The Chef, the Bird and the Blessing

by Andrew Sharp

  ‘My beloved wife … that was most kind of the pastor. Is he gifting us a house?’

  ‘My beloved husband! It’s a symbol. Please understand! A denotation. He’s gifting us blessings! They’ll pour on us from on high. We’ll build the house. The brick is the promise of blessings. The hope of the future. The sure sign of grace already given.’

  ‘And did he gift us the brick?

  ‘Of no faith! Of course! He gifted this baked loaf of blessing.’

  ‘A most generous man,’ I concurred.

  Dorothea took a yellow duster and wiped the burnt edge of the brick as if she could increase the promised blessing with such attention. ‘Of course, I signed up to give the suggested love offering.’

  ‘Pastor Cain suggested? How much was the suggestion?’

  ‘Just one thousand.’

  I weakened and sunk down into our soft pink sofa. Had anyone in all world history, I asked myself, from the Tower of Babel to the Dubai Burj, paid so much for one brick? I stared again at the brick, trying to utilise the eye of faith. Despite my scrutinising eye, I saw that the brick was not glowing in a golden ray, or fluctuating in the rainbow colours of paradise, or undergoing miraculous multiplication. No, of course not, it was a russet brick —plain brown even— from the smoky brick kiln outside the village.

  ‘Dear husband, be reassured, Pastor Cain promised that we’ll receive a hundred-fold … maybe a thousand-fold. That’s one million. This holy brick is a small investment for such a blessing. We can’t fly unless we first jump off the false safety of the branch. That’s what Pastor Cain so truly said.’

  ‘How will we pay for this beatified brick?’ I was on the tip of divulging my dismissal of Mr Bin as my employer, but Dorothea was quick to state her case.

  ‘You’re asking how we’ll afford the love offering? My blind husband, how could you ask such a foolish question? Don’t you know? Love is priceless, but it costs next to nothing. Pastor Cain graciously accepted a commitment from us to gift in instalments.’ I may have then nodded to politely acknowledge the benevolence of Pastor Cain. ‘We always, by heaven’s grace, have change left over from your salary. You’re blessed with employment. It’s promised that if we give back a blessing … then we’ll receive even more blessing. Pastor Cain says that we’ll climb a pyramid of gold.’ I may then have grunted to acknowledge my wife’s holy beliefs. ‘A thousand-fold! Jezek eight. Verse nine. Line two.’

  I may have replied, ‘Jezek eight.’

  ‘Dear husband, please! What bank account would offer such a high rate of interest? See how Pastor Cain himself has been showered with blessings. His new palace has an electrified perimeter wall three metres high. It’s secured by a topping of broken glass from champagne bottles. And it’s painted holy-gloss-purple and bright-angel white.’ She looked at me and maybe thought that I needed more convincing. ‘He has his own borehole and generator. An Italian marble jacuzzi! His reception room has lilac and cream reclining chairs … a French chandelier and pouf upholstery. That, husband, is the pouf … proof … of blessing.’

  I may have been silent in response.

  ‘Oh, faithless one! So much to learn!’ She shook her head and turned to busy herself. ‘Now, let’s be thankful that we’re also to receive such blessings and let’s eat.’

  I could not eat. I was cognisant of my father’s saying, Beautiful words do not put money in your bank account. As an assistant bank clerk, he had the expertise to know such. I was suffering a stomach-ache and was fatigued. I had lost the strength to tell my good wife that this was an inopportune time to pay ‘love offerings’. I excused myself and departed for bed early. I needed to rest and to organise my thinking. Dorothea pecked me forgivingly near my cheek and offered her prayers for my hasty recovery, but mostly that my faith would materialise.

  As I washed and prepared myself for bed, I heard her singing with abundant cheer. She was blessed most, I realised, with no cares for the future. Blessings were assured. In her thoughts she had already partaken of Pastor Cain’s blessing, had already received it, was already living in a palace with a vault ceiling reception room that would make our pink sofa look like a child’s seat, was already bathing in sparkling spring water imported from the high lands of Scotland. Such must be the true reward of faith, to have a guaranteed prospect. No wonder she passaged life singing and dancing. In truth, her joying charmed me, even to endure and forgive her religious indulgences. In this way, we lived in harmony.

