BY PAIDAMOYO MUZULU 'Thoughts like cattle scattered On barren parched fields Spinning backwards my vehicled feelings speeding Forwards to Raffingora –   “Clear sunlit conceptions leap Out of deft brushstroke; landscapes Within. On film, on canvas, on drawing board Trees grass flowers boulder on boulder In the shadow of Flamboyant elegance –” The above lines come from Dambudzo Marechera’s poem — Sunday It’s Raffingora — written around 1983. It is a poem about Marechera’s feelings and perception of what a farm was when he visited famous paint artist and potter Daryl Nero for lunch. Raffingora was one and half hours from Harare then. It was some exotic farm land and particularly BallyMakosa, the farm Nero rented a farmhouse to do his painting and pottery project. Thirty-eight years later, many things have changed — some for the better and many for the worst. Where in the past BallyMakosa was owned by a white family with freehold title, it is now national land and several black families now proudly have leases to the land. They may not have title, but they are now proud land owners and no longer just a cheap form of labour. The land reform embarked on in 1999 might have been chaotic and violent in some instances, but the fact remains it changed land ownership patterns for good. Indigenous blacks now control the land. They now have capital and can be producers. However, Raffingora is now some three hours if not four from Harare by the same road Marechera used. The road from Banket to Raffingora is a mere 46km, but one needs two hours because you cannot drive at more than 20km/hour most parts of the road. The tarred road is gone, it is now some dirty gravel road with gullies. There used to be schools, farm schools, all along the way and they produced top pupils who went on to pass secondary school examinations and studied trades at tertiary institutions. Schools that were supported by the State with grants and the farmers and parents with development fees. Pupils received exercise books at school for “free” and they shared a text book in pairs. Teachers had enough chalks and counterbooks to do their scheming and other things. They earned modest salaries and was one of the cherished noble professions in the community. The same Raffingora had a district hospital with a maternity ward in addition to male and female wards for those who were too infirm to be assisted as outpatients. The hospital had a well-stocked pharmacy that had all the essential drugs. Residents simply had to pay a nominal fee and they would receive all the other services. The hospital had an ambulance on standby to transfer seriously ill patients to either Banket or Chinhoyi where doctors were available. The farm workers had, in many instances, stable and consistent salaries. They had access to clean borehole water and, in some instances, connected to electricity. Life was relatively better and predictable for them. Today, while some may have gotten pieces of land, the majority remain workers and in a worse-off position as salaries are now erratic and job