It's the weekend baby!

Ladies… (and gents) You are at a bar and you meet a guy that isn't taking any alcohol and actually doesn't ever drink any alcoholic beverages and he tells you he has at some point tasted alcohol but found it's just not in his DNA to take it any further than tasting (well...that's like me…ahem). Is this the kind of guy you would want to have a conversation with in that bar? If yes, what would be the first question you would ask him? "What the hell are you doing here?" I guess that would be the most obvious question. 

As a matter of fact, I have met a lot of people that truly believe that if a guy doesn't take any alcohol, then there is something mentally wrong with him or he must be a womaniser. This is how many a guy like myself get 'discriminated against'. But what was I doing at a bar when I don’t take alcohol? Well I was out to relax and dance the night away too, like everyone else.

After a long time of not hanging out at night, I found myself joining many Lusaka party freaks on a Friday night. The morning of Friday 25th July 2014 started in pretty much the same way albeit routinely as the other Fridays before it. It might even have been identical to all other previous Fridays in the preceding 7 years before that day. It was business as usual and I was getting ready to go to the office as my employers required me to. Let me not go on a roll about the morning when the gist of the blog is in the evening.

After I left work that particular Friday evening, I met a colleague for a short meeting at Foxdale court. Shortly after, on my way home I met another colleague at Golden gates, a joint just a few meters from my home. In no time we would find ourselves at shop number 1 arcades shopping mall, great east road - Times Cafe.

It's the weekend baby!

Being at shop number 1 arcades mall in the night or any other night spot for that matter was something I hadn't done in over 3 years. The only time I had been out late at night in that period, I was either attending a corporate function of one sort or another with colleagues at the office or been invited by other colleagues for product launches or any other corporate event. It still qualifies as being out late at night but it is not the same thing.

In the period since I last went out 'clubbing', there have been many changes in the clubbing culture in Zambia it seems. The first change I noticed was the dress code. It seems the official dress code for the ladies going out at night in Lusaka is now the mini-dress. This is a dress so short it barely covers the buttocks. Of course there were a few females that adorned other clothes like tight jeans or bum shorts with leggings inside, but everywhere I looked there were just too many mini dresses. The male folk on the other hand still seem not to have found identity for the clubs. There seemed to be no pattern or dress code of any note from the male folk.

The one change that was unanimous with the sexes was the love of tattoos. It seems there are more Zambians who have taken art to another level by inking their bodies in so many different ways. For the female folk, the most popular spots for the tattoos were the thighs just above the knees, exposed by the mini dresses. The other spots were breasts exposed by excessive cleavage and the back of the shoulder exposed by bare back apparel.

The male folk on the other hand had tattoos on the wrists, and I saw one on the neck. Before that Friday, I had never seen that many tattoos in one place. With each year tattoos are getting more and more popular among crowds of people, young and old in Zambia. And although not everyone agrees with tattoos or why people go through the pain to get them, they are steadily becoming a huge part of our society today. To ink or not to ink, many Zambian’s are definitely inking!

To ink or not to ink?

It seems so much can change in a short period of time. Even attitudes. I was really taken aback when Chris Brown's 'loyal' song blazed in the speakers. There were wild shouts from the ladies and in no time seats were emptied as the female folk danced gleefully. What I couldn't understand is the fact that in the song the singer at some point repeatedly mentions that "these hoes ain't loyal". To me, even though I don't know the full and actual lyrics of that song, what I have heard sort of demeans the females.

Last time I checked, females enjoyed song like TLC’s No scrubs, Beyonce’s irreplaceable and independent women to mention but a few which praise the woman. One thing that hasn't changed though is that 2-Pac and Notorious BIG still get air play in the clubs after more than 18 and 17 years respectively since they died. As a matter of fact the patrons enjoyed the songs from the duo such that I could hear loud choruses of people singing along. It’s not only the two murdered rappers that got people excited but Zambian musicians too.

When Dandy Krazy’s song ‘Mbuyo ya Amama’ played, there was massive wiggling all around accompanied by wild chants. This must be a very popular song really and unfortunate enough for me I had never heard the song before that night.  Since then I have heard the song play on radio a couple of times. The question I have asked myself since listening to the song on radio really has been; ‘do we have club only hits in Zambia? Or a popular song becomes a hit everywhere!’ I believe not every song should play on radio, unless the producer has deliberately done a radio edit version of the song.

