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0:00
10 years ago I started geography now in an apartment I barely knew how to operate the camera and I only spent one month learning Motion Graphics I set out to do all 193 un countries and now we reach our final lesson but you know it's no fun teaching if I can't show you and I can't show you if I always have this black tarp so you know what here we are and everybody come on in where are
0:27
we welcome to
0:38
Zimbabwe it's time to learn geography now hey guys so I invited 18 of my top subscribers to come with me to this last country Extravaganza in Zimbabwe and oh by the way you can get your geography now merch like this t-shirt at geography now.com and what do got what do I always say it's selling it's your it's not selling out if it's your brand they watch the show they know my deal and don't forget you can also get a figy me figurine that's right I am now a figurine at figy me.com for the last
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time this is our last time we'll be promoting it all my subscribers get one of these today in Zimbabwe all right before we start I got to change things up thank you Ruba from the Sudan episode for making these shirts you can get them at Unity shirt shop.com she made me a shirt for every African country after the Sudan episode and I promis her I would wear them all so here you go last one Zimbabwe so in Zimbabwe they have a saying Zimbabwe Kanika kadik but kanona
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kza which means Zimbabwe is a small country but very fun and uh we're going to have a lot of fun in this episode and what better way to start off by having fun than by dissecting the flag we haven't done that in a while haven't
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we the national flag of Zimbabwe consists of seven horizontal stripes of green gold red and black with a white triangle containing a red five-pointed star with a Zimbabwe bird or hungu the bird is actually a depiction of the soapstone bird statuette that was found at the ruins of Great Zimbabwe it is likely to be an African Fish Eagle or battler Eagle no one quite knows exactly according to the nation's official statement the white triangle symbolizes peace the red star represents the
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nation's aspirations whereas for the stripes the green stands for agriculture the yellow for the wealth and minerals the black indicates the Heritage and race of the black majority of the country and the red stands for who fight for the fre who fight for the fre Now we move on to the code of arms the image depicts the same Zimbabwe soapstone bird and red star on the flag at the top with a gardening hoe and Barrel of an AK-47 representing the transition from war to peace below is
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the gold and green wreath symbolizing how Mining and agricultural Enterprises protects the national economy and then we get to the green shield with the blue wavy lines and a stone representing the fertility and prosperity of the ground ground and water and on each side of the shield is a kudu representing Zimbabwe's ethnic groups United the Kudos are standing on an earth Mound with various crops showing the importance of providing for the country and finally
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The Motto at the bottom Unity freedom and work are written yeah great flag right the soap stone bird such an iconic symbol of the country and soon you're going to see that soap stone plays a very interesting role in the country in fact this General concept of stones Zimbabwe meaning the house of stones but we'll get into that later first let's find Zimbabwe on the map shall [Music] we so Zimbabwe many people just abbreviate this place to Zim or the people call themselves Zim or Zimbo it's
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gone through many names in the past you've probably heard the word rhia like the Rhian ridgeback named after Cecil rhods the guy who wanted to build a train all the way from Cape Town to Cairo it's a long story it kind of went like this I'm gaining independence woo oh okay I guess I'll just call myself RJ since we don't need distinguish North and South wait we went Independence 2 okay let's call ourselves Zimbabwe rhia wait why don't we just take out the rhia part and call ourselves Zimbabwe
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and we're changing the capital from Fort Salisbury to harrar yeah that's what we'll do oh and keep in mind before all this they were joined with what is now Malawi and Zambia in a federation called nyasaland and north and south rodesia and before all that there there's so much stuff going on but first let's find it on the map shall we first of all Zimbabwe is a landlocked country located in the southern African region you can remember that it's shaped like a teapot
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and it is surrounded by Moos Beek Zambia batswana and South Africa now if you zoom in really close Zimbabwe also shares a border at the kazungula bridge nearly touching Namibia I consider this a quadr point because it's where all four countries meet but technically cartographers will get super annoying and say well actually it's a double trip point because the batswana Zambia border makes a flat 150 M wide border separating Zimbabwe from Namibia to that I say shut up nerds I literally went
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there and documented it you can see all four countries nobody cares about the legalities it's a Quadra Point anywho the country is divided into eight provinces and two cities with provincial status the cities are buo the second largest city in the country and Harare which is the largest city and also capital of the country har also has the largest and busiest airport of the country Robert Gabriel Mugabe International whereas the second busiest airport due to high demand in tourism is
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actually Victoria Falls airport in the city of Victoria Falls way off in the Northwestern part of the country other wise the country has one of the most historically developed long-distance passenger and cargo transport Rail lines that connect them to all their other neighboring countries all operating under the state-owned nrz or national Railways of Zimbabwe which has been operating since 1893 originally under Rhian Railways on top of that the country has a very extensive Road
