Moyo

Photo of the week. I just had to share another picture of these little kittens

Highlight of the week: Dancing. Singing. Speeches. Our clinic leaving do celebrates a successful tour of duty. 

Lowlight of the week: We are nudged off our perch. Valley docs become has-beens.

Maximum temperature: 32 degrees Celsius.

Rainfall: Still waiting patiently. 

Life or death. Binary. Controlled by an on switch. Or by an off switch. The impala sentient one second. Non-existent the next. The lion’s claw and tooth so swift. So final. Blink and you miss the kill. Pause too long to react and you are left with nothing. The whole carcass devoured. Hooves and all.

The baton is handed on. In a green, impact-resistant case. The backdrop, appropriately enough, is the west bank of the Luangwa river. Keith places the doc phone into Karen’s slightly reluctant fingers. Keith’s shoulders noticeably lift. 24/7 for 3 months is a decent dose of constant availability. He is not quite running on fumes but he is certainly a tad battle hardened. The west bank allows Keith to close another chapter of Zambian service. Karen takes the phone and resolves not to throw it into the Luangwa. At least not just yet.

It’s Friday. The hand-over ceremony is witnessed by a band of select friends. Perry, Freddie and Emma attest to our retreat and Karen and Alan’s advance. We now have an 11 month sabbatical before returning to the Zambian front line.

We are no longer the Valley doctors. Just relegated has-beens. We segue and move on. But we resist the temptation to be totally dormant. And morph into stroke preventers. Keith has organised a full schedule of camp visits. Plenty to keep us gainfully employed for our remaining 3 weeks in the Luangwa Valley. Not necessarily out of trouble. 

It’s too early to look back and reflect. Too much has happened. April 15th feels like the distant past. With fresh batteries we arrive in the Valley. Reunite with old friends. Make new ones. We reclaim the doc house. Slip into familiar rhythms. Wake. Exercise. Breakfast. Clinic. Lunch. Pause. Dinner. Sleep. Repeat. It’s not just a routine. It’s a life. Some days feel long. Some days feel heavy. But then we disappear into the park. Our version of R&R. Swapping patients for elephants. Paperwork for sunsets. The valley has a way of reminding you why you came in the first place. We give our all to the clinic. And to our Valley.

At our leaving sundowners this week, a few people ask how our "time" has gone. A difficult question to answer. It never feels like we are doing time. We simply come home. To our second home.

This week our house becomes Karen and Alan’s house. Mi casa, su casa. Our bedroom becomes their bedroom. We downgrade beds from supersize to single. Our air conditioner becomes their air conditioner. We have a fan at least. But close proximity generates a critical mass. We go nuclear. Restless particles in a confined space. Throwing off radiation. Fighting for coolant. Territorial disputes. But at least the Zambian winter is kind to us and saves us from total melt-down. 

Our main task to hand this week is hand-over. Up-skilling the dream team of Karen and Alan. GP and eye doctor. Generalist and detailist. So now we come to the nub of today’s blog. Handing on the detail. The nitty gritty. Karen gets a broad brush from Keith. Alan gets the key focus on what I care about most. Moyo. Nyanja for life.

The medical side of handover is pretty straightforward. There is long list for us to work through. Valley orientation. Clinic. Drugs. Equipment. Shopping. Patients. But Moyo is more important than all of this.

Moyo comes to life in January 2026. A simple mixture of flour, water and environment. A primordial soup of sorts. Left to fester. A cradle for the birth of a sourdough starter. Begun by Doc Ian. Ian perseveres for 3 months. But by his own appraisal the sourdough is slow to prosper. Generating pancakes not loaves. His hand-over to me held little promise for his spawn. Good luck. He offers without optimism. Keep it in the fridge. Feed it with some flour once a week. Don’t expect too much from it. Clearly my parenting leaves something to be desired. Perhaps without a name, Moyo has felt unloved and has declined to develop. 

So Moyo and I started off on an uneasy footing. Without great expectations. My 2025 imported Yorkshire starter had created tasty flatbreads back then. Surely regression towards the mean should at least guarantee improvement in 2026. Moyo is by now smelly, yeasty and active. A cauldron of bubbles. I add flour. Weevil free for once. Do as I am told. Keeping my little pot of life in the fridge and taking it out once a week to show it the light day and a bit of ambient heat. 

I baptise Moyo and anoint it with holy water. Place it in the fridge for a week. Then let there be light! Our kitchen sees a Genesis. Not quite the birth of a messiah. Or even a very naughty boy. Moyo comes of age.

My first loaf was out of this world. I make dough. Add some seeds. Leave it to prove. Bake it in our not-hot-enough oven. And produce a perfect loaf of bread. Sarah (our local sourdough expert in Brandsby) would give me kudos I’m sure. I gleefully send a picture to Doc Ian. And promptly receive a not unexpected middle finger back. 