  Later, it was pleasing that Dorothea slept soundly beside me, but I did not. I thought that even now, so soon after sacking my employer, I had an urgent need to cook superlative dishes for guests once more. Had I made a hot moment mistake? Would anyone ever say to me again, ‘Mr Mlantushi, your cuisine is divine’? It passed my mind that if I did not find a high-end chef posting in double-quick time, I would indeed be a lost soul falling into a bottomless abyss. I did not accompany this thought with the vocal expression of such a soul out of a respect for the peace of Dorothea’s sleep.

  Such a soul would have a propensity to self-pity as it plummeted without hope. To distract my thoughts to a healthier comportment I remembered my boyhood. Ah, those happy days. I had no cares in that little town, even though the streets were littered and dusted, even though the sidewalks were cracked and crazy, even though wires hung in loose knots from poles or drooped low between the houses like vines. Lying there in the dark, I took myself back. I smelt again the odours of that faraway place: roasting corn, cattle pats, the smoke of burning grass from the surrounding fields. I heard the scratching of the crows’ feet on the tin roofs of the houses and I heard the popping of the joists in the hot sun. There again were the shouts of my friends. My feet kicked a football once more with those boys, our limbs smacking into each other’s like staves. Where were they now, those friends? I had many.

  I remembered helping mother when she was in a peaceful state of mind to feed the brown hen in the yard and I remembered collecting the warm egg each morning. How proud I was to take it without dropping and breaking it to the kitchen. My father took care of everything else. He took my mother to the clinic, got her out of bed in the mornings when she did not wish, cooked for both of us and brought her back from the bar if she’d been out drinking and spending. He fetched her from the street at night if she’d gone out naked in a disturbed state of thinking. Her life was indeed commotional, but my father looked after her and succeeded in maintaining order while I played. Yes, in those days I had no strivings to contend with.

  I wished to allow my remembrance to float there in that contented time, and then I would drift to sleep, but I could not. Once a consternation is recalled in the dark ocean of the night, it sucks thought into a whirlpool from which it cannot swim free. I remembered that I was thirteen years when my father lost his capacity. He suffered a brain stroke. My mother, she lost control of her mind; my father, he lost control of his body. He could not speak and his limbs were both stiff and limp. I do not know which is more unfortunate: to be crippled in the mind or the body.

  Mother left us soon after my father’s stroke. She went away with a friend of my father. I always remembered that it was a friend of my father who took mother away. Yes, a friend. A man he trusted. A man he talked and laughed with. What then, is friendship?

  Mother left a chaos in the house: broken plates in the sink, glass on the floor, dirty clothes, a bare pantry and a dead hen. But I missed her.

  I had to step out of class to care for my father. My play days were over, my strivings had begun. To spoon edible food into my father’s mouth, I learnt how to cook. To please my father and maintain his example, I took on myself to sustain an orderly house and kitchen and I washed and ironed his clothes. I dressed him in his suit every day as if he was going in to work at the bank. I had experienced from my mother what befalls if there is a lack of dignity, if there no self-mastery, if there is loss of control. Duty, discipline, decorum and diligence
. Those were the four Ds of necessity. Otherwise there was destruction, disgrace, dirt and disorder.

  I told my father that although he could no longer speak to voice his sayings, his wisdom was in my heart. I do not know if he understood me.

  After one year I returned to class, but I also took employment in the kitchen of the finest hotel in town to pay the school fees and for living. My father’s disability pension paid only the rent. I became specific in my habits. Without such I could not have accomplished the timetabling of my father’s care, my schoolwork, my household duties and my position at the hotel. There was no more footballing in the street. No more hanging about with the boys. That was the time, in truth, when my friends quit coming around.

  The hotel chef resided under the kitchen table under the influence of alcohol and so I graduated in record time from dish washer, to vegetable chopper, to stew stirrer, to cook. There I found my talent and my calling. When I served my dishes, the truck drivers who stayed overnight in the hotel, complimented me. ‘You were taught by my grandmother, yes? Fetch me another serving.’