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Network that links all major cities and towns however most roadways bypass the northern Corridor due to the area hosting large national parks and the Kuba Reservoir so the main highways typically pass through the central part also keep in mind the bait Bridge border Post in the South between them and South Africa is the busiest Road border entry port in all of Africa finally just keep in mind you may hear the words masona land and matabele land quite a bit here
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these are traditional regions of the country where the majority of the shaa peoples live or masona land and the indele peoples in the west it's matabele land so there you go in any case Zimbabwe is sort of kind of like the rebel of the former British colonies in Africa apart from the USA they are the only former British colony to officially just say no and declare their own independence no get out as opposed to the other colonies that kind of slowly kind of negotiated and figure out a way
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to Independence now granted it was declared by the white minority ruled Rhian front government led by Ian Smith but still the UK saw this as an act of rebellion yeah not surprised but let's be honest at this point in the 1960s half of everything in Africa was gaining independence so they kind of saw it more like this all right we don't like like what you're doing but controlling you by force is so cost ineffective and 19th century so I'm just going to have to
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implore the UN sanctions against you and hopefully you'll regret your actions and destroy yourself either way I'll pick up the pieces when you're ready to craw back to the Commonwealth and that's when the bush War started between the Rhodesian government and it wasn't until the 1980s when everything sort of kind of cooled down and they were actually officially recognized as independent by mugabi zanu party fun fact mugabi was actually not the first president but the
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first prime minister the title of first president actually belonged to Kanan banana who literally tried to make laws to punish people for making fun of his name which only made people want to make fun of his name even more later on mugabi would assume the title as the second President in 1987 and from there he would pretty much become a dictator that ruled for about four decades now it goes without saying there are so many great places in zabe that you can check
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out if you decide to come but one cool little tip if you do come you might want to consider getting the C Visa if you get this you are allowed to go back and forth between Zimbabwe and Zambia as many times within 30 days so if you're into the whole Victoria Falls thing might want to consider it otherwise there are so many cool places to talk about and here we have one of our geography from Zimbabwe to explain take it away hi everybody I'm Rob I'm a proud Zimbabwean hi everybody I'm Natalie I'm
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a proud Zimbabwean everyone I'm Sam I'm a proud zobian jphy and I'm here to tell you about some of the top sites you might want to check out if you ever decide to come here to Zimbabwe first of all you have to understand that Zimbabwe has a lot of history we have had many ancient kingdoms and dynasties that ruled over our lands and you can see some of the ruins of these kingdoms all over if you want prehistoric sites maybe the datom Rocks paintings are for you
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you can see cave paintings all over here in fact Zimbabwe has the largest concentration of rock art in Africa the most popular and important ancient site in the country though is of course the UNESCO inscribed Great Zimbabwe ruins of the shaa peoples here you can see the 11th to the 15th century medev evil stone walls and enclosures of the former Kingdom that play an iconic role in Zimbabwe's identity further west you can find the second largest stone complex
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the Kami ruins of the batua Kingdom near the city of buo this place was a major Center of trade for a long time and even extended trade connections as far as China speaking of buo it's a very cool City they have the buo clubhouse which is a preserved Colonial religion style social clubhouse that is being converted into Museum of course other cities have their charm like the capitol har qu with their night life and Market if you come to Zimbabwe though the most famous and important thing you must
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enjoy is our natural s you've probably seen the1 trillion bank note rides well the picture on the backf actually is a real place the Banting rocks this is a real site in Zab and one of the most beautiful at mobo National Park here you can find these strange rocks and boulders that are eroded and balancing on top of each other many of them have names too like the mother and child rock or the flying boat rocks we also have the chinoi caves that are not only super
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beautiful but you can also do some cave diving here in the Beautiful Blue Waters and finally we cannot talk about zimb without the most iconic natural Landmark Victoria Falls or mosun the smoke that Thunders Victoria Falls is the largest sheet of falling water in the world measured by its combined width and height almost every time you come here you'll see a rainbow on the waterfalls and we share the waterfall with our neighbor sambia if you want the best view of the waterfall you have to come
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to the Zimbabwe side even hearing the sounds of the water is amazing where you can see the Majestic Zambezi River in all its Glory anyway that is just some of the top sides you might want to consider and if you do I hope you enjoy thanks thank you and myasa I hope you enjoy thanks thank you oh man those shaa ruins the house of stones that's literally what Zimbabwe means the house of stones I told you Stones play a big role here and speaking of stones let's talk about the natural side of Zimbabwe
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in the next segment the [Applause] so I'm just going to speak freely right now this isn't even part of the script I'm just going to speak from my own experience when you come to Zimbabwe you pretty much get to see everything that you stereotypically affiliate with Africa you see the savanas you see the umbrella trees you see every single imaginable animal possible you see animals like elephants and baboons just walking around in the populated human areas but on top of that there's also a
