WEDNESDAY MARCH 16, 2010.
The road from Harare to Arcadia, Seke Road, is a straight dusty uninspiring route out of the city to the former prosperous industrial sector – Mbare, and beyond to Chitungwiza. Today there is little production in this sector and overall the country is suffering over 85% unemployment. Leaving a population to support itself by whatever means possible. The old prosperity, beauty and hope is almost gone and with little investment in any part of its economy or social welfare structures the country is crumbling and slowly loosing its dignity as it goes.

I was walking down Seke Road on my way back from the Air Zimbabwe offices in Harare having tried unsuccessfully to extend my stay. 'There are no seats at this time' the young lady at the desk had informed me. It was 8.30am and their offices had just opened, with my questions I had interrupted her sending a text. A mistake on my part as the concept of customer service is not a concept widely practiced in Zimbabwe.

Walking along Seke Road, halfway to Arcadia, I noticed 2 young men walking up behind and past me. They stood out with their long lazy strides and their confident jovial conversation. And the fact they had obviously noticed my camera and me and I was now of interest to them. There was something else about them that stood out – they were both wearing the same Unicef t-shirts. Ironed, clean and new looking, unlike the broken and battered shoes and torn dirty jeans they also wore.

As they slowed in front of me waiting for me to catch up with them I wondered what this encounter would bring.

Initially somewhat suspicious of them we walked on chatting between ourselves. It turned out that Hamza and Jealous were on their way to Arcadia to look for day work – Gardening or cleaning or whatever they could find. Hamza Kaitano, 21, had been living on the streets of harare for 8 years and Jealous Prosper Mutondoro, 24, 4 years.

They invited me to Harare Gardens that afternoon where they were practicing a performance with the Ndozvo-zvinoita Kupenyu drama group for homeless children and young adults.

That afternoon after their practice we spent some time chatting and meeting some of their friends, also living on the streets. Hamza's parents seperated when he was young and he lived with his father and his new girlfriend in Moshingo. His father used to beat him with an 'electric cord', eventually Hamza said 'Ah, let me run away from home', so he left and lived with friends and on the streets of Moshingo. When his father came looking for him he decided to to leave, so Hamza and his friend Dennis snuck onto one of the trucks coming to Harare. He eventually found out his mother had left Zimbabwe to go to South Africa where she had died so months before.

He eventually got sponsorship to attend school and managed to get to Grade 3 before the donor pulled out and his schooling ended, since that time he as been back on the streets.

Both Hamza and Jealous had dabbled in crime and drugs but they are tired now of that life and the street life. They want to get jobs and a place to stay. Especially Hamza as he has an 8month old daughter and a wife.

'We don't have cash or even jobs to get money' so they live in an old burnt out block of flats in Luck Street. 'It was once a nice flat', says Hamza but now it is filled with rubbish and human excrement. The flats are used by the local drug dealers and users, as we enter we pass several teenagers rolling spliffs and others looking high on something stronger. Hamza tells me they all like this place because the house it is safe, the police don't go in, they don't step in here'.

Hamza and Jealous take me up through the building to the roof, 'this is where we sleep'. In the warm dry months they sleep on the roof of the building, or in small shelves set high above some of the doors. 'We used to clean the one room on the second floor, we used to sleep in that room'. But now they sleep on the roof they told me because 'when we go out we come back to find faeces there'.

'its dirty that house, more than dirty'. The whole place inside every room is piled high with discarded rubbish and human waste. As we entered the building we had to stop and wait for a young girl as she was using one of the hallways as a toilet. Hamza warns me not to tread off the path that is wore between the debris. 'you get ill sleeping in there'.

There are discarded needles everywhere and its not only the filth and rechid smell that is worrying me. We have been on luck street for less than 10 mins and we or rather I have attracted way to much attention. As we clamber over the huge pile of rubbish at the entrance to the flats we are surrounded by 10-15 young lads who start to question me and the others about what I am doing. It quickly became obvious that we needed to leave. We made a polite, determined and timely return to the crowds of Speke Avenue.

At the intersection of Luck Street and Speke Avenue is an old wreck of a burgandy BMW that would never move again. Hamza, as we passed, lent into the car and introduced me to his wife. He said 'we sleep there sometimes because it is warmer'. The car belonged to a mechanic whos workshop was just behind us. 'They said you guys we know you have no where to sleep' so the mechanic lets Hamza and his family sleep in the car and in return they keep an eye on his workshop. 'I really like that car, it helps us when it is raining like yesterday'. It is somewhere dry and warm they can spend the night and shelter from the cold and wet.

On Speke Avenue we stop and talk to a man in his late 20's. He is 'Penfold' and he is a friend of the guys. Hamza explains that they had become friends and Penfold had siad to them 'don't steal, come to me to get some food'. So he gets bread for them from one of the shops and left overs, so they don't have to steal or sell drugs to buy food.

When they have food to cook, Jealous tells me, they cook using plastic for fuel. 'Wood is expensive' so they collect the disgaurded bottles and bags and burn them to cook. Not only did these guys give me a glimps into their world they showed me kindness and kept me safe, and for that I owe them thanks.

All they really want to do now is get out of the cycle of poverty and the trap of a life on the streets of Harare. 'I have wishes to be a rich bugger but it is hard now' Hamza says with a little sadness. They were all surviving, doing odd jobs, scavenging and from the charity of the neighbourhoods in which they shelter. Eating the food that the rest of the city discards and constantly dodging the police brutality and dogma.