What I want to be- Part II

During the holiday, a friend of mine studying Business administration decided “we don’t talk about intelligent stuff a lot”, so we had a long conversation about the depreciating Malawi Kwacha and how everything has gone wrong when donors withdrew their funds after they found out billions of money was stolen by top government officials. We shared great ideas on ways we can improve the development of Malawi (and his business knowledge came in handy), and I told him I would ask my dad about these ideas, if anything could/has been done. So I explained to dad about the two great ideas we had, and he just nodded and he had his eyes closed, I’m not even sure if he was listening, but after I poured my heart out, he said, “All these ideas you have have been written before, have you heard of “Malawi Growth Strategy something-something”? The book has very great ideas! You know why nothing is being done? Politicians run this country, not Economists. Their motive is personal gain, not developing Malawi.”

I just felt like a deflated balloon right then. I’m so sure students before me have thought about all these ideas we had, and maybe got frustrated too when nothing seemed to work out. Then I asked myself, what is the use of all this education I’m getting if it will all be blocked by some greedy politician and corrupt officials? Why am I even going to uni if it will all be useless in the end? That’s when I decided that unlike every other person that has had these great ideas and got discouraged, I will do something about it. I will not sit still and sigh about how bad things in Malawi are and DO NOTHING.

So I came to an understanding that a big part of the problem was political. I asked a Political Science student friend of mine about it, and he explained that there was nothing in the direction I wanted to take (which means, yes, there’s a gap, which is why development in Malawi is stagnant but of course, it is a very complex matter). My dad said this one thing that struck me and has been on my mind for a while now, which made me take this direction. He said, “Malawians are very inactive citizens. We are a very very passive people and we treat the government like our father when in fact, they are OUR SERVANTS.” We treat our president and our MPs like some mighty men. Well, NO! We have elected you so we can demand things from YOU! And we all know a big majority of Malawians is uneducated and don’t know this, so what do politicians do? Take advantage of this ignorance.

I am a very vocal person when it comes to issues such as customer service. I rant about customer service almost every week (thank God for twitter where I can rant to no one but feel good after, LOL). I have had rows with shop assistants, nurses, receptionists, et cetera, because they were not doing their job. Just last month, I got into an argument in a China Shop, because the shop assistant wanted me to arrange the items I had touched and I refused, and told him that that is his job. He gets paid to arrange the items after the customer, so why should I do his job like I get paid too? (Of course I went back the next day and apologized because it was quite a heated argument and my conscience condemned me). I also have issues with most Indians (I’m not even being racist, most Indians in Malawi act in this manner), who treat you like YOU have gone to beg from them in their shops and make no eye contact with you as the customer what-so-ever, smoking their fags or tapping away on their smart phone… Okay, first of all, I’m in your shop to give you MY MONEY, and secondly, it is YOUR JOB to smile at me, I don’t care how bad your day is going, when a customer enters your shop, you smile and do everything to please them so they can give you that money (I know this because I worked in customer service for over a year). So ain’t no way I’m giving my hard earned money to someone who doesn’t even know how to greet me when I enter the shop. I will walk away and buy from someone who is willing to give me their attention.

I have had so many of such encounters, and I have always spoken about it, with no regard to race, age, or sex. Where am I driving at? Malawians have forgotten whose job is whose. Suddenly the customer is rearranging items in a China shop, and the customer is begging the shop keeper for his attention… well, that is not the customer’s job. And it certainly isn’t an MPs job to just claim allowances every month and buy real estate with money that was meant to go into development projects for his/her area. What’s the use if policy makers spend time planning projects when all the money ends up in someone’s pocket? There was an issue of “cashgate” in Malawi recently, where BILLIONS of Malawi Kwacha was stolen at Capital Hill by civil servants… Guys, I mean BILLIONS! In a country as poor as Malawi, where a primary school teacher spends months waiting for his/her salary when one person steals all that money just to buy him/herself 10 cars, and build a 20 bedroom house when s/he only has 2 kids. Imagine how heartless that is and just how much it has affected the whole nation. Okay, let me not go off topic, this issue could be a whole other post.

When I got to my Sociology class, I found that the head of department had suddenly changed the rules, and had decided that those who only took one course in second year cannot take ANY sociology course in third year. I had already done the online registration but people who came and registered after me couldn’t and almost everyone gave up right then and there and took courses from other departments. “Guys, won’t we fight for it? This is unfair, we were told in second year that we could take Sociology, even with one course!” but people just shrugged and left me there alone. “Malawians are passive citizens,” I remembered what dad told me. Yes, they just take things as they are, no action done, and go on a-suffering. I decided that I wasn’t gonna take it. I have goals, and I have Sociology planned in them. I had prayed over what courses to take, and I was damn sure this was it, so why should I let one person get in my way?

