Coming Out of the Closet

By Birbal Boniface Musoba

For as long as I can remember, I've always wanted to be a writer. The idea of creating into existence something that is so captivating it allows for a moment of escapism from one’s reality has always instilled such a drive within me that it blinded me to all other pursuits.

Maybe I so single-mindedly fixated on becoming a writer because growing up I never had a lot of friends – actually I was never bothered with making friends, I found the whole routine involved in the dance of getting to know someone utterly pointless because in such moments people always hide their true selves and rather project their ideal selves. The only company that peaked my interest were the worlds of heroes and villains I imagined into being. If I was too shy to meet a girl, I took her to Paris for dinner; if a bully messed with me, I let him grow up, a family and then I tracked him down and slit his throat in front of his kids, who later hunted me down and slit my throat in front of my kids, who later hunted them down and – let’s just say that I had a morbid obsession with the beautifully bizarre and dark, and a lot of throats were slit, a shit load.

But I just realised that I have never put my work out there, any of it. It’s easy enough to put your blog out there, coz let’s face it, everyone blogs. But something that I created for the sake of financial gain, something that has defined who I am for as long as I can remember, that I have never put out there. Maybe I’m a spineless, or maybe I’m scared that if it turns out that I can’t write for shit, that the most interesting thing about my written word are my musings – that frankly are not all that original – then what has my life up to this point amounted to? This fear always held me back from publishing, from pursuing to fruition what I write, from stepping out of the shadows, grabbing and lighting a cigarette, taking a deep puff and proclaiming that I, Birbal Boniface Musoba, am a writer. That fear paralysed me until I read Hemmingway, but that’s a story for another day.

So, without any further ado, below is the first short screenplay I’m publishing – self publishing I know, but still its self gratifying, pan intended – and will pursue to completion. You will see the completed film on my YouTube in the first quarter of 2015 aka early next year.

And please, do leave a comment or two and baptise this new author in the ways of the internet review *GULPS*

“THE LAST MAN ON EARTH”

By

Birbal Boniface Musoba

©2014 Birbal Boniface Musoba

This script is the confidential and proprietary property of the author, and no portion of it may be performed, distributed, reproduced, used, quoted, or published without prior written permission.

FADE IN:

OVER EXTERIOR SHOT OF A VAST UNENDING DESERT

THE CAMERA SLOWLY PANS ACROSS THE VAST EMPTINESS, REVEALING NOTHING

WE HEAR NOTHING, THE SILENCE IS ALMOST AUDIBLE

EXT. WILDERNESS - DAY

The Sun is almost directly overhead and it is a scotching 43^oC.

WE look up and in the very far distance, surrounded by the endless emptiness, WE see a silhouette figure of a MAN walking towards US.

ANGLE: BEHIND THE MAN

THE MAN (could be in his late 40’s here) walks slowly, with short laboured strides. His breathing is heavy and slow, almost gasping. He’s been walking for a long time. WE follow him.

He is wearing a heavy snow suit, with layer after layer of clothing underneath. WE can only see a small part of his face.

WIDE ANGLE

The Man is dragging SOMETHING along on a makeshift sled. It is as heavily padded as he is.

For the first time WE see The Man and the sled he’s dragging in the vast emptiness of the desert. He looks alien to the environment. HOLD

CUT TO:

EXT. WILDERNESS - DAY - HOURS LATER

The Man is kneeling next to the sled, weeping. He stretches out his hand to touch It, but falls short as he breaks down weeping.

The sun is still almost directly overhead, it has not moved an inch even though time has clearly passed.

He gets up and walks away. WE stare at the sled.

SLOWING ZOOM IN ON THE SLED UNTIL

CUT TO:

EXT. WILDERNESS - DAY - HOURS LATER

The Man is walking even slower now, with even greater difficulty. His breathing is heavier and slower, almost gasping.

His lips are thoroughly chapped. He is blinking slower and slower with each step.

The sun, still almost directly overhead, is unrelenting and it beats down on him hard.

He is at the end of his tether. He stops.

WIDE ANGLE

He looks insignificant in comparison.

MAN (V.O.)

What’s worse than being completely alone?

He falls to his knees and collapses to the ground. HOLD

FADE TO:

BLACK

EXT. WILDERNESS - DAY - HOURS LATER

The Man is still lying in the same position, with the sun still almost directly overhead, beating down on him.

He slowly opens his eyes and in front of him he sees a puddle of water. His breathing is now of deep, long erratic gasps.

With his last breath and might, and with great struggle and pain, he pulls himself closer and closer and closer to the water. He needs to reach the water to live.