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resource size to Zimbabwe that really plays an important role in who they are are and every tribe and ethnic group has their own distinct way of utilizing the natural side of Zimbabwe but first let's go to the motion graphic and explain the physical makeup of Zimbabwe first of all much of Zimbabwe lies on a plateau that is part of the Zambezi River Basin sandwiched between two major rivers of Africa the Zambezi in the North and the Limpopo in the South now you cannot talk
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about Zimbabwe without mentioning the Zambezi River first of all it is the longest shared River in Zimbabwe making up most of the northern border with Zambia although side note the longest non shared River completely within Zimbabwe is the saave river in the South this river is also the site of the world famous Victoria Falls also shared with Zambia and by taking the length and height proportions it is considered the world's largest waterfall and the largest sheet of falling water in the
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world keep in mind although the waterfalls are shared with Zambia the best view of the waterfalls is on the Zimbabwe side however most of the actual Falls is on the Zambia side where you can jump into the Devil's Pool and make it look like you're about to fall off but you're totally safe within the Zambezi River they they have the kba reservoir the largest man-made Reservoir in the world created after the completion of the kba dam which Powers both them and Zambia just another side
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note though Zimbabwe doesn't really have many large natural Inland bodies of water other than man-made reservoirs the two largest ones being maname by Harare and Lake muqui in masvingo both of which were created through Dam projects otherwise much of the country depends on underwater aquafer systems which many communities depend on to dig up wells for fresh water sources otherwise apart from all that much of the rest of the country is flat semiarid Savannah with
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occasional Rolling Hills until you get to the East and then you find the Zambezi escarment the UK range and the Zimbabwe range in the Far East by the border with Mozambique here you can find the highest peak of the country Mount Yani at just under 2600 m in height oh man our last physical geography motion graphic well as you can see there's a lot of stuff going on with Zimbabwe you got the reservoir you got the rivers you got the Rocks you got the mountains you
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got the resources and all this plays into the way how they carry themselves economically and uh who better to cover this segment than you know who you knowah who Mr Noah my fellow gagar peeps it's crazy how time flies here we are at long last Zimbabwe actually hold on that's more like it barbs um would you mind holding this hammer for me oh jeez I don't know uh oh look at that I guess uh you're worthy well let's go so what you do need to know is that on the surface Zimbabwe
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has a lot of resource potential for one they are a mineral Powerhouse with over 60 tradable minerals mostly in the PGM category or Platinum Group Metals this includes things like Chrome gold lithium and diamonds today they have the second largest platinum deposit in high-rated chromium ores in the world if you're looking for gems though everywhere you look you will see green malachite in sandana or Zoot gems in the stores and Street Markets now granted this isn't to
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say that Zimbabwe hasn't had their complications in the past yes in 2018 at one point during the economic crisis the Finance Minister tend dibidi announced to the Parliament that Zimbabwe had the lowest bank balance ever recorded in history only $217 left after paying public workers that's incredible today challenges are still evident such as the recent drought brought on by El Nino weather patterns however as we will explain later in the episode fiscal changes were implemented and in any case
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Zimbabwe is at least showing that they are open to taking on new ideas to move forward they've always had a sort of building Spirit historically they were the second country in afca to have their own TV station in 1961 ZTV the one thing they've always proudly featured on their TV channel has been showcasing the beautiful scenery in wildlife of the nation and with that we move on to what's his name again what's up everyone I'm so excited to do the animal segment for the final episode
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Zimbabwe what is this no it can't be maybe just one last time it's Gary hallow for one last episode alas we've reached our final destination right now I'll show you the Zimbabwe to the animals first off Zimbabwe is not only home to a wide range of species today but even in ancient animals too the oldest African dinosaur was found in Zimbabwe the osaurus only a few countries in Africa offer a wildlife experience true to the African continent more than Zimbabwe
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they understand that animals are just as valuable to them as their mineral resources as the Safari industry brings in nearly half a billion dollars annually in Revenue they have 11 national parks and after batswana they have the largest population of African elephants in the world at somewhere around 100,000 many of which are in the largest national park hangi here's bobb's mom witnessing an elephant thinking this was a picture and not a video now we've talked about South
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African Wildlife so of course you know the big five Zimbabwe has four out of the big five species the only rhinos in the country are currently in captivity for protection and breeding programs to help repopulate the species before release back into the wild but in that regard Zimbabwe likes to boast populations of the small five the shy five and the Ugly five that's uh my high school girlfriend the small five being the rhino beetle elephant shrew Buffalo Weaver leopard tortoise and ant lion the
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shy five is the Mir cat porcupine arvar batee Fox and the ardwolf and finally my ax the ugly five the warthog the vulture the wilderbeast the hyena and Pa mom what you see to ah you're beautiful you're beautiful well actually the fifth ugly one is the marabu stock that has a very funny looking thing called a gou sack under its beak used for storing fish when hunting it's like having a small food storage container built into your body in case you want to eat later
