Petina Gappah - An Elegy for Easterly

Even if he had not got his drinks on the house, many of us would have bought him, if not his favourite brandy, then a less expensive alternative. There were no competitions and no more posters, but we began to gather at the Guesthouse every Friday evening to watch M’dhara Vita. Fuelled on by the bottom-of-the-barrel brandy and the museve music, his gymnastics added colour to our grey Fridays.

It was no different on that last Friday.

‘Boys, boys,’ he said as he approached the bar where I stood with Bobojani, Jeremiah and a group of other drinkers.

‘ Ndeipi M’dhara,’ Jeremiah greeted him in the casual way that we talked to him; none of that respect-for-the-elders routine with M’dhara Vita. He cracked a joke at our expense, and we gave it right back to him, he knocked back his drink, and proceeded to the dance floor. Felicitas had come to understand that it was the Congolese rumba that demanded agile waists and rubber legs that really got him moving. So on that night, the Lumumbashi Stars blasted out of the stereo as M’dhara Vitalis took centre stage. He stood a while, as though to let the brandy and the music move its way though his ears and mouth to his brain and pelvis. Then he ground his hips in time to the rumba, all the while his eyes closed, and his arms stretched out in front of him.

‘ Ichi chimudhara chirambakusakara ,’ whistled Jeremiah, echoing the generally held view that M’dhara Vitalis was in possession of a secret elixir of youth.

‘I am Vitalis, shortcut Vita, ilizwo lami ngi Vitalis, danger basopo. Waya waya waya waya! ’ He got down to the ground, rolled and shook. We crowded around him, relishing this new dance that we had not seen before. He twitched to the right, and to the left. The music was loud as we egged him on. He convulsed in response to our cheering. His face shone, and he looked to us as if to say, ‘Clap harder.’

And we did.

It was only when the song ended and we gave him a rousing ovation and still he did not get up that we realised that he would never get up, and that he had not been dancing, but dying.

As M’dhara Vitalis left Why Leave feet first, it was up to Bobojani, with his usual eloquence, to provide a fitting commentary on the evening’s unexpected event.

‘Tight,’ he said.

There was not much to add after that.

We buried him in one of the last coffins he ever made. I don’t know whether he would have appreciated that particular irony. I am sure, though, that he would have appreciated making the front page of the one and only national daily newspaper.

The story of his death appeared right under the daily picture of the President. If you folded the newspaper three-quarters of the way to hide the story in which was made the sunny prediction that inflation was set to go down to two million, seven hundred and fifty-seven per cent by year end, all you saw was the story about M’dhara Vita. They wrote his name as Fidelis instead of Vitalis, and called him a pensioner when he hadn’t got a pension; unless, of course, you counted those three pairs of shoes.

Still, the headline was correct.

‘Man Dances Self to Death’.

That, after all, is just what he did.

Our man in Geneva sits before his computer and blinks at the messages in his inbox. ‘Brother, size matters,’ says a message from K. P. Rimmer. ‘Give her an opportunity to spread rumours about your enormous size. Make her happy by delaying your explosions tonight.’

‘Don’t be a two-pump chump,’ says Karl Lumsky. ‘Millions of men are facing this issue, and the smartest ones already got an answer. Safe, efficient and covering all aspects, Extra-Time will help you forget the premature nightmare.’

‘Do you realise superfluous body kilos kill more and more people around the world?’ asks Joni Corona. ‘We believe that you hate the unattractive look of those people and the social bias against them. Moreover, you’ve not the will to resist an assault of ruinous eating habits of yours. If it sounds familiar, then we have something for you!’

Our man is the Consular Officer at the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Zimbabwe to the United Nations Office in Geneva, which also serves as the country’s embassy to Switzerland. At fifty-five and in his first foreign posting, he is a latecomer to the Internet and all its glories.

‘Baba, get email,’ his children said back in Harare. There was no need, he always said. Too expensive, too set in his ways.

In Geneva, the connection comes with his telephone line. Night after night finds him enmeshed in the World Wide Web, scrolling through emails spun in places he has never been, emails that are woven into his life and leave him blinking before his computer screen. He types slowly, with two fingers, his tongue between his teeth. ‘Like a policeman typing a report on a burglary’, his wife teases him, ‘at the Charge Office in Harare.’

‘See how easy communicating becomes,’ says his daughter Susan in England. ‘Don’t forget to send the instalment for the next term.’ She follows the sentence with several bouncing, bald, yellow, bodiless cartoon heads that open their mouths in toothless smiles as they wink at him.

‘Baba, I need money,’ is the echo from his son Robert in Canada.

‘Improve your credit rating,’ says Frederick Turk.

He is about to click on this message when he sees the next one.

‘Important communication,’ this message says, ‘you are a winner!!’ The message is from the European Bank of Luxembourg (EBL), headquarters — Brussels, Belgium. There is an attached letter on the bank’s letterhead, signed by Dr E. S. Rose, Department Head (Corporate Affairs). In a circle around the name are twelve gold stars, just like the stars on the flag of the European Union.

‘Greetings,’ Dr Rose says, ‘and congratulations. Your email has been entered into the EBL’s annual lottery. You have been selected as one of ten winners to win €1,000,000 each. Write back quickly or lose this chance.’

Blood sings from his thumping heart to the rest of his body.

‘Are you sure that it is me?’ he types. ‘I did not enter any lottery. Have I really won a million euros?’

‘Your email was automatically entered by your Internet service provider,’ says Dr Rose. ‘You really have won a million euros.’

That is the explanation, he thinks, for Rimmer, Lumsky, Corona. And Turk, and Morgan, Shelby, Gordon. They got his email from his Internet service provider.

‘How do I get the money?’ he asks.

‘You will hear from Mr George, our Chief of Client Accounts.’

Within an hour, Mr George writes and says, ‘Greetings and congratulations. The million is yours to pick up at our offices in Amsterdam. We will charge you an administration fee of €5,000.’

Five thousand euros is a lot of money to pay in admin fees, he thinks, but it is a piffle compared to a million. In his head he does his sums: one euro is roughly two Swiss francs. He has six thousand francs just sitting in his bank account. It is for Susan’s second term, but it is not due for another month. He can get four thousand on his credit card to make ten thousand. Almost exactly five thousand euros. This he sees as a sign of a larger truth: God’s hand is in this matter, at the very heart of this good fortune.

For the first time in his life, he uses the Internet to book a flight. The secretary at the embassy recommends easyJet. He does not tell her about his bounty, he has not even told his wife. He wants to surprise her and the children with cold cash evidence of the magnificence of the Lord. His nightly prayers are more fervent than usual. For the Lord has looked upon His servant and found him worthy.