He has almost reached the puddle, just one more pull and his head will-

-A stone crushes his skull. He is repeatedly struck until his head is thoroughly bashed in.

Blood flows from his pulverised head into the puddle and the water slowly turns red.

THE ASSAILANT, heavily covered up like The Man is, rushes to the puddle of water and drinks, scooping it up together with the blood.

The Man’s corpse lies at the edge of the puddle, with his hand almost touching the water.

Halfway through, The Assailant stops drinking the water and starts vigorously convulsing, until- silence!

HOLD

Blood flows out from around The Assailant’s body, as it shrinks in size.

The sand is stained red all around the two bodies. HOLD

CAMERA begins to rise.

CGI: CRANE SHOT REVEALING WHAT USED TO BE LUSAKA IN THE B.G., WITH THE TWO CORPSES IN THE F.G.

The two corpses are facing in the opposite direction to the City, as if they were running away from it.

MAN (V.O.)

What’s worse than being completely alone?

SLOWLY ZOOM IN ON MAN’S FACE UNTIL CU: THE MAN’S FACE, BLOODIED AND BATTERED

The Man opens his eyes. They are black now.

FAST CUT TO:

BLACK

MAN (V.O.)

Not being able to die.

THE END

The First Quality Measured OR FQM

By Birbal Boniface Musoba

In a very old fashioned way of expressing chivalry, I was never raised to idly stand by when heavy loads are being packed into vehicles, regardless of who was doing the packing. But as I stood in that cool morning breeze that had become such a rare occurrence as one of the hottest summers on record in Zambia flared, overlooking so much green my eyes couldn’t believe such colour existed in nature, in that instance I couldn’t help load the vehicle; other people were being thoroughly compensated to ensure that the goods were packed, but more than the thought of taking food out of a working man’s mouth, safety reasons prohibited me from helping least I sue a corporation for restitution – ok, maybe, just maybe, a little part of me was rejoicing at the prospect of not engaging in manual labour when the weather’s invitation to be enjoyed could not be resisted even with a lion’s heart.

But as I stood by and, in awe, watched FQM’s Health Promotion officers jam-pack the mud laced Toyota Land Cruiser, I could tell that the day that laid ahead held remarkable promise. Although, one could have argued that the euphoria I was feeling was a subconscious response to the Officers’ packing the Land Cruiser with life saving drugs, condoms and malaria, syphilis, gonorrhoea and HIV and AIDS test kits for people living in the remote areas of Kalumibila – well, full disclosure, Kalumbila in its entirety is a remote area – thus, giving me a falsified sense of doing good by association, or that because the Land Cruiser was a repurposed ambulance, it fostered in me an erroneous sense of safety. Whatever Freud’s reasoning would have been for that moment, all I knew and cared about was that that Wednesday was teaming with such promise and I intended to ride that wave to the bitter end.

My unbridled optimism held for the most part of the morning until we started hurtling down a gravel road that, from my point of fright, seemed to be the bumpiest and most treacherous gravel road ever paved by insane men playing at God. The Officer driving the erstwhile ambulance cruiser offered no comfort, as with blithe, he sped down the road with what can only be described as either reckless ease or balls-swinging confidence in his faculties or, in my soon to be piss-stained opinion barring any change, utter disregard for human life. At that moment, driving in that ambulance in the back seat, my mind could not but think of the many dead bodies that might have been ferried in it in the same controlled and seasoned rash. How ironic, I brilliantly concluded, would it be if my demise came in such a vehicle, even more so with the contents we were trafficking.

Then it hit me, maybe the Officer was speeding because of his unwavering focus and drive – pan intended – to reach the Northern Resettlement area of Kalumbila in order to administer, as quickly as possible, this life saving programme FQM has poured millions of dollars into establishing and sustaining. This thought calmed me down as I allowed myself to believe that a person who pursued his job with such diligence would not allow himself to take any life for granted, more so than mine the hundreds of expectant families needing the packages the Officers so brazenly packed and were brashly transporting.

I calmed down further when I realised that FQM and its Health Promotional Officers had been doing this for a long time, more specifically since 2010, even before the resettlement of 560 families that became displaced from their ancestral homes so that their virgin, wild, mineral rich lands could be explored, subdued and tamed. Even before the relocation venture in 2013, an initiative that cost the multinational mining and metals company, a company listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange in Canada and the London Stock Exchange in the United Kingdom, US$11.6 million, of which US$10,762,147 was to build 560 houses, seven churches, a school and pay repatriation and disturbance allowances¹, FQM had been running community outreach and health promotion programmes, programmes it insists it had to set up because of the need that was there in the community, an apparent need that the Zambian government, as a whole. could not fill.