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in 1975 Zimbabwe passed the Parks and Wildlife act in which hunting or capturing has been prohibited except under special permits issued by the government most of these permits are used for things like captive breeding efforts scientific research population control or defense of property or Farmland if Wildlife is affecting it yes people sometimes if there are too many of a species it can negatively affect the ecosystem so sometimes Zimbabwe's government is like go for it hunt those
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millions of pesky impire eating all the plants so if a wilderbeast is grazing on your crops you have every right to avenge muosa shoot those Wilder beasts right in their face you've got legal president for Moosa back to the American accent and with that it's been a crazy ride I am so thankful that over these many years we've been able to teach you guys about geography and teach you about the animals of the world it's been so much fun learning and growing with you
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the the Gary of harlo accent was crazy I think I did that for the first time in the guitar episode and that was so much fun to do I know some of you hated it I read the comments I know some of you hated the accent and I know it's not good but a lot of people liked it but a lot of people liked it and it's fun it's a tribute to the one and only Steve Irwin who is the king and will forever be the king of animals so oh just one more for Old Time sake oh it's Gary Hollow son out cheers
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mate thank you Caleb SLG harlo with that we move on to the final segment the food of Zimbabwe oh they were waiting for you to say that Noah it's the way how you say food man now Zimbabwe and food does follow a sort of General Southern and East African format with dishes that are shared amongst other nations in the area the most popular Staples usually serve with most dishes being either n Shima or saza usually made of maze but can also be made with sorghum Millet and cassava
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we asked you guys Zimbabwe and joger peeps what the most popular meal in Zimbabwe was and many of you said it would probably be sadza with hyi and Gango or beef short ribs and leafy green stew other side dishes include stewed okra peanut butter rice and matemba which are dried Lake sardines in markets especially in the more rural areas you might find more native fruits being sold such as the mutamba or monkey orange Mato or African bubblegum fruit and guy or sour plum zimbabweans are quite
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entomophagous and in the Delhi of grocery stores won't be surprised if you often find won worms they are high in protein and they are very popular snack amongst people and here's a clip of Barb sharing with his subscribers in Zimbabwe who else wants to try M worms we got yes these are M worms you cannot Escape Destiny there you go to let us know what you think come on you can do this everybody else did it you want more dude now Julian wants more of course you
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cannot come to Zimbabwe without a proper barbecue or GOI GOI and if the restaurant or person has obtained a government approved permit to hunt a non-endangered species for the sake of population control you would be in for a retreat to have some of the African game meet most of them coming from undulates like Springbok Impala Antelope kudu Buffalo wilderbeast and so on finally for drinks everywhere you go you'll see mahu it's a traditional drink made of maze milk and sugar every bar in
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Zimbabwe has Zambezi beer and masup Juku and finally ma Orange Crush every Zimbabwe and grew up with this stuff they love it so much that one time the company announced that they would change the recipe due to some regulations on some of the more possibly harmful processed ingredients when they heard this the people rebelled and threatened to boycott them if they did so to this day it's up with the original recipe processed ingredients and all there was even a saying so people came up with if
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we die we die with mooi well my fellow jogger peeps it's been great it's been fun it's been a truly amazing time being on the show for all these years thank you for being with us for this adventure and what an adventure it has been I hope after all this time you finally have been able to know a few things whether you've been here from the start or somewhere along the way or even just now watching for the first time from the bottom of my heart thank you this isn't
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the end though we'll meet again but for now I'll see you later ler oh I was worthy until next time stay tuned and stay ready thank you Noah and Gary harlo who is definitely not Caleb well guys as you know there's so much going on in Zimbabwe with the natural landscape and the borders and the demarcations and the lines hm what are we missing probably the most important part of Zimbabwe the Zimbabwe and people let's talk about them
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[Music] a Zimbabwe is uh someone who can speak many languages who can say hello Sab magali in in my language maani that's a kalanga language growing up in Zimbabwe I want to say I could not trade it for anything else I would say resilient as a zaban I've seen how we faced a fair share of political and economic challenges but throughout it all we've always managed to keep our heads and keep our warmth in kindness no matter what's going on we're always the kind of
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people who welcome each other with open arms and a smile Zimbabwe we are a cultural people we do traditional ceremonies we are still doing that to identify ourselves as a people but as God-fearing people God is will fix our things for us friendly approachable welcoming people with so much culture um I think also as well we like Hustlers we work hard we strive to do what we can do and we hustle and we grind when I say Zimbabwean there's pride in it so the diversity amongst
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people that is there it makes me proud to say I am Zimbabwean being a Zimbabwe means being from the single best country in the world what unites all zimbabweans I think it's the way we were brought up even though we might be shaia we are still one Zimbabwean and one nation and through that family bond and the Christianity bond that helps us a lot to you know be United [Music] what is a Zimbabwe in from what I've been told there's a word Katana which means coming together and it's a sort of