  True, my grades at school became compromised after my mother’s departure and my father’s infirmity. My no-nonsense (and so, to my liking) English language teacher, Miss Nyanda —who had herself been drilled in correct English by an old missionary lady— wrote ‘outstanding diction, if a little archaic’ in her school reports but in other subjects and endeavours, only my stews had top marks.

  Dorothea turned in bed which helped me skip-thought past the direful occasion when I neglected the four Ds. I thought instead of my good fortune in meeting Dorothea. To court a woman was problematic whilst also looking after my father on account of his overall dependency on my assistance, but after my father passed I had eyes on the gold-bloused, pepper-red-skirted, sheer-tighted receptionist to the hotel proprietor. A very modern lady and of a joying disposition to balance my temperate comportment. I presented myself to Dorothea’s father and he accepted that I was a suitable groom on account of my steadfast income, my illustrious but sober personality and as a favour for some favour given to him by my father relating to fiscal matters at the bank. Dorothea had no objection. She was tired of being jilted by sugar daddies. Whilst a honeyed sentiment is claimed to be necessary for marriage success, I was satisfied that she testified that I was a kind man and a man of principles. From the first, we lived in wedded contentment. There is no greater satisfaction … and convenience.

  I studied my profession to advance myself, enduring a bus to the capital to spend ten-hour shifts in the National School of Catering library, and volunteering in the restaurants. I mastered cuisines from all over. Idiyappam, friggitelli with tomatoes, beef wellington, egusi, kuku paka. From Keralan to Kenyan and more. To exceed the expectations of the truck drivers, I experimented with every combination of flavours: pineapple and cinnamon, banana and anise, mango and coriander, bacon and eggs. I souffled, grilled, steamed, basted, sautéed, marinated and smoked. I plated out on leadwood, soapstone, catalpa leaves, scalloped shells and —on one celebrated occasion— hubcaps. The truck drivers cheered on that one. I experimented with high-end presentation: dusting, drizzling, sprinkling, fluting, grating and blanching. Out of the muck and disorder of earth-soiled vegetables, crushed-up peppers, fragmented flakes of cinnamon and snapped twigs of cloves, I crafted creative order presented to please the eye. To be a chef is like being a Doctor of Medicine. Fine food is like good health, conducive and necessary to a satisfying and productive life. The promoters and creators of good food and good health are to be lauded in equal measure.

  The hotel guests surely benefitted. I upped my game, month on month. A person must be stubborn and relentless in their quest for advancement.

  Dorothea often said, ‘Your cooking is an obsession.’

  I thanked her for her praise.

  Yes, I bolted myself to duty, to order, to control in living. All to achieve excellence.

  Then one timely day the hotel manager said to me, ‘The truck drivers must have traditional food. They’ve tried your carrot marmalade on crumpets but now they want to go back to cassava and chicken stew with chibwabwa relish. They’d like fried rice and smoked fish. They’d like nshima and kapenta. They’re dismayed by your vol-au-vents with porcini mushrooms and I’m dismayed by the costs of your ingredients. We’re not the Ritz or the Park Hyatt. We’re the Tom Mbolo Overnight Stay Motel (Cash Only). I can’t afford your excesses. Curb them, or I’ll curb you.’

  I had experienced, in truth, that the drivers had recently expressed a preference for their food on a tin dinner plate, served with a ladle from a big pot rather than, I am quoting, ‘a thin smear of rainbow colours on a fancy china side plate with a dwarf leaf on the edge’.

  Mr Tom Mbolo’s remonstration served a predestined purpose. That’s where I should be: at a Ritz or a Park Hyatt or equivalent high end. I now dreamt big for my career and suggested to Dorothea that we should journey to the capital to pursue such. I needed discerning customers. I needed sophisticates. I needed clients with up-to-date tastes and refined palates. I had also become displeased with the noisy disorder in the town; the dust and litter in the streets; the cow pats, which dirtied shoes; the grass fires from the nearby fields, which garnished my dishes with ash; the children kicking their footballs; the men sitting idly on plastic chairs in the streets or loafing in the bars. I wanted to be in a place of highest order, endeavour, and strict regulations. In short, an advanced city.