At that precise moment, everything started to click as the gears of my mind started turning at a rational pace. Speeding down that gravel road at 85km/hr was now reminiscent of the light speed at which FQM had developed that once luscious green forest and farmland into something that resembles a town, with hospital, clinics, schools, ATMs, roads and churches in tow. Maybe that is why the Officer was driving with such ferocious speed down the road, his head bopping up and down as he showed his unrivalled proficiency in multitasking with his incessant texting, because such drive, such speed, such determination with which FQM had developed and achieved and continues to achieve so much is what it instils in its employees, using it to maximise their potential and, thus, exploit the most possible turnover. In that moment, a clear sense of clarity overcame my every sense – this is what Spider-Man must feel everytime before he takes a shit  – maybe this multinational corporation has finally gotten it right. I mean schools, churches, roads, housing, payouts, hospitals – things that before the exodus were nonexistent – and community health outreach programmes; I mean who doesn’t want that?! Who doesn’t need that?! Maybe some corporations, this multinational corporation in particular, as Stephen Colbert farcically puts it, ‘are people too’ and they care for more than just the bottom line.

“Water sanitation is the major problem that we are facing in this community!” Chrispine Chipolongu, a local business owner in his mid-thirties living in the Northern Resettlement area, said. His nostrils were now flaring, his breathing had increased, and I knew I had hit the sweet spot.

“If you had to go around the community, you will find that a lot of boreholes are buggered already,” he continued, talking at rapid pace as if punctuations would kill the urgency of his message. “And I can’t even be sure if the damage to the boreholes is as a result of the boreholes being made from cheap materials or they are being vandalised by the community; all I am sure of is that if I was to draw water from that well in the middle of the market and give it to you, you wouldn’t drink it – the colour is different, it looks like it was diluted with petrol.”

He was now speaking with such passion and conviction that I did not dare interrupt him. His eyes beamed, beckoning at me, not to say that he blamed me per say, but more of a plea for him to be heard, for someone to listen and do something about it.

“This is not just a small matter because how are people expected to survive if the water that they need for everything is contaminated and killing them!” he continued, only pausing to see if I was not just listening but hearing him as well. “The elders in the community have tried to complain, and FQM knows about this, but nothing is being done about this because they have gotten what they wanted (rights to mine the minerals), so why should they care or listen anymore? Tell me why?”

I did not have answer for his question, neither did I want speculate on matters I did not fully grasp. All I could do was draw water from that well in the middle of the market. A young girl, maybe six or seven, pumped the water for me as I placed an empty bottled water container in front of the tap, one of many bottled water we, together with the Officers, brought along to drink when we got slightly parched because we could not be bothered to drink the borehole water. As the young girl cranked the lever away with such joy and enthusiasm of helping a total stranger – it still baffled me how the people in the remotest of areas, who only have the bare minimum of essential to survive on can be so willing to go out of their way for a total stranger – her face beaming with a grin from ear to ear, I couldn’t help but think of what Sharon, the twenty-something lone-school teacher at Sheneng’ene, another resettled area by FQM, told me when I asked her about people’s living conditions after the resettlement.

“The most precious commodity here is Flagyl,” she said with no whiff of sarcasm or bitterness, just a matter of fact. “We take it daily because the water causes us such severe diarrhoea and stomach cramps that we need to take Flagyl as a preventative measure. Coz what else are we supposed to do? Are we going to stop drinking water or using it to cook our food?”

As I sat outside the Ndola offices of Nkanza Laboratories awaiting the results for the water purity test I had requested and performed out of my own pocket, my mind wondered back to the days I spent in Kalumbila, to all that I saw and experienced, to all that heard and witnessed. In that moment, I realised that, even as the Lab Assistant was walking towards me with the results, at an unbearably sluggishly slow pace, a battle of wills still raged on within me; on one part I was naively failing to believe that such cruelty existed in the world with the sole purpose of maximising the bottom line, and on the other hand, I misguidedly but apologetically needed to believe that human beings were ungrateful and unappreciative of what’s done for them when they themselves could not do it. My mind was stuck in limbo, but as the Lab Assistant drew nearer – a fucking dying monkey moves faster than he was moving – I knew that without a shadow of doubt, with a clarity I hadn't had in years  - scientific data tends to do that to unzealots - that I could not not do anything if I wanted to live with myself a day longer.

“Motherfucker!” I exclaimed upon reading the results.