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virtue that most zimbabweans can adhere to now as we'll soon explain yes there are two main ethnic groups but still Zimbabwe is quite a diverse Nation with lots of different ethnol linguistic groups that come together and throughout their history many people groups have come in and fought and taken over or settled different areas postc colonial times things got even more complicated but today regardless of everything that has happened all the peoples here come
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together just as zimbabweans now let's describe it in the demographics graph shall we first of all the country has about 16.5 million people today and is about 99% African in origin now I've heard conflicting numbers on the percentages in my research and asking locals but from what I've gathered it seems like the largest ethnic group that dominates the country is the Shona at somewhere over 70% of the country whereas the second largest group that indele make up about say 18% or so from
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there about 10% of the country is the remaining African groups and tribes and Clans and ethnol linguistic groups and the remaining 2% of the country is made up of non-african citizens mostly of British white descent and a few Asians as well mostly of Indian descent now this is the part where I usually talk about the currency and the plug outlet and the driving side well first of all they drive on the left side of the road former British colony no surprise but for the other two it's a little
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complicated see in 2009 after the financial crisis at one point there were eight official currencies that were used the ones listed right here and today they are trying to revive the new goldback Zig or new Zimbabwe in currency and at stores they will quote the official price in the zig they are trying to push the new currency but it's a little complicated however today you can still use dollars Euros South African Rand and batwan and Pula and unofficially the dollar is the most
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popular one as for plug Outlets a lot of places use the type G British style plug outlet however I've seen a lot of places that use the universal plug outlet woo it's getting a little hot but I still got to keep filming okay so now with all that money talk you're probably wondering okay how did all that happen why was there eight currencies that are official at one time long story short in 2008 Zimbabwe hit the highest inflation rate out of any country in the world
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after Hungary now when people think of Zimbabwe the image that sometimes gets conjured up in their head would be the $100 trillion bank note the highest denomination of any bank note in the entire world this meant that their previous currency the Zimbabwean dollar was devalued three times and then it was completely dropped in 2009 people needed bricks of bills just to buy a piece of candy this meant that zimbabweans were sort of kind of forced into a position
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where they have to kind of figure out things financially in fact they even have a word for it Kung wava guava which is it kind of describes the hustle culture of zimbabweans oh I forgot to talk about the languages today Zimbabwe actually has surpassed South Africa by having 16 official languages and then English as a lingua Franco for those that don't speak either of those languages but generally 16 altogether and this is where we get to the controversial Land Reform Act this is
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something zimbabweans are a little kind of iffy about talking they're kind of uncomfortable with it but they have to kind of address it at some point you may have heard some stuff about this in the news basically it was the incident where they tried to give land back to the native zimbabweans from the minority white colonists on paper it sounded good but the way how it was implemented kind of went down a little let's just say uh headlines were made according to the
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landc agreement of 1979 shortly after Independence it was supposed to be a willing seller willing buyer agreement but the problem was lands weren't selling up fast enough and then the government got kind of impatient and so they kind of just forcibly started taking land and that's when things happened and this is the part of the story that gets really complicated because it really depends on who you ask in Zimbabwe whether it be the native Zimbabwe the white Zimbabwe the
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government official Zimbabwe the countryside Zimbabwe it it was such a complicated thing that happened long story short white zimbabweans started to flee the country as they felt like they could not stay anymore whereas zimbabweans in Zimbabwe originally thought that this was a good thing they were getting land back but then it turned out that the government kind of just allocated the land to government officials and their families showing a high sense of nepotism which when they
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saw that happening it kind of made them feel a different way on how they originally thought they would feel this led to zidera or the Zimbabwe Democrat economic Recovery Act in 2001 followed by sanctions mostly from the Western World in 2008 and 2009 which basically affected their economy and made things so much more complicated this also meant that they could not get funds from the IMF anymore and despite having large reserves of things like diamonds and other resources the demand went down
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Supply went up you can kind of figure out what happened from there in any case since then zimbabweans have been resilient despite all the complications that have happened in the past 10 or 20 or so years they know how to get by and above all that they know how to still have fun regardless and nothing is more fun than the sports and with that let's take it to art with the sports part hey guys it's me art I'm back hey wait art what have you been up to by the way H not much Mr Earth is Mr new mexic
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congratulations Mexico congrat rul Mr New Mexico oh yeah that thing happened yeah that yeah no big deal oh hey M what's up someone grew up remember when you're a baby you're on the show it's crazy how time flies doesn't it okay let's do this one for the last time Bittersweet but here we go so if you want to understand the way that Zimbabwe plays you have to look back at their past as a British colony this means of course that British inspire sports like Cricket rugby and of
