adminIgnatius Mabasa Shelling The Nuts
A TIRED, thirsty and starving man who had been travelling for days, got to a village and pitifully begged for food. The man who received him sympathised with his famished state and instructed his wife to kill and prepare a chicken and some sadza for the stranger. The starving man nearly suffered hallucinationsas the cooking meal mercilessly assaulted his nose and made his mouth to cry.
After what seemed like ages, the meal was served and the wobbly man literally started hurling morsels of sadza into his sack-like mouth.
When he had tossed the third morsel of sadza in the darkness of his mouth, his host suddenly took away all the plates with the food and told him that he had eaten enough.
We will not ask the motive of the host when he instructed that a very good meal be prepared for the stranger in the first place.
However, what is painful is the callousness of teasing and punishing a man in such dire need.
Like the hungry man in the story above, we have had times that we have been given the short end of the stick.
And if the stick does not belong to us, we may have to be content with the short end.
In Shona we say chisi chako, masimba mashoma, meaning you cannot control that which doesn’t belong to you.
It’s true that the chicken, the sadza, the fire, the wife and everything in that home belonged to the host, but such an evil heart unenge wenyoka wakabva kupi?
A lot of Zimbabweans are today plagued by poverty, and the spate of job losses in the past weeks is not something to joke about.
The effects of the job losses are devastating and estranging to the victims and their families.
Losing a job, especially when it is sudden and unexpected can be traumatic because it creates a form of social alienation that goes on to have a chain reaction effect, which can easily result in mental breakdown.
According to Franz Fanon, internal psychological processes cannot be divorced from their social context; even the contents of the unconscious mind, of dreams, fantasies and so on, are supplied by the social, historical and political location of individuals.
Having the plate with food that you were eating suddenly taken away from you when you desperately need to eat can create all sorts of conflicts.
When a lifeline is cut, one gets a feeling of being victimised and ostracised.
They can get angry, confused, unsure about life and the future, as well as thinking that they are the worst failures.
What they go on to do is something that needs careful monitoring because it can end up harming them and others.
Life in the city is about money and a lot of other signs and codes that are indicators of our comfort and success.
In Harare, like in other modern cities – having a job, food, clothes, health insurance and being able to send your children to school is a top priority.
People have many obligations and their ability to meet those obligations makes them decent and respectable citizens.
Generally, the ways that others see us is psychologically important.
Asi, igangaidza mukwenyi mhezi yavavira mudumbu kana taimbomukira kubasa, and all of a sudden we are without a job zvekuti tave kumukira pamushana.
Inhamo inonhuhwa kana taimbosunda ngoro dzine chizi musupamaketi, asi totanga kusunda ngoro dzepfungwa dzedu kuti dzitsvage kwekukumbira hupfu, rent neschool fees.
Apa haisi rent chete iri kudiwa, but even dignity inobva yapera.
Colonialism taught us to get educated, get a good job and rise up the social ladder.
It is the hunger to get up the social ladder that taught us to value education and work.
When we work, we want to acquire tangible things and feel good about life.
We have grand plans about the future.
It is working hard and belonging to an organisation that sees some of us sacrificing our families, our social life, relationships and other important things.
We invest in our employers and in some cases – people have lost wives and husbands and children because they were too committed to their jobs.
There are people who never imagined themselves working for any other employer, until a few weeks ago when they got to work and were told to go back home.
But for most city people, home is where we go to sleep. Suddenly, the pattern and routine that one has been used to changes and they feel empty and lost.
One man who was fired from his job three weeks ago went home and wept uncontrollably in front of his wife and children.
What people who have not lost their jobs don’t realise is that the trauma of losing a job is like losing your life. It is a source of grief that is beyond understanding because in town, when we work we earn money, respect and lot of other things.
The city is about possessions – zvinhu nezvinhu zvisingapere. But when ego is driven to desperation by the amputation of all its defense mechanisms – it may be wise to go back to the soil, to the basics – kumusha kusina pressure yalandlord.
Yet it is not just the egos that get badly dented by job losses, but education is also process useless. The gains we had made as a country are suddenly reversed.
Under the circumstances, women’s lack of access to economic resources and educational opportunities, poor health and malnutrition are going to become a problem again.
In Shona, there is a vivid expression that describes the suddenness and abruptness of something that catches you unaware and completely unprepared.
The expression says – mukaruka ndawa, tsvimbo yekugotsi.
This is when you suddenly find yourself falling to the ground and blacking out because of a vicious attack that you never saw coming.
One young man drove his children to school in a company car before dropping off his wife at her workplace.
When his errands were done, he drove to his workplace as usual. When he had parked his car and got into the office, his personal assistant informed him that the boss wanted to see him immediately.
When he got to his boss’s office, he was told that his services were no longer needed at the company and was handed a letter terminating his contract with immediate effect.
The boss instructed him to go and remove all his personal items from the company car and hand over the keys to a driver.
That is brutal amputation without anesthetic!
Last year, I met one young man who got retrenched and was given a handsome amount of money as a severance package. While he had the money, the job loss had a terrible impact that could be seen by all.
Suddenly, he was spit out, and he truly felt like spittle – out, cold, unwanted and lonely.
When I spoke with him, I didn’t know that he had lost his job, so I naturally asked him how things were at his workplace.
He blurted out, “Aaa mukoma, ndakabva ini, handisisiko. I was retrenched, but I am happy and doing fine. I am starting a business and I think it will work. I have just bought a . . . ” The way he carried on and on about his plans and how things were working well for him actually betrayed his state of mind and emotions.
For most people, their job defines who they are and their self esteem.
In the world we are living in, being employed makes a lot of people feel better about themselves, have sense of satisfaction and enhanced self-esteem. There are people whose employers have provided a supportive and safe environment and, as a result the employees have been completely made to feel loved and part of a big family.
Sadly, while expecting loyalty, the employers have failed to prepare the employee for that rainy day when they will no longer be wanted.
Suddenly, all the many years of lavishing the admiration and praise of bosses, family and society become a nightmare.
Asi, kana tadya tikaguta hatipwanye ndiro, tinodzisuka nekuti tichada kuzodzishandisa zvakare.
The situation we find ourselves in because of the job loses is like being pushed off a fast-moving bus.
This will not just affect the victim, but also the one who has pushed, and those that get to stay and continue with the journey.
Online Reporter