There is a new album available from David Scobie called Zim Ads, it features over 95 Zimbabwean adverts from the 1980’s, 90’s & 2000’s that are now available on CD or as a download for the first time. If like me you grew up watching ZBC, this should bring back loads of memories.

Tracks include:
1. Air Zim Up And Away
2. Barclays Happy
3. Bata All Walks
4. Bata Power
5. Bata Sandak
6. Bata Springsteen
7. Bata Toughees
8. Bata Xmas
9. Berger Paints
10. Beverley Beatles
11. Beverley Fly
12. Beverley Red
13. Beverley Starting Out
14. Blue Ribbon Chibataura
15. Bohlinger’s Rock
16. Bohlinger’s Sunset
17. Bondana
18. Cabs Living
19. Caprin
20. Carguard
21. Carling Black Label
22. Cascade
23. Castle Lager Choir
24. Chibuku Scud
25. Close Up Get Closer
26. Cloth For Africa
27. Coffee Time
28. Coke Rap
29. Coke Summersplash
30. Colgate Blue Gel
31. Colgate Smile
32. Crispies
33. Dairibord Dawn Breaking
34. Dairibord Fruit Drinks
35. Dandy Gum
36. Dettol
37. DHL
38. Disprin
39. Dreaming Of Zimbabwe
40. Dunlop Car
41. Econet Buddy Prepay
42. Elastoplast
43. Enbee Schoolwear
44. Energade
45. Fantasy Soap
46. Founders Target
47. G & D Shoes
48. Green Valley Sauce
49. Green Valley Time
50. Heinz Beans
51. Heinz Ketchup Pop
52. Heinz Ketchup Unplugged
53. Hollywood Gum
54. Image Soap
55. Ingrams Camphor Cream
56. J & J OB
57. J & J Showertime
58. Kiddybank
59. Lemon Twist
60. Madison
61. Mashco
62. Mashonaland Turf Club
63. Mazoe Syrups
64. Mosi Beer
65. Net One Makadi
66. Northstar Hi Cut
67. Nyore Nyore
68. Olivine
69. Pearlenta
70. Pixos Chips
71. Puzey And Payne
72. Quench Drinks
73. QV Pharmacy
74. Rainbow Hotels
75. Ripe And Ready Drinks
76. Rixi Hyundai
77. Royco Home To Mum
78. Rubber And Hose
79. Sales House
80. Schweppes Peach
81. Schweppes Rap
82. Sheild Roll On
83. Smileys Chips
84. Soft Lace
85. Sparletta
86. Sparletta Ragga
87. Spinalong
88. Stoney Ginger Beer
89. Tacoola Drinks
90. TM Stores
91. Travelling Man
92. Trucool Drinks
93. Truworths Jazz
94. Vaseline The Way You Walk
95. Willards Peanut Butter
96. Wimpy Way
97. Woods Cough Syrup
98. Woodwards Gripe Water
99. Zimsun Hotels

To buy this and other music from David Scobie, including the 80’s hit Gypsey Girl check out his website: http://davidscobie.org

Video of some short clips from my trip to Kariba in 2009

I only take video when not taking photographs or fishing, so there is plenty that I missed and I just use the video mode on my camera, so sorry for the camera shake! You can take a look at the photos I took on my last trip here: Beautiful Zimbabwe.

Music is “Dreaming” by Bud Cockcroft and has been used with his permission – Go to www.budcockcroft.com for more of his songs and to buy.

This video by David Scobie of his hit-single, “Gypsey Girl” from way back in 1980 brings back so many good memories, including that of watching Sounds on Saturday on ZBC.

This original video of the song, shows a very young David, aged just fifteen wondering around Harare. The single was released in October 1980 and it went to No.1 in Zimbabwe that November, staying there for the next four months. It was then released in South Africa in April 1981 and it bounced up and down the Springbok charts for nineteen weeks. Gypsey Girl eventually went on to go Gold in both countries and David became an over-night celebrity.

AWARD-WINNING Zimbabwean singer, David Scobie, has unveiled his long-awaited website, http://davidscobie.org/

He made the announcement via his Facebook profile recently. “The new website is finished and we hope to get some interest in the old music again,” says David. The multi-media website features David’s profile, discography, photos and singles released, among other great features.

Visitors to the site can preview and purchase his best selling 1981 album, “Cleaning Up!” for the first time in 28 years which features hit songs like Gypsey Girl, Taking The Easy Way Home, Maybe Life Don’t Care and On The Phone. The CD is also available for download. Other albums are available to preview and download. These include: Reborn (1983), Photograph (1984) and David Scobie Special Edition (1989). These albums will be re-released on CD and downloads by the end of 2009.