For you to understand why everyone just gave up, you should see the head of the sociology department. I went there and presented my case, and she told me that the rules have changed, and the route map used on second year was different now, and she kept repeating, “RULES ARE RULES!” and I would try and explain that the route map last year showed that it was possible for me to minor even if I took one course. “There’s nothing I can do about it!” she exclaimed, “and I won’t approve you!” But I didn’t back down, I kept on pestering her and I could tell she was getting really annoyed with me. I was in her office for about 30 minutes, pleading my case, how she can’t just change rules overnight. If there’s something I’ve learnt at my uni, it’s that tears can get you through negotiations (a group of us were once evicted because we were caught cooking in the dorms and tears got us our rooms back) and I tried this on her and thought that as a woman, she would feel for me and look at me through motherly eyes… My days! I wish I just held my tears back. She didn’t even look up at me, she stood her ground and said she wasn’t gonna change the rules and she continued typing on her computer, ignoring my sniffles.

The most heartbreaking part was when my friends told me I was fighting a losing battle and that I should give up, because the route maps for almost every department had changed and everyone around campus had just accepted it, so why can’t I? Umm, maybe cause I am actually passionate about the courses I am being barred from? And maybe because I’m not gonna let someone impose new rules without giving any notice, and just take it. It really felt like no one understood what I was going through, and it sucked! A few friends did encourage me, and a Law student friend of mine wrote a letter for me (because his English is formal and too awesome!) which I was to give the Dean of Social Science together with my grades from second year. So anyway, looong story short, after going to the office of the dean and finding it closed for over 2 days (thanks to all the demonstrations that were going on), I finally met him and he was so understanding. I don’t know how it happened, and I will owe this entirely to the God I had been praying to, when I logged into my student account with the dean, I found that I had been approved, and he said that I could go into the lectures with no fear, because I am now a Sociology minor. I was sooo happy I just went mad with joy because, finally, I had won the fight and I won’t lie, it felt good to prove people that discouraged me wrong.

I had a long talk with the Political Science student friend againcand we talked about why Malawians are passive citizens, why they let things they are not happy with just happen, and he pointed out that one of the reasons is that there’s no local accountability which means most people don’t know who to report their problems to or they complain to the wrong people; and one thing he told me that I won’t ever forget, is that if I want to develop Malawi, I should start by developing myself.

So, what do I want to be? An Economist, Sociologist and I will not stop there. I want to be an activist… I don’t know how, and my ideas may be vague at the moment, but I will get there… so help me God.

-“Who are you? Who do you want to be? They are one and the same.”

-“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter”- Martin Luther King Jr.

-Isaiah 1:17- Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.

-Proverbs 24:24-25 He that saith unto the wicked, Thou [art] righteous; him shall the people curse, nations shall abhor him: But to them that rebuke [him] shall be delight, and a good blessing shall come upon them.

When people’s part in your story is over

Today I went through my Whatsapp Voice Notes folder and I came across all these OLD voice notes I forgot about, from about a year ago, and I just realized how things have changed! The people I would talk to everyday are not even people I can call my friends now. Some friends changed numbers and I don’t have their new number, but we all know this is code for “I have erased you from my life”. Some people I still talk to, occasional ‘hi’, some I don’t talk to at all, their names are slowly moving to the bottom of my chat list because we completely fell out and I don’t know how or what they are doing. And there’s something about voice notes, they just carry all the emotions… the sighs, the laughter, the sound of their voice… they make you recall exact moments which make them different from a text. They are too raw and all the memories just flood into your mind. I just found myself crying, and I don’t even know why! I don’t know if it’s cause I wanna go back to being so close with them and experience the moments all over again, or if I am realizing just how far I’ve come… or if it’s just me being stupid old emotional me.

Out of everything though, I know one thing for sure, the friends you have today may not even be your friends tomorrow, and this thought scares me used to scare me! See, before, I was the kind that fought to keep people in my life. I would visit and call, and do everything to stay in touch. Then I read somewhere that “there are times when you have to stop crossing oceans for people who wouldn’t even jump a puddle for you." I realized that no matter how much effort you put into staying friends with someone, some people just don’t appreciate it and all it does is leave you hurt. 

This is what I have finally concluded: no friend is guaranteed tomorrow, no matter how close you are today, as harsh as that is to hear. But just because you don’t know if there’ll be there or not, it would be ludicrous to treat them like they have already exited your life. Not only are you denying yourself the chance to be happy, they may end up being the friend that lasts a lifetime. So, enjoy the little time you may have with your friends, some day, you may not be close anymore but you will look back and say, “Damn, we had the time of our lives!” and smile about it, or you will go down memory lane and shed a few tears for an unknown reason, the way I just did. But what really cheered me up is the voice note I listened to from a friend that I am much closer to now and I thanked God they stuck around clumsy, silly me, and honestly, those are the friends that make life worth the while.

This goes out to all my friends, past and present. I have loved the time I have spent with you, and I am grateful that you left a print in my heart and I hope I have too, no matter how little the time we spent together was. You will forever be remembered, because somehow, you have made an impact in my life and made me who I am today.

-“There are people who can walk away from you… let them walk. I don’t want you to try and talk another person into staying with you, loving you, calling you, caring about you, coming to see you, staying attached to you… your destiny is never tied to anybody that left. And it doesn’t mean that they are a bad person, it just means that their part in the story is over. And you’ve got to know when people’s part in your story is over…” -T.D. Jakes