Zambezi Kiwi

June 1 should have been a special day for our little family.

It was eighteen months from when we first checked out Vic Falls for a job offer, and nine months from moving here. More importantly, it was due date for opening our lodge.

You would think we would be celebrating, or at least marking the occasion in some way.

After all, we’ve done a lot over a year-and-a-half; we’ve moved three times, packed a container, maneuvered our way through beaucracy here to get residency, recovered our container, built a 23-bedroom lodge in a foreign country undergoing a currency and fuel crisis and known for corruption, made friends, started a ukulele band, endured months of random illnesses as our immune systems adjust to a new home, had some amazingly special moments loving our new home/country, and are now dealing with random power cuts.

But instead of celebrating, we all collapsed at the finish line. The whole family was taken out by the flu.

It’s probably unsurprising, given how intense the last year-and-a-half has been.

As usual, I went down first, Kepler followed a few days later, and on June 1, our long-awaited soft launch, Will woke up croaking like a bull frog.

So instead of a romantic dinner for two in which we reflected on how far we’d come, how much we had learned about each other and achieved, and what the future might hold, Will and I were rugged up sniffing and coughing in unison as we ate Thai takeaways and watched a movie on Netflix.

Thankfully, by some miracle, Kepler decided to sleep in until 9am the next day, and afterwards we slowly crept our way into Chamabondo National Park to enjoy beautiful views, elephants from a distance (yay), and other game -along with an epic picnic.

We followed it with a quick family nap so we had the energy for the drive out.

It was a lovely, chilled-out, slow Sunday as a family, and Kepler even did us the honour of falling asleep on the back seat shortly after his first nap so Will and I could croak at each other about our hopes and dreams.

At least, I suppose, we could make the claim to a pretty epic ‘celebration’ for a family with the flu. Even if it did involve tissues and frequent naps.

We can also, I suppose, make the claim to throwing ourselves into things 100 per cent as a family, whether it is a new project or getting sick.

If only I didn’t have the sneaky suspicion that getting flu together might be taking our family commitment a LITTLE too far.