The so-called "Violence"

 It is a Friday so we will get on with it.

January 9, 2022. The time is 7:19 am. It is still too dark to be up for many on this part of this rock you call planet earth but I am up already. Having taken a break from whatever made me leave bed early, I go to Facebook where I type.

“I come to Facebook to read original content. There is something about people who share pieces of their mind on different issues. No recycled memes or regurgitations of opinions of their favourite social media influencer. I love unapologetic content. The sort of stuff brittle souls call violent content.

That being said, ine munthu oti amangobwera pamudzi pano kumazapanga post ma pictures opanda ma caption sangandiuze chochita.”

Remember this quote because I will come back to it.

The next page I visit is the Nation Publications Limited because I need to catch up with what’s happening ku Mpanje before I go on to read entertainment gossip on Mikozi and interesting stories on Pemphero Mphande’s page (you people are doing weird things). And did I say Pemphero Mphande?

A couple of weeks ago I was on that page. It must have been a Wednesday because that is when the page gets flooded with stories from ladies. One particular lady was in Pemphero’s inbox asking him to post a story so that she could try to look for the needle of advice in the haystack of mean comments. Her issue? The boyfriend, of course. It is always the boyfriend. I cannot remember the exact issue, but it probably is something about cleanliness. The guy is not taking care of himself. She is afraid of talking to him because she fears it may hurt his feelings. Or is it ego? Whatever. Semantics.

I happen to drop comments on Mr Mphande’s page from time to time so I throw away my mean personality and offer some advice. The advice? “Sometimes feelings need to be hurt before some people can seriously change their attitude enough to change their actions and habits. You need to tell him things as they are.” I probably didn’t comment exactly as reported but you get the idea. Probably didn’t throw away my mean personality too.

Time to get to today’s issues.

When I wrote about original content on Facebook of January 9, I did not expect a lot of engagement from people on the post. I was to get the shocker of my life because people came from all sorts of corners. Their comments? I was being violent. The interesting bit was their argument for labelling my post as violent, the last bit of the post. “That being said, ine munthu oti amangobwera pamudzi pano kumazapanga post ma pictures opanda ma caption sangandiuze chochita.” “I cannot take people who just come online to post pictures without captions seriously.” Most but a few seriously found a problem with that and chose to ignore the essence of the post which was encouraging the responsible use of Facebook for the pursuit of knowledge and alternative opinions. All they picked out was the vayolensi, which I am told is different from violence in ways no one can explain coherently. Story for another day.

Of late people have labelled my posts on the social media as violent and while I do not agree with that connotation, I will admit that I do some of these things by design. The reason is the same one I commented when I was offering to the lady who asked Mr Mphande and the followers of his page for advice. Sometimes people only pay attention to things when you have touched a nerve.

Those of you who like me were raised by disciplinarians for parents may relate to this. Whenever you went on the wrong side of the household’s set of both written and unwritten rules you would get verbal and physical torture. That helped to keep you in check. The problem nowadays is that we have watered down the language we use to communicate whenever people are in the wrong. As a result, we struggle to tell people that what they have done is stupid whenever we need to out of fear of hurting other people’s feelings. Before you go flat out and lose teeth over this, I am not telling you to go around calling people stupid, but you need to call people out for doing stupid things whenever it is due. It helps you. It helps them.

The two-sided problem we have nowadays is that we are increasingly getting softer for one reason or the other. I am not sure if we are following this western way of too much tact and diplomacy that is making us fail to even ask for money people owe us for the sake of preserving friendship. We have people who are afraid of telling others what is going on and giving them honest feedback. We are also people who are not ready to take negative feedback positively. The result is that we are just a bunch of 30-year-old babies walking on eggshells; people whose main priority is to avoid hurting others’ feelings. We are always heaping praise on each other even for doing the wrong things. We can’t rebuke each other when in the wrong. Remember the last time someone sat you down to tell you what you did was wrong? Some of you may say it has been a minute and that is one of the reasons we may be getting softer as a generation. I fear for our children.

Having said all that, I am inclined to think that I have some clever solutions to this problem and the first one is that we all need to be exposed to some sort of trolling. Every single one of you needs to join and to be active on Twitter and that will exponentially increase your chances of meeting bullies who will remind you that you have flaws, and you are not special. Of course, I am joking. Not everyone can handle Twitter and the mean community called Twitter Malawi, but that may be a start for some of you.

For most of you, I would prescribe mentorship. You need to make a deliberate effort to find someone who can give you honest feedback about what you are doing. This may be someone older or senior, but it must be someone wise, knowledgeable, and experienced enough to talk some sense into you. The reason I am suggesting this is that most of you who are just moving out of your parents’ homes to start your own lives are now losing the connection with parents and with that the vital feedback you need to live an upright life. We are a generation of people that are becoming slaves to their own freedom and that is why we need figures that can slap the sense into us whenever we stray. Listen to parents, guardians and older siblings. When they have the knowledge, let them give you the feedback and do not just go when you feel like you are doing the right things. Let them know when you mess up too. So that they can shout at you and hammer some sense into you.

