Park benches and grandmothers: Zimbabwe's novel mental health therapy spreads overseas

Siridzayi Dzukwa, right, talks to Tambudzai Tembo outside her house near Harare, Zimbabwe, May 15, 2024. In Zimbabwe, talk therapy involving park benches and a network of grandmothers has become a saving grace for people with mental health issues. An empty bench is seen outside the Friendship Bench offices in Harare, Zimbabwe, May 4, 2024. Siridzayi Dzukwa, a grandmother, right, talks to a colleague while seated at a bench in Hatfcliffe on the outskirts of the capital Harare, Zimbabwe, May 11, 2024.

After her son, the family’s shining light and only breadwinner, was arrested last year, Tambudzai Tembo went into meltdown. In Zimbabwe, where clinical mental health services are scarce, her chances of getting professional help were next to zero. She contemplated suicide.