From buying grass in Avondale at the now defunct “Hollywood” to grocery shopping in Strathaven for my daily bread, I, Jonathan N. Wakeling, remain “The Bard of Strathaven” – a happenstance reference to Shakespeare, The Bard of Avon. Life is my play and Harare my stage. Want to make a movie Hollywood?

Earlier in life Chisipite and Borrowdale were my stomping ground and Lewisam Shops my local for said green. Times change. Now we’re over Avondale side in the quite suburbia that is Monavale and Strathaven is the byword. As if there weren’t enough grass Harare’s wetlands provide a welcome reprieve from concrete supermarkets and are also big business in the environmental protection department where they vie with all manner of development and attempts at “modernization” of what is otherwise God’s gift of Nature and an important origin to the city’s water supply.

Another fascinating confirmation that The Bard of legend has been popularized in Harare beyond boring school textbooks is The Londoner in Strathaven – a popular watering hole for all manner of alcoholic imbibers – myself formally among them. I am now a proudly recovered drinker and all round ex-addict. Coffee is my new religion – and an aptly private conversation with the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. To Brazil and back Internet users near and far. I serve a mean grind to say the least.