Book excerpt from Lazarus Zim’s ‘Time and Chance’

THANKFULLY, there was a vacancy in the Department of Finance’s Salaries Section. Chabeli Mohlamme, the Personnel Officer, quickly called the head of the Salaries Section, Mbethe “Shakes” Mashinini, to join what would be my second job interview following the disastrous Madikoti experience.

This time, however, I had a completely different, if not pleasant, experience. Mashinini would ask me, “I see you have good symbols; how long do you plan to work here before going to university?”

I planned to work for two years to save money and then resign to go to university.

Mohlamme sternly admonished me before I could reply, saying, “Look here, I am tired of people who will work here for a year or two and then resign to go to university.” I instantly changed my response and said that I wanted to work permanently and study by correspondence which, unknown to me at the time, was exactly what Mashinini had been doing.

I soon settled into my first job as a Clerk Grade 2 in the Salaries Section.

… One of the drawbacks of living alone as bachelors was the number of parties that we attracted.

There was always a party in our house. Some of our friends did not even have the courtesy of informing us ahead of time. We would be sitting and listening to the radio and friends would arrive with their girlfriends, food, beers and records and the party would start.

Our many invited, self-invited, and uninvited guests soon gave our house the nickname “Las Vegas” due to the ongoing parties.

Wake-up call

When I awoke around 8.30am, I was shocked that I was too late for work because our office start time was 8am. Njane and Audi had already left for work, so there was no one else in the house.

I had badly overslept. I quickly got ready and dashed to the office, arriving just before 10am. I was still drunk from the previous night’s revelling.

Bra Shakes called me to his office and asked me what had happened. I came up with a long story about the fact that I did not plan the party, that it had been organised by one of our colleagues to celebrate his birthday … Bra Shakes told me that being drunk at work was a dismissible offence that it did not matter whether the drinking had happened this morning or the night before, he could have thrown the book at me and had me charged for misconduct. Instead, he showed me mercy and told me to go home.

I spent the rest of the day and the next few days in shock. Here I was, a young man who came to Qwaqwa with high hopes to work and save money for university and now I had descended to the level of going to work drunk? … The following day I went to work early and apologised to Bra Shakes and Serialong and promised that this would never happen again. This was to be the first of my two major wake-up calls.

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