Don’t Worry, I Always Take My Wife’s ARVs
Seated on a veranda at the teachers’ quarters, they call them ‘cottages’ down here in Sagonda village, I begin to feel the sweltering heat and realize I’m dripping with sweat. Its 4.30 pm and I just finished eating my plate of boiled fish and sadza. Yes, you heard right, just boiled. With these daily cash withdrawal limits at banks, I can’t afford to spend on mundane things like cooking oil nowadays. After all, we hardly had any cooking oil at our house when I was growing up. The mountain, just a kilometre away gleams and dances as if cursed by the scorching sun, but not even the punishing weather can stop me from joining my colleagues on our daily routine, a 7km walk for some opaque beer at the nearest drinking spot. “Stuff it,” I say, as I painstakingly pull my lanky body off the stoop and trudge towards my room for a quick change of clothes, empty plate in hand. I cringe momentarily at the now familiar prickly sensation on my swollen feet. “This pain will never go away,”