Saturday Night Frights

Alexio arrived Sunday but its been a tough few days. On Saturday night, at midnight, I got a text from him that read "pliz cal. have been in an accident". Cell phone calls can't be made out of the country in Zim anymore, and the only other time he's ever asked me to call right away was when he missed his flight so I totally freaked out. I had no credit in my phone, so I ran out in my pajamas, and drove to a 24 hr gas station to get some. I was terrified and shaking, expecting the worst of course. Got back home and called him. Thank god he was fine. His tire burst while he was driving (at about 100km) and he skidded all over the road trying to get control, then went off the road and overturned twice before finally landing. His car is totaled, but he amazingly doesn't have anything wrong with him except for a tiny scratch on his hand, incurred when he tried to find his phone in the wreckage, as well as a bit of a stiff neck. It's a miracle - I don't play the God Card very often, but someone was watching out for him. He was wearing his seatbelt or this would have been a completely different sort of message. I was so upset by the whole thing - and especially the 15 mins between getting the text and actually being able to talk to him, thinking the worse the whole time of course - that my nerves were shot and I had to wake Janna up to come sit with me while I calmed down. He had his UN radio, so radioed in for help and their emergency responders were there quickly to help him. They towed his car to his house, and he is now trying to figure out what to do next. He can't imagine ever getting back in it, so he may just scrap it instead of seeing what he can salvage. He has photos and said he'll let me post some.

Since he had no injuries he was able to make his flight early Sunday morning and is here now, but it's been a tense situation since Sunday night - the Zim opposition leader announced that he was pulling out of the election because it was impossible for them to be free and fair and he wasn't willing to risk the lives of his supporters. No one knows exactly what will happen next in the country - the MDC still has to officially step down through the Electoral Comission and Mugabe has to be officially accepted by SADC. On a personal level, we didn't know how soon Alexio's office would call him back since the voting that was supposed to happen friday, won't. I feared he would have to go back in a matter of days and was just not prepared for that. In the craziness that in Zimbabwe, seems that the election will go ahead on Friday, despite the fact that there is only one candidate, and the rest of Alexio's team is leaving Zim today, meaning he is here 'til the 2nd as planned.