Hi everyone! Welcome to the "This is Zvakanaka Zimbabwe Volunteer Life" podcast!

I'm Miyu and I started living here in Zimbabwe as part of an official Japanese volunteer program.

Today I want to talk about my daily life in the rural areas of Zimbabwe.

I started working at college about a month ↓ago. Prior to that, I was in the capital city of Zimbabwe, it's called Harare, and then moved here to start working.

Zimbabwean rural life will certainly be interesting for people living outside of Africa.

This college is surrounded by a forest. There are lots of monkeys and other living things, including snakes, baboons, dogs, and something something. I feel the great nature here.

I live in an accommodation for lecturers with my roommate. She is one of the Zimbabwean lecturers. Sometimes we share meals, and other times we have conversations.

And, There are many challenges to our "i"nfrastructure here. The first is the water challenge.

We only have tap water once a week. When tap water arrives, we store it in several buckets and use it. The largest of these buckets can store 100 litres of water in a single container.

In addition to tap water, we use rainwater as well. We use this water to wash our dishes, shower, flush the toilet, and wash our clothes. It's difficult to get a washing machine here in a rural area.

The second is electricity. All over the country, electricity is scarce. My place was not so bad - normally we had electricity. But the transformer was hit by lightning and there was no electricity for last two weeks. Not at all. For two weeks, that meant no Wifi, no network. あーIt was a tough day.

And access to any product is extremely poor.

The nearest supermarket is about 60km away. It takes about one hour to get there.

If we drive 20 minutes, there is a village and there are kind of markets outside. People make stands and sell stuff at that market. The variety of food sold is limited because they don't use the fridge, but the quality of vegetables is better than what you find in supermarkets. They even sell worms! They sell small fish and small worms; people think they are in the same category! It is interesting because they are completely different in our culture.

The local culture and everyday life is interesting and I will have to learn to eat locally during my stay here for two years.

This is my life in zimbabwe up to now. If you have any questions and comment, there is a form in your listening page, I will appreciate for your comment.

Thank you for listening, and see you in the next episode. Tonana!