Of course, my Zimbabwean sides (not the plural!) give me a two-fold character-set, which others can easily get confused about. I had a very, very formal early education, so I can easily accommodate myself to the rituals of certain formal settings, such as martial arts. (I have an uncanny tendency to want to bow on every mat that marks the exit point of shops. I've heard it from another woman trainee, too, about this tendency. She bowed an exit out of a carpet shop.) I understand the meaning and nature of formal rituals in shaping the mind and relationships.
At the same time, I simply cannot shake off an almost completely irreverent attitude to anything and everything. I've tried to do so in the past, and I've ended up sombre and sullen for some time, but ultimately the same old irreverence bursts through the would-be disciplined defences. It's an approach to life that is in fact very culturally Zimbabwean, and is actually an expression of an underlying layer of stoicism. We do not formally object to very much, but use our stoicism, and its associated outpouring of mocking humour, to cope with our realities.
That is our Zimbabwean way.
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