My night out had further surprises. I was really taken aback by the number of females in comparison to males present at shop number 1 arcades mall that night. At most visible tables, there were 4 or 5 females and maybe only 1 or 2 males. The reverse was the case the last time I had been out. I couldn't help but keep wondering if that report that made rounds on the internet suggesting that Zambia has more binge female drinkers than any other country in southern Africa (or was it the whole of Africa), was accurate or truthful. As a matter of fact, the said report was highly rumored to have been authored by some World Health Organization (WHO) experts.

I don’t usually believe rumors so I concluded the source of that information should have been a bloke that was in a night club and saw as many females drinking and passed his observation as a WHO social survey. I am not discounting that report though, just that I do not have the facts of its origins. It could be very true. One other thing of note is that there are far too many young girls and boys clubbing and drinking.

Where I live there is a street nicknamed devil street (topic for another blog) where I have seen extremely young girls engaging in all sorts of uncouth behavior after drinking sprees. But there I was seeing very young girls strut their way into shop number 1 arcades mall. The early days of shop number 1 arcades mall, entry was very restricted not only on the basis of age but also social class to some extent I believe. The bottom line is that not every Mulenga, Jelita, Robert, Sara or Nyambe the hero could walk in.

Seeing that every Maria is clubbing now, probably explains why almost all joints are filled with people. Back in the day, there would be 1 or 2 popular places that would always be full and entry to those places was charged while the rest of the places entry was free to attract as many people. Ya’ll remember XENON I guess. Today the number of happening joints has greatly multiplied and so have been the people to fill them up. It doesn't matter where the money to spend on alcohol comes from but it is always found and people get drunk.

Everyone probably knows that you don’t need to have money to get drunk. There was a very popular term I learned, which described a person who got intoxicated without necessarily paying for the drinks -Rwanda. I am not sure of the origins of that term or whether it had any connections to the country of the same name but it described people who habitually got drunk at the expense of their friends.

I really believe there are too many people drinking alcohol in Zambia now than ever before. Maybe people have more disposable incomes now than before. If that were true then maybe the classification of Zambia as a lower middle income country was very accurate and not mere politicking.

Of course not many expect economists to agree on many things so when the World Bank reclassified Zambia as a lower-middle income country, many disagreed arguing that the percentage of people living below the poverty line had increased instead. However statistics collected also indicated that there has been a rising middle class who now constitutes a market for consumer goods (and 2^nd hand Japanese vehicles). Whether the per capita income of Zambians has increased or not or we are now more poor, there are many people relaxing by throwing or attending parties every so often at which alcohol is the number one item on the menu list.

Of Course a lad like me doesn't expect that economists will agree on most things. Without digressing, I am reminded of the words of George Bernard Shaw who once said “If all the economists were laid end to end, they would not reach a conclusion.” I believe Economists don’t even agree with their own theories a lot of times as they will give you more than one outcomes or expectation as Harry S. Truman a former president of the USA also famously said; Give me a one-handed economist! All my economics say, ''On the one hand? on the other.''

 

Must KK come back with more threats?

So if we have more money to spend and we are spending it on alcohol, are we heading in the right direction as a country? I have my reasons why I don’t take alcohol and I may share them some day. What I want to say now really is that alcohol should not be what defines a weekend. There are a lot of activities that we can all engage in other than alcohol. Yes some have to engage in alcohol drinking but the numbers I am seeing engaged in alcohol drinking every weekend and for many, every day, are really frightening. We may just one day be one drunken country.

There are all sorts of events and parties that take place in Zambia every weekend. The weekend starts literary on Friday mid-morning. In Lusaka, by noon every Friday, it is difficulty to even drive from one end of the Central Business District, (CBD, known as town to many) to another end. By noon, it literary becomes impossible to drive on those roads in the CBD, people are moving in all direction in preparation for the weekend.

By the end of each Friday, there are parties starting everywhere and more parties on Saturday and Sunday. This is the case the whole weekend and the routine is repeated every weekend. All these parties are characterized by alcohol consumption and most times a guy like me feels out of place when attending some of these parties. It has become monotonous explaining myself that I don't take any alcohol and the questions never stops. So the wise thing for me to do is stay away from most of these social events and I prefer to just spend my limited free time with my family and also do some writing.

Well, a combination of writers’ block creeping in and my chrome book acting up after huge files I had typed mysteriously got corrupt sent me to shop number 1 arcades mall to relax like many do. It was great for me going out after a long time and really starting to learn how the clubbing culture has evolved.

So if you found me at a bar and I am not sipping on any glass whose contents have percentages of alcohol, do not ask what the hell am doing there, just raise your glass and toast to the weekend in my direction. It’s the weekend Baby!