'I taught him to drive and of course the bicycle I had bought for him was no longer the thing when he wanted to impress the ladies in his class.'

'I taught him to drive and of course the bicycle I had bought for him was no longer the thing when he wanted to impress the ladies in his class.'

Rosemary describes life in Bulawayo and her relationship with Romuald, an African teenager whom she cared for.

Rosemary McCloskey

Trinity College Dublin

1993

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Rosemary McCloskey

Work and Employment

Life Story

Bulawayo, Zimbabwe

1990's

Life had its ups and down as anyone who has ever had the privilege of working with teenagers will testify. I had bought a Nissan Sunny car from Peter Aiken in Harare, and it was a beautiful car. Romuald thought he was the' bees' knee's in this car. I taught him to drive and of course the bicycle I had bought for him was no longer the thing when he wanted to impress the ladies in his class. I was very na�ve at first and did not cotton on to his motivation. He would often offer to leave me to the college and collect me and I could not understand why the car was using so much petrol! I decided that I needed something smaller since I could not hold out the bills. I bought a little blue Renault 5 and sold the Nissan. As you can imagine Mr Romuald was none too pleased about this as it was a bit of a come down for him, after the style to which he had become accustomed.

Irish Research Council for Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences (IRCHSS)

Dr Kathleen McTiernan (Trinity College Dublin)

Dr Deirdre O'Donnell (Trinity College Dublin)