Now Moyo delivers baking perfection on a weekly basis. Straight to our Kapani kitchen table.

I realise that I am late to the sourdough party. Very late. Well behind the curve. By now, almost everyone with a creative streak has christened a starter. Given it a name. Nurtured their own little sourdough saviour. One that rescues us from the sugar spikes of our local white bread. A bubbling pot of something almost primordial. Flour, water and time. From this humble soup comes bread that fills both the larder and the belly with slow-release goodness. Low GI. Better for the gut. Kinder to the heart.

Those trailblazers were beset by challenges. Taking care with feeding times. Measuring out rations. Mixing by the clock. 5 minutes. No more. No less. Climate controlled proving. Hot steam oven baking. It all felt like too hard work. The prophesy of toil was soon fulfilled. So, I surrendered and drove up the road. One mile up the road I found Sarah and her magic porridge pot of a bread oven. Always productive of the perfect sourdough loaf. Easier to buy than to make. 

Back in Zambia, Sarah is no longer just a mile up the road. Even our nearest bakery is three miles away. And Mfuwe is still well behind the curve. The shelves are lined with soft white bread. White rolls. Pale. Tasteless. Full of calories. Stripped of fibre. Best left alone. Every time we pass the bakery, our blood sugar seems to rise before we've even stepped inside. What Mfuwe really needs is sourdough. Bread that nourishes instead of spikes. Bread to help turn the tide on type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and sleep apnoea.

Making bread is a pleasure. I whoop when my dough feels stretchy and fully combined. I add seeds and nuts by eye. As time passes I guess on quantities. No longer measuring. A jot of water. My feeding regime is lax. A handful of flour. A small mix. And back to the fridge. Whatever I do, it continues to work. Moyo is neglected. But he still comes out once a week to please me.

I stand at a crossroads. I would dearly love Moyo to greet me in June 2027. To leap out of the fridge and embrace me. So, as Karen and Keith talk doctor things, I share with Alan my je ne sais quoi. My parenting style. My mastery of Moyo. Alan will need to be trained. And then Paul or Teresa. And then Anika. This style of foster parenting will suit my offspring no doubt. Neglect the key I’m sure.

Let’s make bread I announce. Alan concurs. And with that pronouncement the chain of Chinese whispers commences. 

Our bread making day runs to plan. Moyo is bubbly and active. Ready to deliver. I attempt to be precise. Quantities are specified. Flour. Water. Magic. Surely, there must be some science to this? Alan’s son Daniel will be comparing notes. Daniel’s scientific approach will serve as our comparator. His analysis guides his brew. Yet mine has no template. Mine has no recipe, no masterplan. And still each loaf surpasses the last. As I work under Alan’s scrutiny I revert to type. The plan goes awry.

Digital scales hold the promise of precision. Yet the gremlins have been making mischief. The toggle beneath the scales has moved, ouija style, from grams to ounces. I fail to notice. A precise amount of chaos. So, I start to wing it like usual. Alan watching like a hawk. Keen to acquire the dark arts. A smidgeon of white flour. A modicum of brown. A dollop of starter. A dash of water. My notes abandoned. Somehow the dough felt soft, pliable and giving. A goldilocks dough.

The written mantra is: stretch it for 20 minutes. My attention span rarely copes with 10. Alan and I somehow manage 15. Next we prove. But abandoning the schedule. An English hour becomes an African hour. The next prove is even less precise. And yet our dough prospers against all the odds. We preheat the oven and Alan creates a Heath Robinson contraption to wedge the oven door to. We guesstimate a bake time to compensate for the anticipated improvement in oven performance. We say a few magic words and we wait.

We wait a quantum. The yardarm helps to distract us. And when we wake from our reverie: the smell of freshly baked bread summons us back to reality. Alan removes the mop from the oven door. He mumbles: Open Sesame. And we are presented with a crispy, yet soft, golden Aladdin’s loaf.

I’m quite convinced that my secret is mayhem. A recipe is futile. Order should be resisted. My starter will thrive, only without a plan. Ian’s nameless starter begets Moyo. Moyo begets Alan’s Breadna. Breadna begets Paul’s twinkle in his eye. Etcetera. Etcetera. Chinese whispers. Passed down the line. Life will find a way. Moyo is destined to die. Yet in death, he will be reborn. Again and again. Reincarnated. Sentient once more. Struck down repeatedly, but ever vital. 

An elephant with a guilty face. Crossing back into the park after a night of naughtiness in the villages

Phone handover ceremony. We are demob happy. Karen and Alan not so keen

We leave Karen and Alan in charge as we continue our Stroke Prevention programme

We get a visit from our resident banded mongoose family. At the exact moment our remote cam mis-functions. Fortunately Keith has his phone to hand