Two Visitors Per Patient

It is the lunch time visiting hour at a major city hospital.An elderly woman lies in a drug induced sleep on a hospital bed and her relatives have come to see how she is doing.The notice for two visitors per patient is ignored as her anxious relatives  crowd around her bed and try to see for themselves what they have from phone calls or chats that they relative is very ill.

Two Visitors Per Bed

Whilst all this is well intentioned but the patient just needs to be left alone to rest,for her body to heal itself.It is quite a contradiction because those who prophesy to love and care for her are the ones who disturb her by waking up and try to talk to her.Wanting to know how she is feeling and whether she recognizes  them.The lady is very ill, the notes on her bed indicate that she has breast cancer and she is unresponsive to treatment.She is no longer eating neither can she talk.

Some sane minds among the visitors suggest that just a few visitors at a time should be by her bed to no avail.Waking up and finding a lot of strangers around ones bed does not exactly augur well for a very sick patient.Eventually after the initial flurry of rubber-necking is over,the visitors realize the gravity of the situation and sit in the chairs provided and talk among themselves.It is taboo for anyone to mention how ill a patient is traditionally but all and sundry can see that the patient is struggling.

For the immediate family,the children,watching their mother being turned into a spectacle is heartbreaking,no matter how well intentioned the action might be.They can only stand by and watch. Should they tell the visitors to keep their distance,it will be misconstrued as arrogance.It is a catch 22 situation.  

Husband Sees Red After Discovering Sneakers Under Bed

The father of three, who ditched his wife three years ago but has remained friendly with the mother of his children ,going to her place on a regular basis to ask for bus -fare got the shock of his life when he discovered a pair of men's sneakers under the bed of his estranged wife's bed.

Husband Sees Red After Discovering Sneakers Under Bed

On enquiring what was going on his worst fears were realised as his wife confirmed that she had moved on and found a lover who was taking care of her and their children.The former husband saw red when he was invited to come inside to be introduced to the new man who had replaced him in the woman's heart and bed.He unexpectedly head- butted the woman and a melee ensured resulting in the man getting bruises to the face and upper body.The woman was able to stand her ground and pounded her former husband for wanting to spoil her new- found happiness.With tail between the legs,he went back home to freshen up and wear a new shirt as the one he had been wearing was completely ruined.

Realising that he had bitten off more than he could chew, he completely disowned the children

This means the new man has both the mother and the children.Interestingly the former husband remarried three years ago and has children with the new wife.The two women actually get on well together.

Are You A Cannibal?

I was asked this question quite a lot during my travels in Lesotho.One of the most hilarious tales i ever heard was the fact that people North of the Limpopo river are cannibals.

Are You Are A Cannibal?

I love my country,failed economy and all.It has the highest literacy rate in Africa.I contributed a bit to this statistic, the tale of which will be written about at a later date. One can pardon me therefore for being a bit defensive when the assertion was made that our country was full of cannibals.

Most of the Basotho i met with would regale me with story of a Mosotho who married a foreigner,went to visit the husband's country of origin and was forced to marry a baboon.I tried to explain that this was impossible, to no avail.What I later discovered was that there was a lot of uninformed stories about Africa.You could have thought you were in Europe or the Americas, the lack of knowledge their is about Africa in the countries south of the Limpopo.In Lesotho this would have been perpetuated by the fact that History is not taught in the schools.Those schools which teach it

Are Chitungwiza Residents Getting The Service Delivery They Deserve At Last?

For the past two weeks ,water supplies have been coming to Chitungwiza residents regularly from Sunday to Wednesday morning,quite a departure from the usual Monday mornings to Wednesday morning.

Are Chitungwiza Residents Getting The Service Delivery They Deserve At Last?

Imagine our surprise then when we saw a caterpillar front-end loader early in the morning piling sand and rubbish that had been dug up from the water drains along Hombarume drive and tipping them into waiting rubbish dump trucks,to be carted away to some distant landfill.

The fact that 624 workers were laid off not more than two months ago seems to have jump-started service delivery in our beloved community.One to think really hard to when last we saw anything similar to this happening here.

However, a lot still needs to be done in regards to the provision of refuse bags.I have personally gone to the office of the man in charge of the issuing of refuse bags and have been assured that i will get one this month.I am going to demand this service since I am paying my rates diligently every month.We do not want the enforced water rationing that we have been forced to endure.Other suburbs in the town have uninterrupted water supplies,what sins have we committed to be singled out for such arbitrary action.

The area of St Mary's township previously known as C.A.A still reeks from the stench of overflowing raw sewerage.This problem has been going on since time immemorial.One question which begs to be asked is if this area has any councillors.If so what are they being doing because one is led to believe that these are supposed to report any poor service delivery to the town manager.Another question is whether the said town manager ever meets with residents to find out any complaints they might have.

