I don’t know why, but I believe this year, compared to many other previous years, I have heard fewer new year resolutions. I am not sure why this is so. I could just have been paying less attention to what was going on around me or the people around me have gone more and more hopeless and despondent.
Remember the greatest problem that people of this country have, according to Goodall Gondwe? Despondency. People who are despondent will not be coming up with new year resolutions. They are more likely to be reciting Job Chapter 13 verse 13 of the bible.
It should not appear that other people around me have no new year resolutions while I have some. No. I also do not have any resolutions for this year. Whatever comes, let it come. I am not planning to write a book. I am not planning to lose weight. I am not planning to exercise more. I am not planning to drop sugar and salt from my diet. I am not planning to have a full preventive medical examination this year. I am not planning to save money for the future. I am not planning to go on a holiday. I am not planning to plan. I will just glide on like that bird, khokwe aka nkomwemmalinga, and that is where the wind blows, I will fly.
While I do not have resolutions, there are things that I wish were changed. The first, of course, is the cleanliness or lack of cleanliness of the shopping baskets and trolleys at the major shopping centres in Blantyre and Lilongwe. I cannot say much about Mzuzu and Zomba because I have not used the trolleys in these cities. But in Blantyre and Lilongwe, it is becoming a matter of tradition that the trolleys must be as dirty as they can be. You pick a trolley and you must decide not to pay attention as to how filthy it is. I guess the solution to making the shopping baskets and trolleys humane can be simple. Each shop can assign an individual who during the day takes a few trolleys and baskets off from circulation into the “laundry” and give them a thorough bath. These are then dried and taken back into circulation.
There is no shortage of people around the world to tell us that the United States is not the greatest place in the world. With the election of Donald Trump as president, this assertion has been affirmed. The advice has been that while the United States may have hundreds of things to offer to the world, we should not just copy each and everything that they throw onto the menu. We need to examine things first. Having said that, however, is it not great that American hotels, motels and restaurants offer you “free” drinking water in a glass (not bottled water) even before you order your food? But what do we see in Malawi? The hotel wants to sell you bottled water. They have no water in a jug or glass to offer you. What a shame!
