We are far from a working nation

By TONY MALESI

The other day, I encountered an incident that really disturbed my mind. I had a one-hour break and ducked out of the office, ostensibly to kill three birds with one stone; eating lunch, meeting with a friend and doing a bank transaction.

I accomplished the first two successfully but I had complications executing the third one. You see, I strolled into the bank and, hey presto! I bump into a meandering queue that made me almost scream ‘inefficiency’! The many service points, however, gave me hope. Never mind, except for the two tellers, the rest were away. Perhaps, out for lunch and were coming back shorty, I consoled myself.

Incongruous

On the queue, I was sandwiched between two women. And as a rule, I always try my level best to avoid physical contact with people of the female persuasion in such situation. As we wasted a lot of time on the queue due to the slow service, I endured torture by employing all sorts of tricks in the book – including squinching up myself and holding back my stomach just to avoid contact with the women lest they accuse me of harassment of sorts. A delicate balancing act, I tell you.

After a couple of minutes, I eventually got to the teller but it was not even time to sigh with relief. The young woman who was to serve me, despite her long neck, perking mammary glands, luscious lips and her general beauty, one thing was incongruous with her; she kept on chewing gum, rather violently! She relentlessly chomped away chomp! Chomp! Chomp! As if her life depended on it.

Quagmire

To infuriate me further, she momentarily blew air in it, like we used to do as children, forming a balloon that she immediately burst before doing it again and again, imagine! Never mind I was explaining a very complex financial quagmire. It got me thinking, surely, even if she wanted to maintain fresh breath or eating is her hobby and, therefore, she so loved her jaws so much that she had to keep them fit for the hobby, where had she forgotten her work ethic?

As if that was enough, she was talking too fast and never gave me a chance to talk; she restricted me to listening and all I could do was nod my head like a goat, to everything she said. So fast was her speech that one would have been forgiven for imagining she had been threatened, at gun point, to finish all her days allocated word count on me or else…you get the point. Gosh! To me this was a scandal.

Impromptu

You see, such lackadaisical and sickeningly casual attitude towards work has nothing to do with political leaders — who we like blaming for everything.

Most Kenyans forget that rubbish of going an extra mile long time ago, and all we want is work less but earn more, period. Going an extra mile was a fad that is no longer in vogue. And this is not just a problem with banks. I mean, when was the last time you saw a traffic cop excitedly, directing traffic (all I see are bored and stern faced chaps gesturing instructions!); a punctual and diligent civil servant; a wife humming as she excitedly, cooks, cleans or winnows away; a responsible husband excitedly whistling as he carrying out his duties without grumbling and blaming government; a cleaner at your office moon-walking as they do their thing; a teacher doing tuition free of charge; an MP making an impromptu visit to his constituency to inspect development projects without an entourage that overruns the local market.  At this rate, I’m sorry Kenyans, Vision 2030 remains a pipe dream.