Milk, Shaken

This is a picture of Kean's classroom, with Kean dressed in is Form 6 white Sweater. This is what they wear all the time!

It was the boys last day of exams and Mikaela and I wanted to take them out and reward them for their hard work.

Side Note: I feel like I really missed out by not growing up here. For some reason the Academic grade scale of the Cambridge System is as follows:

A= 75% and above
B= 65%
C= 55%

Aka- Either they:
1. Grade ridiculously hard,
2. Like to think the high pass rate is reflective of the abundant supply of bright minded youths, or
3. They just like to reward plain mediocrity.

Needless to say, despite the clear “advantages” in the system it was amusing to hear Kean attempt to explain how his 28% on an exam was OK. “It’s because my teacher’s crap.” No matter where you are- some things just don’t change. . .

Anyhoo, we wanted to reward the boys for their (up until that point) assumed hard work, and took them out to ice cream. We went to a little shopping area where there were a few burger and pizza joints next to a popular supermarket (Yes, all of the above establishments DO exist here) and went to “Creamie Inn”. To the American audience, it was basically the Dairy Queen of Zimbabwe- minus the concept of edible ice cream all together.

It was essentially soft serve with the different flavors scooped or drizzled on top. Not particularly in the mood for soft serve, I opted for what seemed to be the next most universal item on the menu: a chocolate milkshake. It was to my surprise then, when I was handed a plastic cup with a straw containing what seemed to merely be frothy milk with a little bit of chocolate syrup mixed in.

Guess what? It WAS frothy milk with a little bit of chocolate syrup mixed in. True to form, they had given me precisely what they had advertised. Milk, shaken. One sip added another dimension: You know the white frosting that is on ice cream cakes in the States? The milk was essentially that stuff- melted.

Back to the window I go to return the milk shake, but only to find out that since I had used the plastic cup, I would still be charged full price. However, if I wanted the same cup to be re-used and filled with Ice cream instead, it would be free of charge.

They didn’t care about the extra ice cream wasted, but rather cared about the plastic cup. It then occurred to me that the ice cream was most likely a domestic product of Zimbabwe, and the plastic cups were clearly imported. This difference in the origins of the materials meant that the cups were more important: it was more of a cost to waste a plastic cup than it was to lose more ice cream.

After all the cultural analyzation and extended macro-geo-economical thought. . .

the ice cream was still awful.

Oh well, you can’t expect Zim to get everything right.