2004 for New Zealanders: Kirsty McLean

Kirsty McLean

The memory of her four big dogs makes Kirsty McLean's voice break and she wipes away tears.

The great danes were left behind when, as a single, white female she finally made the tough decision to leave Zimbabwe in southern Africa.

A long way away in Albany, north of Auckland, she worries about how her precious pets are getting on and wonders if they are still alive.

The 26-year-old was the last member of her family to flee following President Robert Mugabe's declaration in 2000 that white farmers were "enemies of Zimbabwe".

McLean has just spent her third Christmas in New Zealand, a new homeland she raves about. But memories of the extraordinary land she grew up in are never far away.

Last year was in many ways tough but in others full of hope, promise and excitement.

McLean lives in Albany with her biological father and says in New Zealand she has found friends, freedom and opportunity. But she lives every day with horror memories of a Zimbabwe which she says aged before her eyes, becoming decrepit and malnourished.

McLean gently recalls the farm where her family lived for 50 years with antelope, warthogs and zebras never far away.

"It was beautiful. It was such a special life. It really, really was."

But at the farm her adopted father began getting death threats. Then news broke that a 100-strong mob had murdered another white farmer and set fire to his farm.

Anyone who had received death threats was advised to abandon their farms and McLean's family suddenly found themselves with 24 hours to get off their property.

They grabbed what they could and headed into town, heartbroken as their workers stood by jeering.

The rest of her family went on to England, but McLean stayed with her grandmother in the town of Gweru with the dogs in a house surrounded by high cement walls and electric gates. Still, she did not feel safe.

She then sent her grandmother to England and stayed on alone, not wanting to leave her beautiful Zimbabwe.

It proved too hard. She would jump up in the night peering out of the window fearing for the dogs and watching for intruders. She bathed with a kitchen knife in her bath.

She went to England first but "as a raw African out of a wild bush" found it cold, grey and lonely so decided to come to New Zealand to be with her biological father.

She has heard rumours the farm has been stripped of its roof and windows and might have been turned into a beer hall.

Because dogs were being attacked and poisoned the family had decided the great danes should be put down. But McLean could not do it and found them homes at other farms. It haunts her and she wonders if she made the right choice.

Despite the sadness, life in New Zealand is good. This year she and her father set up an immigration consultancy business and she has bought her first car.

She is still excited at all the food in the supermarkets. "Honestly, I waste so much time at the cheese counter."

She has learnt a lot about what is important in life.

"I've learnt that material things don't last forever and you might lose them all. I've learnt to let go of a lot of silly family heirlooms and furniture and stuff like that and I've learnt to laugh it off. You learn that people are important."

But it is not always easy. "I still have a problem. I live with my dad here and he's really just taken me under his wing because I just haven't been well through all of this. I've been seeing doctors about that.

"If my dad's away on business I sleep with the lights on because it really was a bit scary. I'm not quite over that yet."

Next year all she really wants is to settle further into the New Zealand lifestyle and perhaps visit her Zimbabwean boyfriend who now lives in England.

In the meantime, a comfort has been the new dog she did not really want to get, not wanting to get close to another pet. She reckons Sam the bichon frise has been pretty good therapy after all.