Our early cultural experiences count for something right until we die. Sometimes we get our sense of normality from them and sometimes we rebel. I think I’m very different from my sister, who tends to lean toward community and feel defined by it. My character has always been structured in an asocial way — in a sense of wanting to sniff the air and catch its vibe, like a dog with its head out the window of a car going as fast as possible.
My migratory shift from an exciting situation of war and freedom to one where citizens were genuinely law-abiding was the worst experience of my life. To me, the move from Zimbabwe to Australia was from an adult state to an infantilized one, where nobody actually trusted themselves to make their own decisions, but instead looked to the law to tell them what to do. I’m sure much of the problem was private property. You couldn’t camp just anywhere you wanted to. You couldn’t build a fire and be trusted to put it out again afterwards. You weren’t allowed to do a great deal. Also, the TV news was extremely dumbed-down compared to the very serious news we had been used to experiencing, which concerned war and death and stoicism in the face of enemy hostility. Instead, we learned that somebody’s dog had gone missing, but had been returned.
The spirit of lawlessness still prevails in Zimbabwe, thankfully. One takes the responsibility for dealing with one’s own safety and is entirely responsible if the outcome isn’t what you’d hoped for. One would never blame others if a project one had set out to complete hadn’t worked out. In Australia, they do, though. It’s second nature. “If I obey the laws that are in place to protect me, society has to make sure everything goes according to my plans, otherwise heads will roll! (I will find someone to blame).”
I find this more civilized Australian attitude to be incomprehensible. It seems to imply the desire for a social contract based on blind trust.
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