The End

¹Figures courtesy of www.lusakavoice.com. Retrieved on 20^th November, 2014, from http://lusakavoice.com/2014/03/31/fqm-to-spend-us-11-6m-to-resettle-displaced-families/

Not Tonight Honey, I Have a Headache - A Valentine's Day Special

By Jacqueline Chikakano

I didn't want to miss this opportunity to have my say about a form of violence that makes me all the more passionate about this subject of violence against women... that is "marital rape," yes you heard me right... Marital Rape.

Now let me hasten you say that I am well aware of the numerous moral, traditional, egotistical and other arguments that mostly men have against this concept  of marital rape but for today, I’m sorry but you will all have to just bear with  me as I say it  from where I stand.

So yes, there is such a thing called marital rape and I’m going to look at a few reasons why it exists and how it’s affecting women in different ways. Without getting legalistic at all, I shall for purposes of this discussion describe marital rape as that situation where a man forcefully has intercourse with his WIFE against her wish or consent… yes against one's WIFE without her "consent!"

Now I bet all you men, especially of African origin, who had to "pay" hefty sums of money as bride price accompanied by the choicest herd of cattle from your cattle pen are gasping for breath right now as I speak, out of shock and possibly anger at what I’m saying i.e. that a man needs to agree with his wife on when and how they have sex. But unapologetically, I maintain that yes, even in marriage the two ought to be in agreement as to when and how they have sex and should the man forcefully take his wife then not only is it wrong and hurtful, but it is an offence in a number of jurisdictions, including my motherland Zimbabwe.

Marital rape is one common form of violence that married women across the globe have to withstand more times and perhaps more often than other forms of violence that women suffer, mostly without recourse to justice too because it happens in such privacy and also because women largely find it hard to divulge their family problems let alone those related to sex and their sexuality.

I think what makes marital rape even more prevalent is the fact that mostly culture/tradition and religion do not recognise this form of violence as violence at all. At church at one time during a meeting; the female speaker said in my language " nhengo dzese dzemuviri hadzifaniri kutsamwa nyangwe zvodii" what she was trying to say was that even if you are angry at each other as a couple, this anger should not affect your sexual anatomy and desires and that despite being angry at each other, a couple's sexual life must go on....really, really..?? A penny for your thought on that one.

On the other hand the proponents of culture and tradition also preach that "baba havanyimwe nyangwe zvodini" meaning that no matter what...the man must have sex when and how he wants it...but what about me the woman and how I feel at that particular time? Doesn’t it matter at all?

It is in my belief that these traditional/ cultural and religious beliefs have spoiled men to believe they can violate a woman in that way just because she is his wife. A few men that i have probed on this subject maintain with shocking confidence and self belief that sex with their wives is a "right" to be enjoyed at all costs regardless of circumstances.

But then I think to myself, fine culture/tradition and religion have a lot of blame in this but at the same time I cant help but also lay the blame sorely at the feet of those men who are into this deplorable practice of forcibly having entercourse with their wives. i have since come to the  conclusion that such men lack respect for and appreciation of women and are also simply weak as well as largely not up to their game in terms of "handling" their wives  i.e. they just don't know how to put their wives into the right and conducive mood for entercourse  because speaking as a woman if a man knows his stuff then without a doubt the use of force  on the marriage bed is absolutely unnecessary.

But then such men are also lazy and havent invested time and effort in learning their wives and what puts them into song, hence they resort to the easiest and cowardly way out, which is to take their wives by force. yet..its simple really , you just gotta know your woman, and there won't be any need to use force and violate  a woman in that way. Instead sex can be had as and when and how both partners wish within the marriage... if only men would master this and some.

However, if you men out there feel differently about all this please do feel free to share with us the other side of the story. Otherwise  for me, the issue here is simple, marital rape exists. Infact maybe more than other forms of violence suffered by women.  Aside from it being morally, physically and legally wrong...the saddest part for me is how it more  often than not leads to other forms of violence that women suffer such as emotional, psychological as well as physical abuse. It also leads to other related consequences such as  women contracting sexually transmitted diseases and HIV because that room to negotiate when and how she has entercourse is not there.

So as we  commemorate these 16 days of activism against gender based violence...lets spare a thought for the plight of many a married women across the globe especially because very few of them get to speak out about  it. To all you married men out there, don't  you even dare sugarcoat it... NO means NO ...when  you  take her by force its RAPE and there is no nicer way of describing it other than by what it is.....  The next time you force yourself on her just remember the gravity of the violation you are perpetrating on her...here is hoping we see an end to this form of violence and any others against women.

End

*This article was written for the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence.

*Ms. Chikakano is a former Magistrate and trained lawyer, who currently works for the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Zimbabwe Chapter.