In The Kingdom In The Sky

The first time I arrived in the country ,Lesotho,I was really impressed.It was the middle of May and it was bone-chilling cold.

Students learning

My friend ,who had generously agreed to show me the way , lead me to a hostel where other foreigners lived.What I noticed within days is the proud sense of belonging among the local people.Their love for their country,language,and their culture.Whilst quite a few would try to communicate in English,they made it a point to remind one that one is in Lesotho therefore one had to learn Sesotho,the local language.On the whole, the people are very friendly and welcoming.

Since more than half of the people one meets tells one to learn the local language,I went to the biggest bookshop in Maseru and bought a handbook of English and Sesotho translations.Within three months I could speak the language well.A lot of the people  I first met, when I did not know how to speak Sesotho, were amazed.What I discovered is that, if you love something ,then it will grow and you will succeed at it .The fact that I was  not afraid of making mistakes helped a lot.I had a group of young children children around nine and ten years old who would correct me and teach me the proper pronunciation,by the end of my sixth month in Lesotho, I could  hold my own in a simple conversation.As I write,I can safely say that I am proficient in the language since I can even interpret the meanings of idioms and some obscure expressions.

The essence of what I am trying to say is ,when one learns a language they make it their own.They then use it when they please.There is nothing more rewarding than seeing people's faces when they realise that as a foreigner in their country ,you can communicate in the local language
.Opportunities opened up for me and my fellow countrymen ,who had not bothered to learn the language quickly realised their folly and started learning too.

Maggie The Gambler

Maggie is a forty-something professional.She is a single mother of three school going children.Her biggest vice is gambling.

Maggie The Gambler

It has got to the extend where the Lesotho Sun Hotel actually gave her a gold class access card for use of one of the special rooms designated for  their most loyal customers.The doormen and service people know her by name.Every month-end, without fail, she is at the gambling tables, slot machines or whatever it is that takes her fancy to try her luck.

The unfortunate thing is that she could have had a home of her own,good furniture.The gambling bug has really bitten very deep.Maggie gambles her earnings away and has to rely on loan sharks in-order to make ends meet.It all started innocently as a night of fun with the girls from work,but now her life is up-side down.The loan sharks have possession of her A.T.M card and passport which she had to surrender as security.At the month end , she goes and collects the remainder of the amount left in her account ,usually about a hundred and fifty rands.This is hardly enough to pay the three hundred and fifty rands rental for the two-roomed rented garden flat in one of the not-so-elegant suburbs of Maseru as well the food for her children.To make ends meet she has to immediately borrow from the loan shark at an interest of around 30%,so the vicious circle continues.After getting the loan she gambles in the faint hope that she will be able to score a big enough amount to clear all her debts but slowly but surely she is sinking deeper into the hole of desperation fuelled by her debts and gambling habit.

Her children know that on her payday she will arrive home late after visiting the hotel for a gambling session.The eldest, a tall thirteen year old,does the best she can to look after her eleven year old brother and two year old sister.She has lost all respect for her mother,to the extent that she back-chats and is generally unruly.

What makes this situation tragic is the fact that Maggie actually has a college education,one would have thought that she would be wise enough to the dangers of addiction and the poor influence she is having on her offspring.She foolishly believes that she can stop at any time but this has been going on for a while.Her younger sibling, who has a well paying job in one of the government departments,has vowed not to feed Maggie's gambling habits and will not give her any money at all.

My sympathies lie with the children who have an AWOL mother on the day they should be enjoying her monthly toils.If children cannot partake of the mother's hard-earned cash,whilst she feeds it to the slot machines,can one really blame them for feeling neglected.Were it possible those children would have been taken into foster care.

Making Marriage Vows And Sticking With Them

This is the second funeral I have been to in a week.The deceased, a father of four grown children had been bed-ridden for more than five years.He was paralysed from the neck downwards and could not do anything for himself.

Making Marriage Vows And Sticking With Them

It got me thinking about the spouse who has been by her husband's side all the time during his illness.Had the ill spouse been a woman,how long would it have taken for the man to get a side-dish.Almost all the time ,some women take their marriage vows seriously and will stick by their partners through thick and thin.Does this make men incapable of loving and staying faithful to their spouses for rich or poor ,in sickness and in health ,till death do them part? Or is it just a question of self-indulgence on the part of the male partners who believe that society will accept their philandering ways.In most cases society sides with the man and makes excuses for them.

To those ladies who suffer with their men,keep their marriage vows and keep the family together in times of trouble a heartfelt THANK YOU.