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course football are all popular here in fact Cricket is one of the only Sports they've qualified for the World Cup their national team is called the Chevrons everyone knows these famous players right here by the way if you meet a guy named tatenda there is likely a 90% chance that he's from Zimbabwe because they play a lot of Nintendo there Nintendo Nintendo the female Nintendo oh God their National Rugby Union team is the Sables and they made appearance at two Rugby World World Cups
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for football many zimbabweans will remind you of the fact that their National men's team The Warriors has competed in the African Cup five times and won the kosa cup six times and when these two teams play they are going crazy on another side note zimbabweans will also let you know that they were the first Southern African country to host the all Africa games in 1995 something that they are very proud of and to this day Zimbabwe has eight Olympic medals but here's the kicker
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seven of those eight Olympic medals were all won by Christy Coventry in the women's swimming making her the most decorated athlete of all of Africa after having won the medals for her country Robert maab called her a daughter of Zimbabwe and the Golden Girl awarding her not only money but also appointed her the minister of Youth Sports arts and Recreation in this cabinet we also can't forget Elliot maaji a track and field athlete whose arm was amputated after an electrical incident after
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recovering he went on to become zab's first Paro Olympic gold medalist so there you go guys that is the sports part for Zimbabwe I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who's been tuning into geography now this has become a big part of my life uh Paul's one of my best friends as well as the other co-hosts so we're all very close it's been it's been a fun ride we'll still be making other stuff but this is the end of this chapter so on to the next one last time can I do the Wolverine claws
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okay fine okay here we go
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thank you art yes Zimbabwe and still have a recreational fun competitive side to them but they also have a lot of ethnol linguistic and diverse parts to them as well and it's really cool to kind of highlight each and every single one of them but you know I'm not the one who's going to do that our favorite token female random Hannah is going to take it away take it away to culture stuff Hannah for one last time hey everyone for one last random time I'm random Hannah here to bring you
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the culture segment I can't believe that this is the last episode I read that line on the teleprompter and I got emotional because we've been doing this for so many years how many years was seven years or something it's about 7 years I was I've been married for 6 and 1/2 years and I started this right before I got married or before you married Ian before I married Ian uh I started filming all I needed was a girl who could read the teleprompter and you fit the bill so that was literally I
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showed up I had no idea what I was doing and then here we are s years later anyways so as mentioned Zimbabwe has lots of different ethnic groups most of whom came from The Great bonto Migration but for now we'll just give you a brief overview of the two largest ones that make up about 90% of the country the Shona and the B the Shona people are such an influential group that nearly everyone learns their language and it has become an almost ubiquitous part of their national identity Shona peoples
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were known for having started the Zimbabwe Kingdom where the country gets its name from which was built upon the castle and medieval city of Great Zimbabwe later other kingdoms and dynasties would follow like the torwa and mutapa until the last empire the rose V ruled until the 19th century and if there's one thing that Shona people are known for specifically it's the value of stone sculpture specifically in soap stones and later Serpentine these stones are unique in that they start
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with a gray color but when finally polished they turn black so many sculptures feature polished and unpolished sections to highlight the beautiful duality of the Stone's natural features the national emblem of Zimbabwe is even derived from the soapstone bird found in Great Zimbabwe the indell people on the other hand are split into North and South groups and they are essentially the cousins of the Zulus in South Africa that split off and migrated North up to what is now mainly the
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western part of Zimbabwe and North South Africa they share a lot of similar cultural traits as the Zulus and have a pretty mutually intelligible language with them in the bellet crafts are heavy on colorful bead work that is used in thick rings that they use to cover practically every part of their bodies during ceremonies the limbs the neck the head and even ankle and if you go to the countryside outside of cities you might come across the indalo their traditional
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thatched mud houses that some people still live in traditionally they have a custom of painting the sides of these houses with elaborate colorful patterns that the women are in charge of creating many in deell villages may have a building dedicated to Sanga who is a traditional healer that uses various herbs and traditional rituals for people that have ailments otherwise the remainder of of the country is filled with so many other unique peoples and Customs there's even the voma known as
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the ostrich people these people have a large portion of their population that lives with the ectrodactyly condition that gives them cleff digits on their hands and feet otherwise a few cultural traits all zimbabweans more or less are familiar with would be the concept of mupo sometimes translated to Totem this is not like the totem poles we have in the Americas but rather is a concept that is used to identify native tribes and Clans signified by native animals so
