Reminisces of a Mission Boy: Manyoka @ Vic High Dot.Com

REMINISCES OF A MISSION BOY

By Tererai R. Mafukidze

Manyoka @ Vic High Dot.Com

The 1992 soccer first team was rubbish. They did not make it to the district finals. Koki and I had written a pre-season review and published it on the Library Notice board next to the newspapers. We had described a scion of the Murehwa clan, as a ‘pale shadow of his brother not even qualified to lace his brother’s boots’. We said Pele’s worst blunder was better than Jabulani’s best move. We described another as ‘the star of the team. Proud as a peacock...If only he could humble himself.’ About MaPepa we said, ‘take away the left foot and you have no footballer’. About the coach, Mr Mthombeni, we wrote ‘He is a History teacher. Nothing more needs to be said!’ We were similarly acerbic about various other players. Everyone took it with a great heart. Maybe because it was generally true. But Mission banter could be of an acidic kind. Each one had their turn.

I feared that my History teacher would not take it well. Surprisingly, he did, which was an awkward surprise. We knew soccer coaches were a sensitive bunch. Who can ever forget the tempestuous first team coach slapping the late Shamu at Topora on our way from an away game? Shamu, who coached the successful U16s, had dared question the colleague’s tactics. I can still hear the beautiful Mrs tearfully pleading...‘X kanhi...! X...kanhi! Unondisvodesereiko kanhi?’ It was a painfully embarrassing sight.

And then someone decided that suddenly herding us back onto the bus would save faces. Kutisiisa doro redu pasi pemimengo yaMukwacha!

And the furious students did what they knew best when needing to express an opinion. It was sad to see the clearly devastated wife being comforted by Sr Chabhongora as students sang loudly, ‘...usauya wamwa doro, unotinyadzisa! Wamwa doro...!’ It was better that the assailant and the victim did not get back onto the bus and stayed behind. But I digress.

Yes, the 1992 senior team lost to Zimuto and drew against an Upper Top side. That ended their season. So it meant there was no Masvingo for them. Senior netball, U16s soccer and netball and the volleyball teams were the flag bearers of the school.

It was in July. The Mhunga bus came to fetch. I pretended to play volleyball, and so travelled a lot with the sports team on that account. If anything we made practice possible. As was customary we had arranged lunch with the Dining staff. Early on the Saturday morning we collected our sadza and meat. It was packed in the shiniest brand new aluminium bins with tipping lids. Mistake number one!

We were excited. We got to Vic High.

We then carried our food bins to the small open shed next to the soccer pitch near Les Sharp hostel. Mistake number two!

We had great sporting camaraderie. For some reason, my good muzukuru Cathrine decided she wanted to play netball once she was in A’Level. She was good at it. Open Girls ceased to take part in sports once they considered themselves to be ‘senior’ girls. Few did. One person who brought a new perspective to sport was my good friend Maria Kweuka. She had come for A’ Levels from Chemukute in Kadoma. She was a talented netballer and didn’t give a hoot about being a ‘big girl’. She loved sport and was the most affable person. She made sports trips a great joy. As previously advertised, the U16s were mostly VanaYuti and the Famous Form 3 girls. It was a great team. We enjoyed the trips.

I busied myself with assisting the sports master Mr Malisa with registering players. My good friend Thabani Dube, despite being captain of the losing senior soccer team, characteristically found himself some excuse to be on the bus. I handled the ‘vetting’ of U16 boys. The Vetting Officer used some paint to label approved players. I must say it was totally unscientific. My great friend Panso was approved to play soccer for the U16s. He was 20 in that year! In fact, he did triple-jump for U17 boys until he left Gokomere! Brian Nyatoro tried his luck. The man was almost marking him until he looked at my friend’s bulging drumsticks and laughed off the cheeky bid.

 And then came Mahapa. The man looked at him and started to laugh. Mahapa laughed too. We all joined in the laughter, and the man put his arm around Mahapa’s shoulders and said solemnly:

‘Mwanangu, ndava nemakore nemakore ndichikuona uchimhanya, uchiwuruka, uchitamba bhora. Une chipo mwanangu. Asi U16, aiwa booooodo!’

With that, Mahapa was excluded. I hope he has found a way to deal with that skin deep tattoo he carried on his arm. If each one of us had permanently tattooed our sweetheart’s name on our arms in Form 2, would we not all be wearing long-sleeved shirts for the rest of our lives? What was the name: Matilda? Mildred? Eish!

Nobody bothered about the safety of the food. We enjoyed the matches. We tried to chat-up Vic High girls. Their boys came to try some luck on our girls. We knew some senior girls from our A’Level Divinity and History seminars. The girls always pretended to like Gokomere guys. It was mostly because they wanted to borrow ‘Notes’. This was clear from the letters exchanged. You would write a deeply romantic one and in reply she would spend 99% of the letter talking about a Mwata Yamvo assignment she had due the following week. If she was doing Divinity, you would be asked to share your ideas about the similarities in the divine message delivered by the prophets Amos and Hosea! To keep you ‘hooked’, she would invariably write as the last sentence:

‘When will I see you again? I miss you. But please reply as a matter of urgency as the assignment is due next week.’

We knew we were being used. We pretended not to notice. It was wonderful to receive a letter from a Vic High chick in that day.

