How a cyclone, a waterfall, and a gown carried Zimbabwe’s resilience to Poland.
by NORMA TSOPO
THE CATARACT drops fifty metres over the Chimanimani escarpment. Tourists know it as the Bridal Veil.
It has outlasted empires. More remarkably, it outlasted Cyclone Idai. In 2019 the storm scattered boulders the size of cars across the valley and redrew the contours of the land. The water kept coming.
Nicole Nyawera wears that fact now.
On Facebook she is Nic Coc; on the catwalk in Nowy Sącz, Poland, she is Miss Supranational Zimbabwe 2026. The gown on her shoulders, called The Bridal Veil, was conceived by Doc Switch Jay and made by Jasper Mandizera, who designs under the label Ivhu Tribe. Mandizera treats cloth as a record of place.
Silk runs in sheets to mimic the cascade. Textured panels recall the cyclonic rubble—dislodged rock that now sits at the falls’ base as an unintended monument. The costume is built on memory, not mere ornament.
Nyawera is a nurse by training, specialising in maternal health. She has held the hands of women in labour and monitored fragile newborns.
Resilience, for her, is occupational.
“This journey is about representing Zimbabwe with pride,” she said. “Promoting maternal health awareness, inspiring young women, and showcasing the strength, beauty and resilience of our nation.”
In Poland she has won Miss Supra Influencer Africa and placed among the top two African contestants in the Supra Model of the Year.
The gown invokes the Dziva totem. In Zimbabwean tradition, totems are not decorations. They connect the wearer to ancestors, bloodlines and the land. To wear Dziva is to make that lineage visible.
The falls themselves still supply clear water to Chimanimani’s communities. They irrigate the vegetation and sustain the wildlife that survived the cyclone. They are a working resource, not a relic.
The dress is not a sermon. It is a piece of national memory worn on a foreign stage. The falls are still standing. So, for now, is she.
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