THE NOVEL 'THE SHAPING OF WATER' BY RUTH HARTLEY AND THE KARIBA DAM CRISIS TODAY.

An excerpt from my novel in which the current crisis is foreseen by Nick one of the fictional characters in the book.

 

 

 

MANDA RETURNS TO THE LAKE AND TO NICK

 

 

Now on her return journey, Harare was behind her, with all its stylish, glossy smartness; its supermarkets, galleries, cinemas, gardens, tourists, aid workers, hospitals and its bitter, scarred memories of the Bush War. Manda would not go to Chirundu this time to cross the border. She would leave the Great North Road at Makuti and take the scenic road to Kariba through the valleys full of trees, rivers and wild animals. Every mile would take her closer to the lake and the cottage that felt like her real home in Zambia. She would go past Kariba Airport, along the lakeside drive and climb up to the Zimbabwe border on the south of the dam wall where a colony of hyrax or dassies had their home among the boulders. Once she had cleared customs and immigration, Manda would make that extraordinary transit over the arching concrete wall. On one side, she would see a 300 foot drop through air, empty except for flying swifts and swallows, to the bottom of the gorge where the Zambezi once again continued its muscled flow to the sea. On the other side, she would see and feel the pressure of almost 200 billion cubic metres of Lake Kariba water. Then she would be back at the cottage in Margaret's beautiful, green garden where Milimo would have magically arranged the household and her children and Nick would be waiting for her with smiles of greeting.

That hot evening, Nick and Manda sat together on the dark veranda mesmerised by the extraordinary stroboscopic light show exploding over the Matusadona Hills. Phosphorescent sheet lightning made the towering blue thunderheads continuously visible. Jagged gold streaks flashed and crackled across the sky and hurled themselves at the endangered earth. The constant noise of thunder rolled back and forth, above the savage din and crash of lightning strikes. The wet and fecund smell of rain reached their nostrils. The threatening storms made lush promises.

“Isn't this wonderful!” said Manda in awe, “Aren't you happy to see the lake filling up again Nick?”

Nick nodded.

“Yes” he said quietly. “It will be good to go out sailing again without the danger of clattering into those iron-hard dead trees and holing the boat.”

“It's amazing that they haven't rotted away,” Manda said, “I rather like their dramatic appearance and the cormorants like them too.”

“Aquatic life generally likes them,” Nick continued. “No one really knew what would happen to the mupane trees when the lake filled. Everyone calls them ‘petrified’ but of course they haven't turned to stone – they are just hard. The drought exposed many more of them even though vast areas were cleared of trees for the fishing industry.

“Do you know that the water from the floodgates has scoured out a plunge pool below the wall that is almost eighty metres deep? That was not expected and it is quite close to the dam wall foundation.”

“Let's face it – in many ways the lake was a giant experiment. Just like our life is.”

Nick turned with a smile to Manda.

Manda smiled back. She looked at her husband, wondering momentarily if his words signalled an awareness of his need to change. There was no sign of any self-knowledge. It was with a curious sense of relief that she turned again to watch the storms and see them reflected in the lake.

She said after a while, “I feel sad though, for the Zambezi River, lost and dispersed in the lake.”

“No – it isn't!” Nick responded, “The Zambezi continues to flow through the lake as an identifiable current and so does the Sanyati River. The smaller rivers that dry up in the rainy season don't continue but the Zambezi is always there.”

Manda looked up at her husband's face in the uncertain light under the storm lanterns. She wondered about the strong, dark and secret currents of his personality.

“So,” she said softly, watching again the gentle ripples on the surface of the lake, “the drowned river is still there, flowing onwards through its valley.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-20/zimbabwe-s-kariba-dam-may-collapse-threating-millions-newsday.html

http://www.news24.com/Africa/News/35m-in-danger-as-Kariba-Dam-faces-collapse-20140320

http://www.postzambia.com/post-read_article.php?articleId=46822

www.ruthhartley.com