Frank talk of Mwanza ‘queens’
I have just been on an adventure trip to Zobue, a Mozambican border post that is not only an equivalent of Mwanza here in Malawi but is right on the other side of the border.
It was a short but exciting trip that coincided with a visit to the same Zobue by my long time Mwanza friend, John – don’t mind his surname as he is a popular figure in that area.
Neither will I dwell too much on our Zobue escapades save to say that John left me somewhere around Zobue border where I had decided to hang out as he proceeded deep inside Mozambique for a funeral.
We agree he would find me at one of the joints at Zobue where, thanks to his wallet, I am left with four ‘big’ bottles of Manica beer – just imagine.
At a supersonic speed, I drink one after another of the stuff and after making rounds of different spots of Zobue, I decide to trek back to the Malawian side of the border post, Mwanza.
After some minutes of travel, I am at a small restaurant by the border post.
Eating some basic dish of nsima with goat meat, I pay my bill and decide to wade into Malawi.
But just as I am about to pass by the gate at the border post, some lady, in the company of five others, beckons me.
“Kodi inu, bwanji simumapereka moni kwa anzanu? Tabwerani mutimwetse, [Why don’t you have the courtesy to greeting friends? Come here and at least buy us some beer!]” she says.
Her charm is irresistible and so is the beauty of the rest of them. I get enticed not because of weak morals but believe you me or not, some ladies are just very charming and irresistible. If my grandmother was alive, she would obviously have said I had been bewitched.
Fortunately for me, only one of the ladies is drinking beer. But looking at their eyes, it is obvious that the ‘queens’ have had a cruise of continuous alcoholic stuff drinking for the last two days.
As I drink, the one who called me stresses they are the ‘real ladies’ that can provide any visitor to Mwanza all the goodies.
“Ndipo mudziwe kuti tilibe miseche [we don’t gossip]), we just tell things the way they are!” she says.
And lo! I wish I knew this type of women-fork would baptise my ears with real talk – frank talk of occurrences around Mwanza and the border area.
Some woman, obviously mentally challenged by her looks and dress, comes around and starts dancing. The women laugh and one of them says: “Men are really devils. How come someone very reasonable and on a good job decides to impregnate such a lady, ife sakutiwona? [Why not us?]”
“Amwali, akaone ife otchukuma (Should he go for us night queens?) And know that some of these men impregnate mad women or imbeciles as a ritual to get rich or seeking promotion at their workplaces. For this one all of you know the suspects…!”
They speculate the suspects until they appear to have settled for one man working around the border area. They laugh their lungs out.
The topic changes to how some married women around the area outpace sex workers in the field of promiscuity.
Says one: “Look at that lady, she is married but she is busy openly chatting with that man who is her lover – shame! Considering that her husband works together with the lover at the border post.”
“And yet these same women rebuke us when we have sexual relationships with their husbands. I tell you, there is no difference between us and those married women, we are all promiscuous. He he de!” says another.
But my new found friends also criticise one of their own for going a step too far to plan snatching some man from his wife.
“Iweyo ungamanene mzakoyo kuti ali ndi nsanje ya galu pamene ukusoneza ndiwe ?(why blame the wife of jealousy when you are the cause?)” one of the women rebukes her.
And that sparks another chapter of analysing many of promiscuous men working around the border and how they behave when drunk. The women also talk of explicit experiences they have gone through with numerous men – residents of Mwanza, truck drivers, and even foreigners.
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