Another one? Pick your friends right. You need to have those people that can tell you to stop things whenever they are headed the wrong way. This whole thing of kumangoipatsa moto when our friends are doing the wrong things does not help anyone. I remember having been sat down by a friend who questioned my spending habits then. I hated him for it because I thought he did not have the right to say it (I started kupanga zondisangalatsa before it was cool), but when I think about it today, his advice saved me a lot. You need to have those friends you can tell that clubbing four weekends a month is not the way to go and those you can listen to when your promiscuous habits are questioned. Kumaletsana. Kumadzudzulana. It helps. Don’t be afraid to tell your spouse of what they are doing wrong for fear of hurting their feelings.

That being said, I am all against this whole soft talking and heavily censored kind of conversations. I encourage the use of raw opinions and feedback to instill change. I have lost a couple of friends to brutal honesty, and I know I will keep losing some. I have learnt to appreciate the people who sit me down and tell me that what I am doing is wrong although I may not admit it on a normal sunny day. The thing is just that I do not believe that we can push ourselves to greater heights if we continue this eggshell walking and shy away from giving each other uncomfortable pieces of advice or feedback.

In 2021 we were calling people out using memes which were captioned in ways that told people to wear the cap if it was fitting. I don’t think that took us anywhere. People do not make firm decisions to move out of their comfort zones when they are laughing. Memes do not cut it. Soft and kind words do not cut it. You need to turn the heat up a notch and use some brutally honest words to bring the desired effect. Others call it violence and for purposes of this article I will join the bandwagon. Nowadays we should just go flat out and call people out using our own words and in our own handwriting. If it is a spade, unapologetically call it a spade. Do not call it a shovel.

I will be using kind words sparingly this year because my general observation is that they make people soft.

Good luck being in my circle.  

 

On Cheating

 

It is another Friday.

I was halfway through an article on communicating the 2022 way when I remembered two things. 

1. The last two articles were about 2022. 

2. The topic of relationships has been neglected on this blog for some time at a time when people are misbehaving around relationships. Here to share some somewhat unpopular opinions. 

You may not agree with some of these things, but read on. This is the year of alternative wisdom.

Wednesday, January 12, 2022 was dubbed the day of the MG2. For those of you who live under information-deprived rocks or those of you who generally are not vascularized enough to be getting what goes on in Malawi, there were two clips (and I have seen a third one) that were in circulation. According to the narratives, one was of a man who was caught by his wife while driving with his mistress. The wife’s reaction? Fighting the mistress. Other trigger happy humans thought it might be time to break out their Itel S16 and shoot some grainy video of what was happening. Second clip? A fight between an MG2 and MG3. A side chick caught a side chick with the man’s car and caused a scene. But you probably know this already having seen the clips.

I think this is a good point to start today. Time and again we hear stories of cheating. In most cases, it is men who are doing the most in this field but a female friend of mine told me that that balance is rapidly and dangerously shifting as women are increasingly getting into cheating. The issue of cheating deserves its own article but I am here to initiate a discussion on the reaction to cheating. Time and again we hear about incidents of cheating because of the way people react to them, and I am wondering if we are handling these issues well.

You catch your spouse cheating. This is someone you have been dating for that past couple of years. Your families know about your relationship and you have already contacted the tailor (or designer as they prefer to be called these days) and paid the deposit for your engagement outfit. With the date for chinkhoswe already fixed you hear that he or she is with another person at Balotelli Lodge. You want to rush there to catch them pants down. I think that may be a fair reaction. But do you have to grab a gang of your friends and tell them to take pictures and videos of your loved one naked? Say you found some suspicious chats. Do you take screenshots and send them out on social media?

Of late we have seen a lot of people exposing their partners’ cheating behaviours. In one clip that was in circulation last year, a naked woman is seen pleading with people to stop taking photos and videos of what was going on. Apparently she was caught with another man in a cheap lodge. A married woman. His husband showed up with his boys and who took what can be likened to a video of the ordeal. Sources, however, have it that the two people made up and are back to their lovey doveys. Remember the Area 30 scandal? I shouldn’t go into that. My point is that when we feel like someone is cheating on us, it is good to leave silently and move on to the next one without making a scene. We are sharing too much in these relationships; things that are bound to bring us together. You do not want to be back with someone you punched in the face. You don’t want to go back to a photoshoot with someone whose conversations you exposed. Back to the person whose nudes you leaked? How does that reflect on you? Even if you are not coming back, you do not need to tape anything. Put that phone back in your pocket, because we are not interested.

