BY PHILIP CHIRWA
SHOE MENDER VERSUS POLICE INSPECTOR: WHO IS THE BOSS?
ONE Saturday morning, some years back, I took my shoes to a roadside shoe repairer’s shop in Lusaka’s Kamwala second class trading area. While there, I had the fortune of witnessing a hot but interesting argument between the old man mending my shoes and a police officer in civilian clothes who said he was from the nearby Lusaka Central Police Station.
The argument centred basically on respect for another person’s job. The old man felt that the police officer had been rude to him and therefore wanted to show him that even cobblers mattered in society and could not be underrated with impunity.
This is how the scuffle started: I was initially the only customer at the shoe repair shop which was located under a tree shade with several concrete blocks serving as seats for customers. The old man gave me the day’s newspaper to read to keep me busy while my shoes were being attended to.
After a little while, a man came along and sat next to me on another concrete block. I took it for granted that he too had come with a shoe problem. He asked me if he could have a look at the newspaper I was reading and I obliged.
It would appear that the old man was too busy with my shoes and did not notice the new arrival, and so when he finally did, he asked me if the visitor was my companion. When I said we did not know each other, he turned to the gentleman and asked politely, “Excuse me, sir. Can I help you?”
The man replied that he had come to see an Indian friend with whom he had arranged to meet around that spot.
COBBLER: “Sir, do you know whose newspaper you are reading?”
VISITOR: “I thought it was this gentleman’s,” (pointing at me).
COBBLER (roughly): “You thought! Don’t think! I am asking you a simple question: whose newspaper are you reading?”
In order to avoid further argument, the visitor handed the paper back to me but the old man told me to give it back to him, saying, “We are not here for jokes. This is serious business.”
He asked the visitor to look at a notice pinned on the tree. The notice read: “NOTICE TO THE PUBLIC: ALL SEATS HERE ARE RESERVED FOR OUR ESTEEMED CUSTOMERS. PERMISSION REQUIRED. BY ORDER.” He then turned to the visitor and asked, “Did you see that notice when you came here?”
The visitor said he hadn’t seen it, to which the old man replied, “If you didn’t see it, that’s your fault. But that’s the regulation here. Unless one is a customer, one is not allowed to sit here without my permission. But that’s what you did. You just came here and sat.”
VISITOR (visibly surprised): “Old man, are you angry with me or what? Have I insulted you?”
COBBLER: “Nobody has levelled any such accusations against you. I am merely asking you a simple question: why did you come and sit here without my permission when you knew you were not my customer? Perhaps you didn’t think much of me. Perhaps you thought I was just a useless old man who did not deserve to be respected, didn’t you?”
The visitor told the old man that he was being difficult for nothing, saying, “After all, this is a public place. Why should I get permission to use it? You don’t even pay rent for this place, so what are you complaining about?”
The remarks annoyed the cobbler who then rose to his feet and handed my shoes to the visitor, saying, “I will go away for a few minutes. When I come back, I must find the shoes mended.”
The visitor vowed he would not leave the place whether the old man liked it or not. Meanwhile, I decided to play it safe by refraining from making any comments on the matter. I did not want to be involved.
After some time, the old man returned from wherever he had gone and was apparently surprised to find the same person still seated at his place. “Sir, have you mended my customer’s shoes?” he asked deliberately. “If you haven’t, please leave this place at once.”
The visitor warned the old man to mind his language because he did not know the person he was talking to.
“And who are you?” the old man asked rather scornfully.
The police officer produced a police identity card, saying he was Inspector Kalinso from the Central Police Station. But the old man would not even take a glance at the card, saying, “Whether you are a police officer, a general manager of some parastatal company or whatever, that’s immaterial and I don’t care! In fact, as a police officer, you are supposed to be exemplary in your conduct in public.”
The cobbler then started giving a long lecture to the officer on the importance of keeping manners and respecting another person’s job.
“This is my place and I have every right to interview anybody who comes here. If you are a boss at your station, that’s there and not here. Here I am the boss,” he bragged.
He said he could not have come all the way from his village home in Chinsali to Lusaka for nothing. “It’s not as if there are no trees in Chinsali, but I came here and chose this particular tree for a purpose – to make money,” he said.
Thereafter, the old man asked the officer to leave “in peace” because he would not resume his duties until after he (the officer) had left.
Although clearly embarrassed by the incident, the officer was wise enough to realise that his continued presence there might bring him even more embarrassment. So he quietly picked up a piece of paper and went to sit at a far off place to wait for his Indian friend.
After the man had left, the cobbler turned to me and said, “When people look at me, they think I am just a sleepy, illiterate old man. They don’t know they are dealing with an educated man who knows his rights. No one can intimidate me.”
To prove his “educatedness,” the old man started speaking in fluent English. “When I tell people that I once worked as an accounts clerk, they don’t believe me. But as you have heard for yourself, I can speak good English, even better than some of the present-day Grade 12s.”
The author is a Lusaka-based media consultant and freelance writer.. For comments, sms 0977425827, whatsapp 0777259558 or email: pchirwa2022@yahoo.com.
