OUTSIDER LOOKING IN: Why I hate people who call at 8pm

The first telephone I remember having as a child was a grey one where, to call someone, we had to dial.  Often whenever a phone call came after eight in the evening, there was some news usually of a close family

member’s demise.

This was bad, but worse for my mother as the relatives who would have passed away were more people she knew than I knew. Sometimes though, it was not a death message. But for me, something perhaps worse than the death of extended family members I did not know.

Back then, the main news bulletin was at eight in the evening so if anyone wanted to report a child for an infraction, calling after eight, but before nine, was the time they would do it.

They knew most parents would be home in time for the news. It was how, one evening after eight, our household received a phone call which had me detesting phone calls after eight even more than I had normally

done. You see in those days in Zimbabwe, every school had a very distinct uniform such that everyone automatically knew which school you went to by the uniform you wore.

At my primary school, there was an added way of policing children. We all had to wear name badges as long as we were in our school uniforms. It was after a day of wearing such a uniform and name badge that my mother got a phone call.

Earlier that day, I had got into Harare Central Business District after school because I had to meet my mother so she could buy me a new school jersey. After our purchase, she went back to work and I went to the

buses back home.

Now on the bus back home, I managed to sit down and I was possibly thinking about whatever eleven-year-olds think about until I alighted at our bus stop.

THE PROBLEM

Turns out my sitting on the bus the whole trip was the problem. In those days where the public transport system had standing passengers, I had failed to stand when some older person got on the bus.

The adult who was sitting next to me noted my name then after eight, she called the first number with my last name in our neighbourhood and unfortunately for me, my mother answered.

She recounted the story and I was told to go outside and get the stick that would be used to beat me. As if this obviously child-hating adult had not done enough damage with her phone call to my home, in the

morning, obviously using her office phone for non-work things, she called my school and I was called to the Principal’s office. Whatever she said earned me a week’s detention.

From then on, whenever on a bus, I would stand up for an adult and would get very distraught if they refused to take the seat. I would, in fact, keep standing so that no-one would have a reason to call anyone after eight.

The only time our household ever got a phone call after eight that did not portend bad news was around this time in February one year from a family friend. This friend, a professor abroad, called at four  in the

morning because he was distraught. No. No-one in his family had died. He called because his fiancé had left him. He, a whole professor at a leading university, for a janitor.

My dad would recount later in the morning that my mother was so annoyed at being woken up that she bluntly told him, “she left you because you don’t know how to be romantic.”

DIALING PHONE

Our lives have changed drastically since my days as a youngster. Back then the grey dialling phone we had was a privilege and having it disconnected was comparable to declaring bankruptcy and appearing in a

tabloid nowadays.

Nowadays many of us in Africa have more phones than toilets or running water.  Our phones can do wonders. They have our emails and other social media.

Why then, despite these advancements in technology, does anyone still need to drive the fear of heaven into me by making me hear my ringing phone after eight?

None of the phone calls have ever been about serious things, usually  ‘uko wapi?’ or ‘I was just calling to say hae.’ And I am thinking, ‘you could not wait to say hello to me in the morning?’

Fortunately for me, unlike in our landline days, I have discovered that the phone can be put on silent. I never need fear a phone ringing after eight again.

Zukiswa Wanner is a South African author based in Kenya