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for example when zimbabweans meet they may ask what their mupo is and a response might be something like I'm from the warthog mupo or the giraffe mupo and they will know exactly where that person comes from and what their lineage and backstory is Hanah what do you think your mupo would be I don't know I like red pandas they're very vicious have you seen those they're vicious and they're the cutest thing that has ever existed so red panda fin answer you're a red panda this was done
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as a way to organize the Clans and to avoid close kinship marriages is people of the same mupo are not allowed to marry and it also serves as a way to protect the environment as it usually considered taboo to eat or kill the animal that represents y mupo you will notice that the month of November is considered sacred in Zimbabwe It is believed this is the month when insestual Spirits rest so all weddings ceremonies events memorial events or even hunting is typically not performed
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as the spirits are usually summoned for those events and finally in Zimbabwe you will see a lot of bulas which are a general meeting area with a fire in the center usually used for eating meetings and performances performances that typically have lots of music and with that one last time thankfully you only have to hear Keith one last time we move on to Keith for the music segment but before we do I just want to say it has been such an honor and a privilege to be
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a part of geography now and to talk about the culture of different countries I have learned so much and I've met so many amazing people from different cultures around the world so I have to thank Paul bar so glad you've been a part of the channel for all this time you've seen her grow up I know I got married and had a kid on the you've been pregnant on the show I've been pregnant on the show crazy Paul still owes me and he in a trip to St Lucia because he gave
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us a trip and then literally like the next week Co hit and then we had a baby and so I still owe you a trip to St Lucia so you haven't seen the last of Hannah You Haven't Seen the Last of Us guarantee it thank you Hannah for everything thank you Paul love you now off to Keith oh Keith we got Keith back how's my hair look it just looks like though all right guys it's the last episode and guess who's back it's me Keith the one the only the Keith Eternal Keith forever the greatest Keith that
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has ever existed you can even get this shirt at geography now.com get that shirt anyways let's get to the Zimbabwe episode guys okay so let's talk music did I just get a text mid thing and ruin this take not talking to you um first of all if you ask people in Zimbabwe what instrument do you think is the most iconic to Zimbabwe most of them will probably go with the imira sometimes called the thumb piano basically an instrument where you pluck the metal keys with your thumbs and it
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makes this like cool metallic sound I think they're pretty sick honestly like if you happen to live in in Zimbabwe and you want to send me one please send me one wo it is said that this instrument was invented here and all almost every event or ceremony in Zimbabwe includes this instrument somehow some way or another you will also hear and see other instruments used at events like large drums called enoma gourd rattles called hosho and the large wooden morima these four instruments are
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like the base of every traditional performance I played the maima in high school in the pit of the marching band that was pretty cool am I a worldclass Mima player absolutely not in addition of course the music is almost always accompanied by singing and dancing each group has their own style and Melody but one common thing they all share is a very complex vocal harmonic system that uses a lot of improvisation often times the singers will go back and forth between audience members and other
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singers on stage and sing typically maybe a four bar phrase participation is encouraged and even expected at some of these performances if you're feeling it join in that's the rule I mean hey you know who doesn't go to a Rock concert and then when the singer goes all right audience sing this part whoa see there you go Paul's singing the words otherwise in a more contemporary sense Zimbabwe's music has evolved in the past Century taking influences for example sangura which means rabbit is
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one of if not the most popular genre that emerged in the 1950s later it was pioneered in the'80s again by epim Joe and his band it's best described as a like uh style that infuses traditional instruments with rock Roomba and pop combining Western and African influences and the songs tend to be super long like a minimum of 10 minutes so if you're into a long show get comfy progressive rock bands also have long shows so just enjoy the show we live in a world where
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everything is such instant gratification or otherwise known as Tik Tok brain as the Boomers call it anyways another genre that came out of Zimbabwe is in boo you yeah who doesn't like boes you know what I'm saying it was created by mind workers that would sing in the caves to pass time and would use the Echoes of the caves to create a delay effect that would sound really dope and then they would sing with a delay but we can't forget Zim dance allall it's a super
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popular genre as well heavily influenced by Jamaican dance hall music in fact speaking of Jamaica Bob Marley performed uh the at the country's Independence and wrote a song called Zimbabwe and he did it for free wow other genres to have come out of Zimbabwe include jiti chimy churi uh Tuco and zimp poop here are some top artists from Zimbabwe you should totally look up if you have time show list of people and one of our subscribers told us everyone lowkey loves winky D if you
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criticize him you will get get destroyed in Zimbabwe or you'll get trampled to death by elephants and you guys wanted us to say that Alec Macho invented the dance called uh Bale every Zimbabwe and knows this dance and it's important to tell the world crazy how much Zimbabwe has created over all these years isn't it in any case that's it for me you know I would like to say thanks to Paul for having me on the show from 2016 to now 2024 8 years of geography now for me 10
