A question of my home town

 June 30, 2022

Eish! Been thinking of the concept of My Home Town (MHT). And after scratching my cranium to the bone, I realise I have none. So. I will just do a 'picki picki na picki doli'.

1. Choma - place of birth;

2. Nkana-Kitwe - place of introduction to 'banyamazai', entry into first grade, and on second round of residence first job at Stanchart and entry into college;

3. Kalulushi - place where the old man deforested the trees he had planted as he was transferred just after nine months residence, and where my elder brother nearly shot dead a cousin (he decided to play cowboy after cleaning the old man's rifle and there was one in the chamber);

4. Chipata - place where mum slept her last, and where we rocked the stadium 1974 Independence Day playing 'Aga le I will do the shengling' on our makeshift band instruments;

5. Livingstone - place of last primary schooling, start of Form 1, and where on second round of residence old man retired;

6. Chililabombwe - place of exiting Form 5; and,

7. Lusaka - place of transitory adult behaviours (a term of teaching at David Kaunda, a couple of months at Town and Country Planning Department, but got glued to academic tenure until retirement at 52 years old).

Hectic, ne.

Ora pro nobis.

Of rogues, ethnicity and beauty

 February 7, 2020

Once upon a time, in a bar in Lusaka. Not too many moons ago.

"Lozis are not good people. They just love themselves. They just use Lozi when they meet." The chap says in ichibemba.

"And Mbinji?" A mutual friend asks him.

"Why mention him? He is Bemba." Hilarious laughter followed.

A closer Bemba friend, drummed the table in comical merriment. A Tonga one, imitated that "who who" sounding instrument of theirs. What do they call that witchcraft thing?

"Mbinji is Lozi. He speaks Bemba well, simply because he grew up in Kopala. The chap started school ku Nkana, Ndeke A. And finished secondary school in Chilies," another friend says.

"What is Chilies?" He asked.

"Chililabombwe," I said. "Are you not now feeling stupid," I added. The chap just lowered his eyes, mumbled to himself and left.

In another time, in Livingstone. Many moons before the bar chat.

Walked into the house, and there was this monk sitting at the dining table pigging himself, just like he always did back at college. And this was, in my father's house!

"You! What are you doing in my father's house?" He asks me. Anger and surprise creasing his face. Was I stupefied!

"I live here," I said calmly. A million questions were trying to jump the thought queue in my head. Should I strangle him? Should I find malegeni, and aim for this nuts?

"Huh!" Now the monk was clearly confused.

"Since my father is your father, then you are my brother. Cousin, I mean." Turns out the monk was visiting his uncle, my father, for the first time.

"I am sorry. I just can not believe I called my own brother a tribalist. I am really sorry," he stuttered after reality came to roost.

"But why were you campaigning for Patrick Mpundu in the UNZASU elections?" He asked when it seemed that his marbles were now in equilibria.

"Because he made more sense than you," I had replied. The monk looked away for a minute or so, then burst out laughing. I joined in. We hugged each other.

Fact is. In these two real life experiences, I really thought I could see a tail sneaking between some legs. But even then, a recollection of the events always resulted in us shedding tears of laughter. 

We learned a lot from our own stupidity. We are just all the same. A beautiful people.

Pax vobiscum.

Of the man from a tall tree of savoury alcoholic pleasures

 November 3, 2023

Well. I really believed I had buried my beloved my grandmother, during the time of Noah. I mean the one, of the world famous paraffin and battery acid laced seven days. Today, she came visiting. My skeleton nearly jumped out of my body. She surely could not have resurrected, like that chap in a white crimplene dress who flew into the skies.

Anyway, she calmed me down with her usual folktales. And it is I sat to listen, though not convinced that it was not a ghost I was listening to.

"Once upon a time," she began.

"There was a chiefdom that decided that some man plucked from a tall tree of savoury alcoholic pleasures, should be their chief. The man later ascended to become ruler of the Kingdom. He appointed most of his indunas to be his advisors, and governors of the other chiefdoms.

During his rule, his Rottweiler-like disciples terrorised subjects in all chiefdoms, without being flogged. And, the indunas prostrated before him in eyeball popping reverence. It was a time for indunas to fatten. Skinny indunas, suddenly needed a peniscope to see John Downstairs.

Decades into his rule, the subjects in the Kingdom revolted and deposed him. The indunas begged him, to continue being the chief in his village. But he was so angry and felt betrayed. He told them, to go to hell. For he believed dethroning him, exposed his sinewy and frail John Downstairs to the Kingdom’s subjects.

The indunas were lost. For nearly two decades, they kept searching for hell, where he had told them to go. And they could not find it. So every now and then, the indunas with shattered peniscopes, would go and ask him where hell is located.

However one day, one induna found hell and decreed himself chief.

When the man was told that some induna had found hell, he suddenly decreed that he is the chief. After all the other indunas perseverance that he was still chief, made him believe his John Downstairs was not sinewy and frail.

The jubilation among the indunas was so earth-shattering that, his Rottweiler -like disciples started salivating in anticipation of a continuum of imbecility. And so it was that, in a parade of fools, they ceremoniously escorted him to the chief's palace.

But lo and behold!

The induna who had found hell, had already matted to the king's guardsmen telling them that they need to preserve the sanctity of his chiefdom.

They arrived at the chief's palace, only to creep back with tails between their legs”, she paused. I was already sitting on eggs, eagerly waiting to hear the finale of the folktale.

“Days later,” she continued.

“The man's indunas were sighted prostrating before a Kingdom, they once believed was ruled by Satan." With these words, granny sat back deep in the sofa. Eyes glued to a naked gecko, that had suddenly decided to listen in.

"Granny, what happened next," I exclaimed.

"Huh! You young people, no longer respect elders. How can you ask me that? Yet, you have not offered me any seven days?" She retorted.

"I am sorry, granny." I replied and drifted to the fridge. When I drifted back with a glass of savoury alcoholic pleasures, the sofa was empty. She surely has flown into the skies like that chap, I said to myself.

I rushed outside, hoping to have an out of this world experience. But eish! Only to find Putin, my Siberian Husky, trying to chow a frog. Well, the slimy frog reminded me of the chief's indunas and their fools parade.

Kozo.