Blessing Musariri Shelling the Nuts
Act one.
Meet Liza and Henry. They live a life in which a bucket can feature prominently at some point during their day. There’s a hole in the bucket and this is a problem. Henry tells Lisa, who rightly tells him to fix it. Henry obviously has trouble thinking for himself and so promptly asks Liza what he should use to fix the bucket. Clued in as ever Liza tells him to use a straw. It should be simple enough but the straw is too long. Liza tells Henry to cut it. Henry asks with what. “With a knife, dear Henry, a knife.” Liza is obviously a very patient woman. Of course, this does not fix the problem because the knife is too blunt and Henry doesn’t hesitate to share this information and wait for a response, which is, to share with him the grand idea to sharpen it on a stone.

It turns out the stone is too dry and needs wetting. Liza tells Henry to go ahead and wet it then. You guessed it: Henry wants to know with what he should wet it. At this point I would just roll my eyes and tell Henry to throw the useless bucket away and find a hose. What I’m guessing is that a hose is not available at this point, so onwards with the story.

Liza, I’m sure by now is rolling her eyes for sure. She tells Henry, with water, obviously.

At this point in Henry’s tale of woe I begin to suspect a set-up, as if he knew where this story was leading all along and just wanted to prove a point. Maybe he had asked Liza to buy a new bucket at the store when she went to buy vegetables and it had slipped her mind or she had told him there was no need for a new bucket – back story is important. So, naturally, Henry asks with what he should fetch the water. “With what a bucket, dear Henry, dear Henry…. ”. That’s all well and good Liza, but here’s the thing: there’s a hole in the bucket.

Act two
Meet Any Small Business Owner (Asbo) in the greater environs of Harare. With Asbo’s story comes the backstory of a nation faced with the necessity of a change in currency leading to backdated Relative Authority (RA) charges in the new and somewhat elusive currency, for the (non) provision of services, specifically water.

On top of non-provision of services comes the lax policing of competing vendors right outside Asbo’s business which has paid hefty shop licence fees and is juggling a variety of overheads at a time when business is not booming.

Asbo is on a payment plan while said virtually non-existent water is shut off until payments are caught up. Asbo’s water pipes are already rusty from the dry spells and become even rustier now that not even a drop comes through from time to time.

Asbo brings water in daily from an outside source in an effort to keep things going so money can be made to meet the payment plan, to pay his workers, to pay other bills as well as survive. One day Asbo is visited by RA who wants to know where Asbo is getting water to run the business when they shut the water off?

How is Asbo operating without running water, which to be honest never really ran. Asbo is required to have running water on the premises but before the water can run, the bill in arrears must be paid and even when it is paid, chances are the water will not run anyway.

Here’s a thought about Henry and Liza’s situation. Henry has a problem and can’t be bothered to sit down and think about how to solve it on his own so he goes to Liza and makes every step of the situation her problem to solve.

Liza is forced to go through all the various options that are available and to her credit, does so in a logical manner providing what would be an efficient but temporary solution. One would assume that at some point the bucket would need more than a straw to hold the leak. However, Liza’s problem-solving skills are wasted on the situation because in a Catch-22 situation the end is as good as the beginning, chicken or egg, which comes first? Similarly, Asbo’s problems have brought him to that same place.

So Henry, for whatever reason, can’t solve this leaky bucket problem on his own and takes it to Liza. The question must be asked, why? Is it because this is Liza’s domain? Is she the ultimate owner of the bucket? Does Henry need permission from Liza to do his job?

My impression is that Henry thought about all the possible scenarios for fixing his bucket, otherwise his comebacks would not have been so leading, and came to a dead end. There are many other possible solutions that depend on many things, such as how big is the stone that needs wetting, and how much water would be needed to wet it? Is a bucket the only vessel that can be used to fetch the water? Were there really no other options available to the solving of this dilemma than to go and lead Liza into a situational trap?

Smells like passing the buck to me: “Listen, I even asked Liza what to do about it and she couldn’t come up with anything either, so we need to just throw the bucket away or buy a new one.”

Asbo’s business depends on the bucket Henry is supposed to fix. Henry is basically saying to Asbo, “Hey man, there’s a problem here with my tools/skills set/interest in the current predicament and guess what, everything you are trying, to get around it is not going to fix what is at the root of the problem but why don’t I go ahead anyway and make it your problem for a while and when you fail, like I have failed then we just end the song.”

Henry bringing the leaky bucket to Liza implies that Liza has a vested interest in the bucket being fixed, or it may be the case that Henry really cannot think for himself, in which case Henry probably shouldn’t be in charge of anything that might become so infinitely challenging.

On a slightly humorous note, it could be that Henry is employing a rather convoluted strategy to engage Liza in conversation because he is interested in her romantically and this is his version of a pick-up line. In which case it can be concluded that Henry has no game whatsoever and Liza should keep walking. It would be interesting to know what would have been the end result had the song been polygonal rather than circular in form

As it stands we can only go round and round with the same issue, a situation with which Asbo is only too familiar. Liza is genuinely trying to help Henry, to whom the bucket belongs (this concluded because Henry says there’s a hole in my bucket rather than, hey Liza, there’s a hole in the bucket), and accordingly Henry needs to make a better effort towards owning the problem.

Act three
Meet Every Other Small Business Owner (Eosbo), pronounced, Eezbo. Eosbo looks at Asbo and thinks, hey, Asbo’s got a fine set up there, let me get myself some of that business, after all that’s what competition is all about. Eosbo is soon joined by Eosbo two, Eosbo three, Eosbo four, until they dominate the shopping area offering exactly the same services and products. Asbo tries to innovate so that he can stand out from the Eosbos but the Eosbos keep a close eye on every innovation and replicate.

It’s a free country after all and competition keeps business owners on their toes. However, the trouble of the leaky bucket remains and this affects Asbo and all the Eosbos and unfortunately, all they can do is work around it because the bucket is not theirs to fix.

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