Story of a Bag

[This story was first published in The Post on 26th May 2004. The context is that, in a time of drought, India has donated 3,000 bags of rice to Zambia. The government had decided to distribute this be giving each MP 200 bags to donate to the needy in their constituency. What happened, of course, was quite another matter...]

Story of a Bag

I am a bag. Not a fancy handbag, or a plastic bag, or anything like that. I am a big strong hession sack, made by Mr Bagawala in Bangalore. As soon as I came into the world I had the desire to have a purpose in life, and to help the needy and vulnerable.

Imagine my delight when Mr Bagawala came into the warehouse one morning and said ‘You’re all off to the Punjab, to be loaded up with rice for Africa! To feed the starving! My friend Baggy and me did a little sack dance of joy. I call him Baggy because he’s so shapeless. He calls me Sacky because I want to sacrifice myself to save the world.

In the Punjab we found ourselves amongst ten thousand strong young bags, all recruited to bring food aid to starving people in Zambia! Here we come! Zambia shall be saved!

All ten thousand of us were put on the train to Mumbai, singing all the way. And what a send off when we boarded the boat for Dar-es-Salaam! Bands playing, flags waving! India’s gift to the starving people of Africa! Off to save the world! Hooray!

Bit of a problem at Dar, apparently we didn’t have an import permit. Never mind, we just gave fifty bags to the Chief Customs Officer to feed all the people needed to facilitate the documentation. Still plenty of bags left!

Then onto the Tazara Railway, and the long journey to Zambia. Bit of a problem at the border, apparently we didn’t have an export permit to leave Tanzania, or an import permit to enter Zambia. Never mind, another hundred bags soon solved that!

‘The rich steal all the food,’ said Baggy. ‘That’s why the poor are starving.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘Don’t say that. We just have to respect their customs and traditions.’

Finally, we were all offloaded into a big warehouse in Lusaka, where the President of Vice himself came to visit us, surrounded by a big crowd of people employed to cheer his every word! We were off to the Province of Njala by truck, he announced. Every MP in the province would be allocated a hundred bags to raise money for the transport.

‘These people are in a mess,’ I whispered to Baggy. ‘They don’t seem to have any food reserve agency to provide transport, or even a ministry of agriculture! Just as well we came to help!’

‘The fat rats have just stolen another two thousand bags,’ replied Baggy.

‘Don’t be such a misery guts,’ I laughed. ‘We’ve still got seven thousand bags left!’

So Baggy and I, along with two hundred others, were put on a truck to the District of Chipowe, hundreds of kilometres up a long dusty road, with a roadblock every ten kilometres.

And always the policeman would find something wrong. Hooter too loud. No headlights at the back. Full beam not working on the reversing light. Travelling at 20 kph in a 10 kph area. And every time the driver had to pay a fine, which was always two bags of rice.

‘Thank you,’ the policeman would always say, ‘for your contribution to our noble fight against corruption.’

Baggy and I were lucky to be amongst the sixty survivors who finally reached the boma in Chipowe, where it was quickly agreed that each councillor would take home two bags each. So Baggy and I were put in the back of Councillor Wakuba’s Pajero.

‘He’s going to eat all our rice!’ Baggy hissed.

‘No,’ I said. ‘he has to distribute it to the starving.’

But by the end of the week Councillor Wakuba and his family had eaten all the rice that I had carried, and only Baggy’s remained. And then, on Sunday morning, a crowd of starving villagers came to Wakuba’s door, begging for food.

‘Mpupuluzi!’ Wakuba shouted at the headman. ‘Why don’t you do some work and grow you own food! All you know is begging! This is just dependency syndrome! Even if I give you food, I know you will just sell it to pay school fees and medicines! That is corruption! This government is here to stamp out corruption! And next time you come to my house, don’t come here naked! Show some respect to your leaders!’

So saying, he picked me up from the floor and threw me at the headman. ‘Here, cover yourself with this!’

After two days of walking we reached the village of Mpupuluzi, to be greeted with much wailing. Kwashiorkor, the grandson of Mpupuluzi, had died. Only two years old.

They couldn’t afford a coffin, so they had to use me. They stretched me out, with a rope on each corner, and lowered poor little Kwashiorkor into his grave.

At last I had been able to do something for the starving people of Zambia.