While we are on the same issue of cheating, some of you need to learn how to make firm decisions about your cheating partners. He cheats for the 8^th time with the 5^th girl and you still take him back. “He is a good man and he loves me. Anangolakwitsa”. Kupusa. Do you know kuti nafenso timakufuna and we are planning on being faithful? DO you even know that relationships are meant to be enjoyed as opposed to being endured? Men who are seeing red flags all over but not doing anything about it… Is everything okay? Mwamva zoti munthuyu ndiwagulu. What are you doing about it? Learn to make these tough decisions. These things you call love can be explained in terms of chemical reactions when we go on the deeper end of the pool of science. Oxytocin is the chemical that makes you feel butterflies and what not. I guess all I am saying is that you need to know when to walk out.

A couple of months ago there was a hot debate about an article written by Edith Gondwe who bashed ladies who trouble their men for money. Interestingly, that debate has refused to die. On the male side, people have argued that azimayi akupempha kwambiri; asking for expensive things and almost living off relationships. Women, on the other hand argued that they are meant to be provided. Interestingly, there came one statement that advised men to be courting women that they can afford. Some have wondered why we have gotten to a point where women want to be afforded and not to be loved. Love does not pay bills, some would say. But are relationships supposed to be a source of money for paying for bills? We could go on and on, but that would not solve the underlying problem. Let’s dissect.

Relationships have gotten complicated nowadays. With this whole “sex first, relationship later” mess we have gotten ourselves into, most people find themselves in situationships where people end up having transactional sex. If your think I am exaggerating, go to Pemphero Mphande’s page and read about the girl who tricked his boyfriend’s friend into getting a relationship with her because he was generous while her boyfriend was stingy. The man we used to call chidyamakanda was later named sugar daddy and now wears an almost canonized name of blesser.

Here is the thing about a blesser. The typical one has a proper family; wife and children. He is out there chasing some young girl that he will not marry. Wanna know why they accept him? Because of what he offers. He brings money that you, a 27-year-old handsome beard farmer cannot bring. When she asks you for an internet bundle you tell her that you will see and switch your data off. The blesser? When she asks for a bundle she buys her an iPhone. The end result is that there are some who have taken relationships as a means of earning a living. When this man spends that much, e wants something in return. You know what I mean. This brought in an interesting argument when the debate about Edith’s article. Some women told men off, saying that if they want peace, they should stop chasing these slay queens. The slay queen has no other thing to gain so it they want to go with them, they might as well accept that they will be paying the price. Fair point? I don’t know. All I am saying is that we cannot continue like this. And shall we stop sugar coating things please? Blesser? Side chick? Why don’t we call these people what we used to call them in the 80s? I wasn’t there in the 80s but you know what I mean.

Back to the issue of these relationships you call automatic. A guy is out there telling people that he has a girl. They probably slept together a couple of times prior leading the guy into thinking they are together. He probably spends on her too. Somewhere else the girl is out denying, saying he is just a friend. You’ve never heard of that, right? Me neither, but I am sure it has happened somewhere although in most cases the reverse happens. Atsikana ambiri ali mu zibwenzi zoti alimo okha. The guy they are counting has no idea that he is in a relationship and is probably planning on how to entice his next victim; or friend with benefit as we call them in this brittle world where we sugarcoat everything. Can I just remind you what the old Chewa adage says? Awiri sayenda limodzi asanapangane. You’ve got to make it clear that you are starting a relationship before you start giving each other relationship privileges. Y’all people are giving too much to people that don’t care about you. Are you okay?

And what’s this obsession with sex and relationships, good people?Tilibe zina zochita? A girl dumps you and goes to another man because you have no money. Instead of making money you go looking for another girl. No work done. And ladies, having friends that are getting laid doesn’t mean you should also be getting laid. We are walking in different lanes and fighting different battles. There is a whole life outside sex and relationships. Have you tried chasing money? How about evangelism? Farming? How about that thing called self-love. Yes. We need to be loved, but stop forcing things because there is more to life than this thing we are calling love nowadays. Whatever the hell it is.

Anyway. I should stop. I shouldn’t take away all the motivation you need to be forcing your relationship. Aliyense azipanga zomwe zamusangalatsa.

2022 Again

 

Friday the 7^th of January, 2022. It is the first Friday of the year and once again we have a piece to read. When I sat down to think of the best way to start the year, I could not look any further than the thought of offering some unsolicited ideas on how you could make the best out of your year. Have I become a motivationist? Probably. All in all, I am at the point in my life where I believe that in as much as we love to discuss non-issues we should spend a bit of time talking about things that matter, somewhat. Here is my attempt at starting such a conversation.

