WE WERE INVITED TO A GERMAN Christmas party. Groups of people in summery clothes, wine glasses in hand, neatly dressed children, tables decorated with twigs of pine, homemade Lebkuchen arranged on small trays, their chocolate icing melting, a waft of roast coming from the kitchen. And in the middle of it all a Waldorf nativity play. German Christmas under the tropical sun. Such was our introduction into our new life in Harare.

Our host was a geologist from Germany who, with this wife and three children, was posted in Zimbabwe for three years. He was not the type we would have normally spent our time with in Germany. He seemed overly correct and formal and, whenever we met him, throughout the three years, he always addressed us with the formal ‘Sie’. But he was outgoing and he radiated some of the excitement of a life out of the ordinary, which brought us all here together on that hot Christmas Day.

‘My work is exciting. I have to travel a lot, looking at mines and the like – but, come, let me introduce you to the other guests.’

‘Aha, so are you helping our old friend Mugabe with his land reform?’ Victor said, when we were introduced to a guest who worked as an adviser to the Ministry of Agriculture.

‘What do you mean, your old friend …?’

‘This must be your wife,’ I interrupted, not sure what the German agriculturalist would think of our close affiliation with Mugabe and his comrades during the liberation war.

His wife reminded me of my mother. Tall and slim like her husband, keeping herself upright, she radiated a sporty elegance. I imagined her wearing a tartan skirt in winter topped by a twinset with a pearl necklace. Their faces were tanned – probably from playing tennis or golf – but I also sensed in them a resolve to make the best of their stay, for themselves and their three girls.

‘So what brought youhere?’ she asked. ‘Who do you work for?’

‘Well, actually’ – I was trying to find a way of saying that we did not come with a contract, that we were just ourselves – ‘my husband got a job as a technical instructor in a trainees’ workshop –’

‘Let me introduce you to our pastor,’ our host interrupted.