So lunch time came. We all queued up and shared the food. We ate to our heart’s delight. It was too much food. In fact we shared some of it with the famous Mucheke One’s Tarino Girls. They liked us. They also had a cheeky culture.

Matches ended. Some of us had arranged waters of wisdom and happily consumed. Manenji Mhiribidi, our dear friend, was good at looking after that. We got onto the bus, sang the best songs and headed back to Mission. We had classic songs. Teachers would pretend not to listen as we sang the classic:

            ‘Muchiseme’

There were other classics, like Kahobho:

            ‘Kahobho kakadai, kasumbu kerudo!’

X... musikana wemadhiri,

Ende haambonyara gen’a riripo,

Anokuitira favour, achikuitira favour!’

Brian had imported this one for us from his old Goromonzi. It became a favourite. We enjoyed ourselves. Yes, and the other one:

            ‘Nzimbe yakarimwa nababa, ndoita kunakigwa....!’

Sometimes the songs sang about current affairs. Sometimes they expressed anger about a school authority. Sometimes they were just humorous. Like:

‘Elaya, Elaya, Elaya usadaro...wotora jovo, woteta nyama, wonanga kunaCorra!’

And Corra and Elaya would take it with a great heart! 

But I digress.

We got back to Mission excited by our great victories. We went and had our specially reserved supper and maybe went kufirimu.

Midnight Call

At 12 midnight on the dot, I felt a train running down my alimentary canal. I woke up from my deep sese-induced slumber. I was babalaazed too. I dashed to the toilet nearby. It was a real emergency. As I entered at great speed, I was amazed to see about 6 of my mates standing half-naked around the sinks. They were wearing pained faces. They attempted to smile at my appearance. I had no time for chit-chat. I hit a couple of doors, but they were ‘engaged’. I found a free one. The train left the station. It was swift, fast and painful.

After a while, I re-emerged, only to discover that some of my comrades had similarly re-occupied some of the cubicles. New comrades had appeared. It was like a diarrhoeal alarm.  We were in distress. I tried to walk back to my room, but someone tried to dissuade me. I would not listen. As I covered my body to try and sleep again, I felt another train coming I jumped off and headed back to ‘conference’ at great speed. The train left the station. After a while, I re-emerged to join my comrades. There was no need to convince me not to go back to my room this time. I was converted. There was no point. The trains were coming thin and fast. We took turns to go in and out of the cubicles. It was painful. It was food poisoning. 

After several hours of milling about the toilets, we felt strong enough to attempt sleep. It was a hopeless enterprise. There was yet another train trying to leave the station. At least now, the train had fewer wagons. We were in trouble.

Being a Sunday morning, we were tempted to miss church. But the devout among us would have none of it. So we went to church. The tummies were still unsettled. Before we entered church, word had already come around that a similar F1 Grand Prix had taken place at Shashe and Bruno. Hillside confirmed too that the Girls had had trains. Word from Mimosa was that only Cathrine had survived. Because she had had a ‘visitor’ who brought her lunch, she had not partaken of the Bhodho lunch. Love saved her!

During Mass, we did not tempt fate by dancing. It even felt dangerous to kneel, genuflect or sing. We looked around for comrades, but few had had the reckless sense to come to church. During Communion, I saw ‘Ghetto’ Manoti, the U16 boys centre striker queue up to ‘receive’. Mid way through the church and before reaching the priest, he just turned and walked briskly out of the church. He had a train coming!

After church, we arranged that the entire sports team should assemble at the Clinic. But first, we had to collect our ‘maboko mana nekajarina kacho’! Otherwise Rubaba would have carried on his usual Sunday bet: ‘Nhasi ndodhla sere!’ And Sere became his name!

We formed a convoy of around 70 and headed to the Clinic. Old delightful Sr Denhere had heard the news. She was ready with the salt-and-sugar solution and some anti-poison pills. We queued up and guzzled the salty Kuru with delight. Being a cold July day, we had fortuitously gotten the opportunity to sit in the sun. We sat, the tens of us, together with the 10 or so amused pregnant women who had come ‘kuzorindira’ at the Clinic.

We exchanged our midnight experiences. There were frequent interruptions as some had to make use of the nearby O’level block toilets. We spent 2 hours at the Clinic under observation and were later discharged. It took a few days to fully recover. But a lesson had been learnt.

On hearing the news, the Bhodhorians were obviously concerned. They felt culpable. Their desire to improve our appearance at the Vic High district sporting event by giving us their newest containers was bona fide, but tragic. On the next trip to the provincial finals, special arrangements were made for VaGozho to separately bring the food hot and off the stove around lunch time!

And one of the Tarino girls came to us at the provincial finals and said:

‘Handifi ndakadhla sadza rokuGokomere futi!’

It wasn’t the famous Pride. And yes, they did not join us this time. A lesson had been learnt.

But all of us were relieved that the trains left the station hours later when we were now back at Mission. We could not imagine what would have happened had this happened in full view of Ma’Nose’ @ Vic High!

Vincere Caritate!

© Tererai R Mafukidze, Gokomere 1987-1992 (tereraim@gmail.com) 

This is a series of my personal reminisces of life during Mission days. Please respect the anonymity given to protagonists.