“So who is the Ghanaian layman?”
“I don’t know, oh! What do you think Chris?”
Chris stirred his alomo and lime with his pinky.
“The Ghanaian layman is a cultural icon. An ever changing ideation. Yet incredibly static. A result of the grotesque, implorable, unacceptable state of inequality in our country…”
“Aye! Brofo!”
“Relax, relax, I have not finished,” Chris sipped then stirred some more. “The layman is the unassuming fellow. On the street. In the fitter shop. The driver. The artisan whom you must repeatedly tell of what you want, but must still accept he will get it wrong. The plumber, who will come to your house and fix one thing, and spoil five. Yes, the layman. The unintelligible. The squat. Apeteshi drinker. Kenke lover. Simpleton. The common folk of this country. The populous. Stretched across the land. Inhabiting the grey areas between formal living. Living off the change from the elite’s pockets…” Chris chugged the rest of his drink, then burped.
The others were silent, so Chris continued.
“The layman, the topic of political manifesto, yet bane of the politician. An enigma. A paradox. The layman, the person we look to when we think of ourselves as being a Ghanaian. The one we look to form some camaraderie between, but in the same regard, unfortunately, the last person we think of when it comes down to it. To formal employment. The layman is many things boiled into one, gentlemen. But let me not sit here and take up too much of your time,” Chris got up shakily and burped again.
“The layman is the same one who would help you when your car has broken down and ask for nothing. But the same one who would ask for something after doing nothing. He is a liar, a scallywag, and a cheat. Yet an angel and a good Samaritan.” Chris buttoned his shirt up and looked down at his two friends.
“And that my friends, is the layman.” Chris spun on the spot then walked off without another word.
——-
Read – Born on Friday – A Flash Fiction by Nsibande Refilwe, South Africa