I will start where I left it off in the last article by reminding you to plan your year. If you are to ask me, I probably have written 3 or so articles about making plans at the beginning of the year, constantly reviewing the progress and evaluating at the end of the year. Some of you may wonder if I actually do it, but if you have been following the articles you will know that this is a tradition I have been following for the past 5 years save for 2019 when I decided to set out on the voyage of life without a guiding compass in the form of a yearly blueprint. Guess what happened? Midway through the year I was forced to go on and buy a diary to keep life in check. I had been all over the place and things were not working.

Some of you may wonder what a plan can help with in the modern day world where everything is unpredictable and depends on some factors that may be beyond our control. Some may wonder if planning actually works helps a person to achieve their results. The actual answers to those questions may not be directly provided in this piece but here is a bit of what I have learnt from experience. Having a bit of written goals or plans to which one goes back to for reference helps with focus. You are constantly reminded of what the goal for the time period is and what to do to get it. What that does in the end is to improve one’s efficiency and output, and while you may not get all the things you want done, you get to appreciate the importance of the exercise of planning and reviewing. And these plans do not have to be complicated, by the way. For my 2018 plan, I used a piece of plain paper on which I drew a confused face, wrote my goals around it and hung on my living room for me to see every day. Not a very complicated process but it worked the magic.

Second tip: after thinking of what you want to achieve, think of how you are going to do it. Now this is not something for people who are just trying to make it to the next Friday alive. If you are thinking getting a promotion, starting a family, buying a car, enriching your spiritual life and things along those lines, you may want to pay a little more attention to how you can possibly get what you want. This is the major difference between a goal and a plan. With a goal you are looking at what and with a plan you are looking at how. That makes a huge difference between people who dream and those who get it. If you want it that badly, it might be worthwhile scribbling whose number you will call, which doors you will knock down and how far you are willing to go to get something.

Some people have defined success as the continual achievement of one’s goals. With the idea that achieving goals is directly linked with one’s input, it is important to keep the energy high to sustain achievements. Most times we fail to achieve our goals because we are not consistent with our actions. Sometimes we start the new year with resolutions out of excitement and end up dropping them along the way. This lack of consistency sometimes comes because we set goals that are too radical and devoid of consideration of how gradual adjustments need to be if we are to make lasting change. Take it easy and be consistent. You are not going to give up alcohol, become vegetarian and start burning 800 calories every day to manage your weight. You are not going to suddenly cut off half of your friends for being toxic and expect life to go smoothly. Just saying. Be gradual and consistent about things.

Another thing. Consciously use the calendar to your advantage. A couple of days back a friend of mine made a social media post on how he refuses to believe that things change because of a change in numbers on the calendar. I think he made a fair point and to an extent there are a lot of people that think setting goals and having new year’s resolutions is a laughable idea. I tend to think that that is not entirely true. When well thought through, these plans and resolutions actually do pay off, but that it a story for another day. I am here to talk about patterns.

If you happen to pay attention to things, you will notice that the beginning of the year marks the beginning of the same repetitive cycle. On the social media you see a lot of chatter about school fees, people being broke, cabbages, new year’s resolutions, sober Januaries and all that. February comes with its own Valentine’s and Men’s Conference issues and March is just one of those flat months. April marks the beginning of the harvesting season after which we begin to see weddings. Those will peak around October and November at which time people start talking about village banks and Ke Dezember. If you look on the serious side of things, you will notice that there are some recruiters who follow a certain pattern, releasing calls for applications at specific times of the year. In short, there are some things that are some things that only happen in those specific times. If you want to start that seasonal business, to go to that annual festival, to apply for that fellowship… You might want to acquaint yourself with when these things usually happen and start preparing in any possible way. Save that money. Start looking for tips on how to make that application better. Don’t let predictable things surprise you this year.

If you want to go far this year, be optimistic. Work hard and smart with the belief that you will get whatever you are gunning for. If you plan to drop that resume at that company, make sure you give it the best you can with faith that you will bag the job. Fortune favors he bold. Also.. Set Standards. It is important to define what you want to be and to get because if you do not do so people will do that for you and give you raw deals. Want a spouse? Have some class. Osamangotola bola chikupuma. If you provide a service, charge your work’s worth.

Think of the wisdom that comes with the guilt from festive spending. Already some are talking of Sober January and cutting expenditure which may or may not be out of choice. For those that are doing it having chopped all the money in December are likely to get back to misbehaving with the recovery that comes with the first two salaries of the year. My suggestion? Use this to orchestrate behavioral change. If you are to have a sober January, you might as well add the 28-day February to it. Maybe you could make it 4 months or the whole year. Or just quit, really. I mean, you could do that, can’t you?

I could continue with these unsolicited opinions all day, but I guess you get the gist.

Happy 2022!