Zim has been a fun place lately... This year has brought many new things: new currency denominations (see above), and a new player on the political scene (presidential candidate Simba Makoni). Oh, and inflation officially at 66,000 % (yes, you read that right). What that means, in layman's language (that is, if you live here), is that one litre of milk that cost ZD2,000,000 last week costs almost ZD9,000,000 this week.. That a banana costs ZD1,000,000... Not too many Zimbabwean are economists, but I think everyone now understands the language of inflation...

Election fever is starting to grip the nation. Elections are set for Mar 29, when we will choose a president (new or otherwise, lol). It is a "harmonized election", which means we will choose both a president, and also members of parliament etc (a general election). Just how this will be done and completed on one day remains to be seen.... Due to a quirk in our constitution, we used to have the general and presidential elections two years apart, which apparently was not efficient.. So this is a better system. Most people are (and the world is, too!) only interested in finding out who Zimbabwe's next president will be. There are three candidates: (current) President Robert Mugabe, MDC (main opposition) leader Morgan Tsvangirai, and a new independent candidate, Dr Simba Makoni, who is formerly of the ruling party, ZANU-PF. I will try and keep everyone posted on how things progress. All I can say for now is that the advent of Simba Makoni has got Zimbabweans talking about and interested in this election, which I can assure you was not the case in January. There are even , groups about him.. (see here or here). And here is a BBC article on him.