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years in total it's been a long journey we've seen some stuff we did some stuff uh I would like to give some shout outs to some people that subscribers that I met from the show hey what's up Andre and Drago you guys were great all my Balkan homies my friends up in the northern European countries the Middle East you guys know who you are thank you to every each and single one of you people on planet Earth that has watched me be a complete idiot on camera and I
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hope I put a smile on your face and made you laugh maybe at some point I'll have my own country called kopia it's not the end ofy but it's the end oh dude it's never the end of me cuz I am Keith I am Immortal I transcend time I am the greatest with the internet I technically do transcend time until they shut down all the servers and a nuclear Holocaust happens we all die anyways and I love all of you guys thank you so much wo don't do drugs stay in school woo I hope to see you on the next
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one thank you Keith so good to have you back and with that let's move on to our last and final segment you know what it is the friend
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zone so in terms of diplomacy Zimbabwe has had a lot of ties over the years not just with their southern African neighbors but abroad as well for one after declaring independence and signing the Lancaster agreement they started out focusing more on the Nam or non- align movement States as this time was in the heat of the Cold War during the Rhian Bush War times China supported Robert mugabi's zanu party while Russia supported Joshua Eno's zapu party eventually the zanu came into control
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and since then China has become the largest foreign investor for Zimbabwe their heads of state have visited each other and they have done multiple trade deals and everything from agriculture to military equipment for Europe Mugabe had always been sort of critical of France from a distance after making statements about their involvement in African Affairs such as the jibuti Civil War but in 2003 he and his wife were invited by then president jacqu sharak on a sort of
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controversial attempt at diplomacy and although mugabi expressed appreciation this made other European nations upset at the time due to France sort of offering legitimacy to a figure they deemed controversial otherwise South Africa the UK and Australia hold the largest communities of zimbabweans in diaspora to this day most migrated during conflict times interestingly enough Mugabe described himself as an angile he was frequently seen wearing saval R suits and being a huge fan and
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promoting the game of cricket to his country and befriending former prime minister Margaret Thatcher he even went so far as siding with them on the fauland island Wars and shunning talks with the Soviet Union in favor of accepting British military advisers and allowing British military bases to be set up during the late '90s and early 2000s however things soured a bit after human rights records were brought up and accused and Mugabe then accused the British of sabotage however after the
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2017 Cuda that forcibly removed mug relations got much better and dignitaries started to make diplomatic visits again otherwise if we're going to talk about their best friends it really depends on who you ask for example Zimbabwe and mozambik share the same shaa ethnic group and much of their trade sector depends on the train line that goes to the port of Berra on that note South Africa and batswana also share a lot of the same tribes and ethnic groups South Africa has usually
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tried to play a more mediator role for Zimbabwe during conflict times batswana has had their brief moments of cross criticism during the Mugabe years like when they had to deal with a large influx of Zimbabwe and refugees and publicly expressing illegitimacy to their political system or or when they built the kazungula bridge that curved around Zimbabwe and Waters effectively cutting Zimbabwe in cooperation nonetheless again after the removal of Mugabe relations have improved and now
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batswana is generally amicable with Zimbabwe but finally we get to the one friend that they have generally agreed that is probably the least dramatic and chillest person to hang with Zambia these two countries have not only shared a lot of the same history as being the two rhas and not only do they share a lot of the same ethnic groups like The Tonga but Zambia has usually played a mediator role to Zimbabwe's conflict times and has participated in multiple cooperation agreements with them
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zambians and zimbabweans are easily able to cross and work into each other's countries and it's not uncommon to find many people from these two countries intermarrying and having family on the other side they love each other in conclusion Zimbabwe really is the embodiment of the very name that they have Zimbabwe greater Zimbabwe the house of stones the old medieval Kingdom that took over traded and grew up to what it is today I just want to say a huge thank you to Zimbabwe the country
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for having me and letting me visit and all the very nice people that have been able to help me and accommodate me into making this video This truly was a great country that I'm so glad that not only me but also my mom could also experience with me as well as 18 of my top Elite subscribers this really was the trip of a lifetime and I'm so glad I got to make this video for you and with that our last country lesson is complete I want to say a huge thank you to all of you
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that have been with me for 10 years this truly is the most amazing thing I've ever accomplished and I love you guys class dismissed
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[Music] w
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[Music] oh w
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w
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w
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[Music]
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oh what's that you thought I was done no I'm not done see when you graduate something what do you do you go out and see the world you experience it you show it you share it so uh with that you guys ready for the next chapter of geography now [Applause] [Music]
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