Brogue CDs are also available for purchase and download on the site. Brogue is David’s new project. He teamed up with Zimbabwean singer, Brigitte Rodrigues to form the duo producing Scottish/Celtic music. They have released three albums to date: Rhythm Of The Celts (2007) (which has already gained silver disc status in Scotland and is very close to gold) Girls And Strong Whisky (2008) and Popscots which has just been released (2009).

Visitors can register for a newsletter to keep up-to-date with news.Visitors to the site are struck by its ease of use, especially as it includes all content areas that are integral to David’s brand. It has been designed to be the premiere destination for all his fans.It is fresh, interactive, and of high quality competing with all other big artist websites. David aims to reach his growing fans through the site and other multimedia outlets available now. The highly interactive site has already garnered tremendous interest and responses from David’s fans. The Guestbook, especially, has already attracted a lot of attention.

Born in Dundee, Scotland, David was exposed to traditional Scottish folk music from the age of six. His parents took him to his first live concert held in Dundee where popular folk Duo “The Corries” blew David away. In 1973 the Scobie family moved to Harare Zimbabwe. From the age of ten, under the instruction of a close musical family friend, David began learning rudimentary chords on a guitar his parents had bought him. In 1980 David, aged fifteen had a hit-single in Southern Africa called “Gypsey Girl”. The single was released in October 1980 and it went to No.1 in Zimbabwe that November, staying there for the next four months. It was then released in South Africa in April 1981 and it bounced up and down the Springbok charts for nineteen weeks.

The single went Gold in both countries and David became an over-night celebrity. His next single “Taking The Easy Way Home” was recorded in April 1981 and by that June it had reached the Top Ten in both territories again. He went on to release four albums.

From 1983 to 2004 he endured a fruitful career in advertising jingles, producing and engineering. Over the years David repeatedly earned Zimbabwe Advertising Awards for his efforts. In 1998, he staged two musicals and two comedy theatre productions to full houses around the country.

David has teamed up with Brigitte Rodrigues producing Celtic music and call themselves Brogue and they are now based near Edinburgh in Scotland. http://www.broguemusic.com

Visit David’s website at: http://davidscobie.org/

This years Zimfest was bigger and better than ever and turnout was huge, with around 5000 people through the gates. You could even go as far to say that Zimfest is becoming a global phenomenom. The Zimfestlive.com website this year had links to festivals all over the world. “Zimfest UK is the strongest Zimbabwean charity-festival brand in the world,” says Mike Tashaya head of marketing for Zimfest. “So we have made contact with various fledgling teams around the world to make Zimfest a global event. Within the year, we will have similar aspirations, big screen link ups between the festivals on the same day and we’ll start to build a community who share the same values which are: have a good time, do a good thing and feel good!” Zimfest will continue to grow and there are some strong rumours that Zimfest might next year become an all-weekend camping event.

I did not have time to visit this years event, but the organisers kindly sent me some information to publish, so below are a few snippets of some of the best things that I missed this year:

The Music at the Festival
The Zimfest organising committee made the decision to showcase acts bubbling up from obscurity rather than relying on aging stars, who might push the ticket prices up even further and make the festival all about ‘a headliner.’ The gamble paid off in that there were some excellent performances right across the cultural spectrum, which not only allowed everyone to feel welcome, but served to reveal to Zimbabweans how much talent their countrymen have. Rozalla’s ‘Everybody’s Free!’ had people screaming with an abandon not seen at a Zimbabwean musical gathering for years and a savvy marketer could easily re-release the song as an anthem for a positive Zimbabwe of the future)

Football at Zimfest
With support from some of the world’s most famous footballers, the football was a real success at Zimfest. Zimbabwe team captain and Manchester City striker Benjani Mwaruwaru joined in along with former England and Tottenham Hotspur goalkeeper Ian Walker, former West Ham Player Rufus Brevitt and former Watford and AC Milan player Luther Blissett who came as part of the Brand Africa our sponsors for the football tournament. As part of  that sponsorship they also help a raffle where winners won tickets to premiership matches.

Rugby at Zimfest
The sporting events aren’t always the highest profile activities at the festival, but this year there were some great teams and fantastic matches.  The rugby 7s was sponsored by Saracens Rugby Club who gave tickets to Wembly to watch The Saracens play to the winners.