  ‘I don’t want to leave my friends,’ said Dorothea.

  Myself, I did not suffer that constraint.

  I opened the National Reporter and pointed out an article.

  The President announced yesterday that Mpili village, in Northern Province, has been designated as a Growth Point. ‘This remote area needs a fiscal kick,’ said the President. ‘For too long it has not benefitted from economic empowerment. We will found a new regional city there. Mpili will be renamed Romaji.’

  Below His Excellency’s words was an artist’s impression of the proposed city showing taxis and buses on a wide street and many skyscrapers behind a large mall busy with consuming consumers.

  A spokesperson for the Ministry of Economic Advancement said, ‘A tarred road will be laid to the existing village to increase market access. Tenders are invited for the procurement of land for the building of a petrol station, a clinic and a supermarket.’

  With a sharpened pencil, I drew another building next to the mall and drew a large sign above the door. Mlantushi Kitchen.

  ‘The President is correct,’ I said to Dorothea, ‘Rome started from a few mud huts. A great city will surely develop from the Growth Point. The population will have the aspirations of city people. This will be the place where I can develop my career as a top chef. Look, there’s our restaurant.’

  ‘Your ambition knows no limit, but it needs a sign,’ said Dorothea.

  ‘Look, it has a sign!’

  ‘No, a sign from heaven that this venture will be blessed. And look here.’ She pointed to the further text in the article.

  An objection has been raised by conservation organisations. A spokesperson, who did not wish to be named, said, ‘The Growth Point is too close to the National Park. This haven for wildlife will come under threat from population growth.’

  ‘Ah, but the authorities have already anticipated such objections,’ I countered.

  A government spokesperson said that the needs of wildlife would be accommodated and compromised [sic] in the Growth Plan. ‘In any case,’ said the spokesperson, ‘economic empowerment for remote regions are our priority over all else.’

  Dorothea remained resistant, but at that time she became baptised in the Angelic Miracle Mission. She received a prophecy, a sign, that Romaji would, in some as yet unbeknown way, be a place of miracles and blessings. Dorothea had little belief in sciences or political authorities, in worldly explanatories and logics, preferring to rely on unseen
mystical influences and supernatural causalities.

  It was a two-day journey to Romaji (a Holy Pilgrimage, said Dorothea), taking the weekly bus for the last day of the journey. Two hours short of Romaji all benefits of civilisation ended. The promised tar had not yet been laid. We slid on gravel patches, threatening to roll, jolting and swerving through thorn bush that stretched monotonous to the horizon. There were no masts, no enclosures, no domestications to reassure. On the horizon the scrub ghosted in and out of a thin haze of heat. The road dipped us into gullies gouged out by floods from infrequent but bad-tempered rains. Buffalo droppings occasioned our route and once an elephant trumpeted beside us, loud as the horn of an articulated sixteen-wheeler, and then bashed off into the wastes. The road gave no intimation that it would have a purposeful ending.

  We arrived at the terminus with our suitcase and ears coated in talc-dry dust, but with the wettest of thighs from sitting long on seats with plastic covers, and somewhat queasy from the sliding and bumping. I say we arrived, but it was hardly possible to realise that this was our destination. The village comprised thatched dwellings of the simple two-room variety, dotted about without care. The potential city had no petrol station, no clinic and no retail outlet. In place of a downtown skyscraper at the central point of the village, there was a three-metre-high anthill, its skin baked hard by the torturous sun; but I noted that the ants were more industrious than the villagers who squatted away the time of day, observing the passage of shadows, as lazy as the lifeless air. Chickens and children picked around in the shade of the trees that had not yet been harvested for firewood and bare paths wandered aimlessly across the hard and bouldered earth. Nothing from the modernised world had reached Romaji, not even litter. Dorothea and I footed to and fro, catching latrine-like smells, pondering how high-end dining could be fulfilled in such a place, this outpost beyond, where the ghosts of scrub signed the edge of the world.