Peter, reflecting on the trip after the trucks had reached their destination.

Jonathan Marks, an American volunteer driver and long-time friend of Peter, left his home in New York at the end of November, flying via London and Johannesburg to get a connection to the Namibian port city of Walvis Bay. He joined Lobel and other men from America, Zimbabwe and South Africa and they waited for the fire trucks to arrive.

Lobel had been charting the progress of the transport ship Arcadia Highway since October, when he contracted for the fire trucks to be loaded onto the 587-foot carrier. There was an anticipated arrival date, but with many other factors at play, Lobel and his volunteer drivers could only hope that the trucks would arrive on schedule.

Two days after they had assembled in Walvis Bay, the men were eating at an oceanfront restaurant when the Arcadia floated by. Lobel was overjoyed.

"I said, `That's it. There can't be anything larger than that,' " he said.

"We were very excited," Marks said.

The next day, the men and the trucks set out on the eight-day drive, armed with a list of diesel gas stations and repair shops along 1,360-mile route. Ebzerly Lobel had found hotels that could accommodate six men and two large vehicles and Peter rented a GPS transponder so families and Facebook followers could see in real time how the trip was progressing.

The drive was broken into three- to four-hour segments, and the men would stop along the side of the road in the shade to lunch or relax and visit with curious passersby.

Several of the men said their most memorable stop was at Planet Baobab, a guest house in Gweta, Botswana, where the only other guests were 17 American teenagers on a school tour. Along the way, the volunteer drivers also accepted good wishes at a quick gas station ceremony with the mayor of Windhoek, Namibia's capital, and visited fire stations in Francistown, Botswana, and Bulawayo, Zimbabwe.

But for raw emotion, no part of journey could match the arrival of the group in Harare. With a blare of sirens, the fire engines rolled down the last street and turned into the driveway.

"It was difficult to describe how it felt," the station's fire chief, Servias Mugava, said of the first sight and sound of the new arrivals. "A lot of people say they will do things, but Mr. Lobel really did it. I said to him, `You are a star.' "

A few days later a crowd that included Vice President Joice Mujuru, the widow of Solomon Mujuru, gathered to celebrate. Mujuru held Lobel's hands and both cried as they spoke of the death of the general and what the fire trucks would mean to the community.

"You have shown love to my husband and to City of Harare," she said. "On behalf of the family and children, we have no better words to thank you."

Like much else in this politically troubled African country, the Harare Fire Department is in advanced stages of neglect. Chipped paint hangs from the ceiling of the garage. Firefighters work in threadbare coveralls. Against a fence in the back parking lot, a half-dozen fire trucks need repairs that the department cannot afford. Fire Chief Mugava said he battles an average of four building fires a day in a city with a population of 1.6 million people.

"We have 255 fighters, and they are professionally trained," Mugava said. "But the future is bleak. They have no tools to work with."

The firefighters were already learning their way around the new pumper trucks as the chief discussed plans to get the new equipment insured so the department could begin using them.

Ebezry Lobel said many of her travel clients have made generous gifts after visiting Africa, and like the gift of fire trucks, these can be attributed to a greater global awareness.

"People are just more conscious of what's going on around them and high-profile programs like those of Bill Gates and Bono and Bill Clinton," she said. "All of those high-profile people who have initiatives on a large scale have made people think about what their own contribution can be. That has been inspirational."

Christine Negroni writes about aviation and travel at www.gohowknowhow.com



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