Zimfest Supports Zimbabwe and Zimbabweans
The core of Zimfest is Zimbabwe and in that sense the festival which continues to grow, still continues to support Zimbabwe. and when you say the two words ‘charity’ and ‘Africa’ people immediately get suspicious. But after conversation with the Wezimbabwe and Zimfest teams and you’ll find the type of steadfast vision for the money that simply broaches no suspicion. “We support a range of projects from building schools to teaching kids how to use computers in Zim” says Hilton Mendelsohn of Wezimbabwe “Anyone who wonders where the money goes at Zimfest simply needs to go to our website www.wezimbabwe.org where they will find constant updates as exactly to where the money is going. A group of independently successful individuals runs Wezimbabwe, we are bound by a strict charity charter, and completely transparent. We want people to be proud of what they have achieved with us.” Many people don’t know this but Zimfest itself is a self funding charitable project with it’s goal being community development

The Rhinoceros is one of my favourite animals and I have had some truly excellent experiences with them. As a guide working on a reserve in South Africa that had a large population of White Rhinos, they always provided me with excellent sightings for both me and my guests. However mostly because of poaching they, especially the Black Rhino are highly endangered.

Save the Rhino Campaign

Bud Cockcroft’s “Run Rhino Run” was the theme tune for the very successful “Save the Rhino” Campaign  in Zimbabwe in the 1980’s that brought the black rhino back from near extinction. The song brings back loads of memories for me, as it was often played on  ZTV’s “Sounds on Saturday”. This video below was filmed back in 1998 at “The Inn Place” at the Holiday Inn, in Harare Zimbabwe, in 1988:

Go to www.budcockcroft.com for more information and to buy Bud Cockcroft’s music including Sunrise in Zimbabwe (the old Air Zim ad), Run Rhino Run music video, and the Dreaming about Zimbabwe.

Len Strydom
The lead guitarist, who you catch a glimpse of playing the awesome guitar solo about halfway through the song was called Len Strydom. On a personal note: I used to have guitar lessons with him in his flat in Harare in the early 90’s, If he ever reads this, I would just like to thank him for all his patience and for creating calluses on my fingers that are still with me today! I’d love to hear how he is doing, if anyone knows.

Zimbabwe Black Rhino Conservation

Zimbabwe is home to the fourth largest population of the  black rhinos in the world.
Unfortunately with the collapse of the economy and just about everything else, there has also been a massive increase in poaching. Poaching of black and white rhinos in Zimbabwe has more than doubled in the past year and organized poaching gangs may have literally been getting away with murder.  Not only do the poachers slaughter rhinos, but they have also been firing on the people who try to protect them. According to Save the Rhino, the London-based organization which supports on-going rhino conservation through financial and in-kind support, the combined population of black and white rhinos was about 830 at the end of 2007, but by December 2008, the numbers had fallen to about 740, despite good birth rates. Already in 2009, 18 rhinos have been slaughtered by poachers who kill the one- ton animals for their horn.  Because of collapsing law-enforcement efforts, not a single Zimbabwean rhino poacher has been sentenced in a court during the past three years.

By the end of 2008, eighty percent of Zimbabwe’s black rhinos and half of its white rhinos were located in the lowveld. These large tracts of land, converted from cattle ranches to wildlife management areas, were created to safeguard the rhino.  Despite recent losses, the lowveld conservancies, monitored by the Lowveld Rhino Trust and linked with Zimbabwe’s Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, still hold 360 black rhinos and provide the best hope for their survival.   >> More Information

Volunteer Program
If you would like to help save the rhino, you can get involved by working as a volunteer on Real Gap’s ‘Black Rhino Conservation Project.’ This ‘save the rhino’ project is based in the beautiful Midlands of Zimbabwe and is endorsed by the WWF. Volunteers help save the rhino by helping out with important day-to-day tasks such as monitoring the local black rhino population out in the field and recording relevant data. The type of people working on this ‘save the rhino’ projects ranges from local Zimbabweans through to other volunteers and respected conservationists. As well as doing your bit to save the rhino it’s also a great way to experience ‘real’ African culture and meet both local people and other like-minded fellow travellers.

The efforts of ‘save the rhino’ campaigns such as this one in Zimbabwe will hopefully help stabilise the black rhino population. However the fight to save the rhino is very much an on-going process and there is no room whatsoever for complacency. By getting involved with this fantastic project you can do your bit to save the rhino for future generations of visitors to Africa.  >> More Information

Other Wildlife Volunteer Programs in Africa

If you are interested in volunteering with wildlife, take a look at my guide to Volunteering Wildlife Work in Africa on the Safari Guide website.

White Rhino and a young calf. I took this photo whilst working at Welgevonden Game Reserve in South Africa