Kalahari Typing School for Men (13 page)

“But that is not the rule,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I would
never tell you your job—a clever man like you does not need to be told by a woman how to do his job—but I think that you have got the rule wrong. The rule says that you must not give the name of a pensioner. It says nothing about the address. That you can tell.”

The clerk shook his head. “I do not think you can be right, Mma. I am the one who knows the rules. You are the public.”

“Yes, Rra. I am sure that you are very good when it comes to rules. I am sure that this is the case. But sometimes, when one has to know so many rules, one can get them mixed up. You are thinking of rule 25. This rule is really rule 24(b), subsection (i). That is the rule that you are thinking of. That is the rule which says that no names of pensioners must be revealed, but which does not say anything about addresses. The rule which deals with addresses is rule 18, which has now been cancelled.”

The clerk shifted on his feet. He felt uneasy now and was not sure what to make of this assertive woman with her rule numbers. Did rules have numbers? Nobody had told him about them, but it was quite possible, he supposed.

“How do you know about these rules?” he asked. “Who told you?”

“Have you not read the
Government Gazette?
” asked Mma Ramotswe. “The rules are usually printed out in the
Gazette
, for everybody to see. Everybody is allowed to see the rules, as they are there for the protection of the public, Rra. That is important.”

The clerk said nothing. He was biting his lip now, and Mma Ramotswe saw him throw a quick glance over his shoulder.

“Of course,” she pressed on, “if you are too junior to deal with these matters, then I would be very happy to deal with a more senior person. Perhaps there is somebody in the back office who is senior enough to understand these rules.”

The clerk’s eyes narrowed, and Mma Ramotswe knew at that
moment that her judgement had been correct: if he called somebody else, he would lose face.

“I am quite senior enough,” he said haughtily. “And what you say about the rules is quite correct. I was just waiting to see if you knew. It is very good that you did. If only more members of the public knew about these rules, then our job would be easier.”

“You are doing your job very well, Rra,” said Mma Ramotswe. “I am glad that I found you and not some junior person who would know nothing about the rules.”

The clerk nodded sagely. “Yes,” he said. “Anyway, this is the address of the woman you mention. Here, I’ll write it down for you. It is a small village on the way to Lobatse. Maybe you know it. She is living there.”

Mma Ramotswe took the piece of paper from the clerk and tucked it into the pocket of her dress. Then, having thanked him for his help, she went outside, reflecting on how bureaucracy was very rarely an obstruction, provided that one applied to it the insights of ordinary, everyday psychology, insights with which Mma Ramotswe, more than many, had always been well endowed.

L
OOKING BACK
, as she later would do, on the early days of the Kalahari Typing School for Men, Mma Makutsi, assistant detective at the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency and formerly acting manager of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors, would marvel at just how easy it was to start the school. If all businesses were as easy, she reflected, then the road to plutocracy would be simple indeed. What made it all so simple and so painless? The answers might form the kernel of a business school essay: a good idea; a niche in the market; low start-up costs; and, what is perhaps most important of all, a willingness to work hard. All of these were present in ample measure in the case of the Kalahari Typing School for Men.

The easiest task—potentially the most difficult—had been the finding of a place to hold the classes. This issue had been quickly resolved by the younger apprentice, who offered to speak
to the minister about the possible use of the meeting room attached to his church.

“It is never used during the week,” he had said. “The minister is always saying that we must share. This is a chance for us to do just that.”

The minister was amenable, under the condition that the religious pamphlets be left in the hall so that those attending the classes might have the chance to be saved.

“There will be many sinners wishing to learn to type,” he said. “They will see the pamphlets and some of them will realise what sinners they are.”

Mma Makutsi had readily agreed and had taken the typewriters, most of which were now in basic working order even if not all the keys worked, over to the hall, where they were stored in two padlocked cupboards. There were already tables and chairs in the hall, and these could seat over thirty, although the number of pupils would be limited by the ten typewriters available.

Within a few days, every thing was prepared. A small advertisement had been inserted in the
Botswana Daily News
, worded in such a way as to appeal to exactly the audience which Mma Makutsi had in mind.

Prospective students were then referred to the telephone number of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency and instructed to ask for the Typing School Department.

On the day of publication, Mma Makutsi was at work earlier than usual. She had obtained an early copy of the paper from the printers and had read and reread the text of the advertisement. It gave her considerable pleasure to see her name in print. It was the first time that she had ever seen this, and she sat and stared at it for some time, thinking,
That’s me, that’s my name, in print, in the newspaper, me
.

The first call came half an hour later, and one followed another throughout the day. By four o’clock in the afternoon, there were twenty-two firm bookings for a place in the class; ten would start that week, a further ten would be admitted to the second course some two months later, and two were placed on a waiting list.

Mma Ramotswe shared Mma Makutsi’s pleasure.

“You were right,” she said. “There must be many men who are desperate to learn how to type. It is very sad.”

“I told you it would work out,” said Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni. “I told you.”

THE FIRST
class took place on a Wednesday evening. Mma Ramotswe had given Mma Makutsi the afternoon off so that she could prepare for the occasion, and Mma Makutsi had spent some time setting out sheets of paper at each desk and distributing the exercise booklet which she had herself typed out and duplicated. On a makeshift blackboard at one end of the room she had drawn, in chalk, the layout of the keyboard, dissected with wavy lines for the domain of each finger and each thumb. This was the basic knowledge of the typist, the foundation stone of the skill that would send the fingers racing across the keyboard and the keys clattering against the roller.

There had never been any doubt about the pedagogical philosophy which would underpin the efforts of the Kalahari Typing
School for Men. This was the same as the philosophy of the Botswana Secretarial College, and it held that every finger must be taught to know its place. There would be no shortcuts; there would be no leeway for sloppy habits. The little finger must
think
q; the thumb must
think
space bar. That is how they had put it at the Botswana Secretarial College, and Mma Makutsi had never heard the philosophy of typing put so succinctly and so truly.

On the basis of this instinctive positioning of fingers, the students would be taught, by sheer repetition, to bridge the gap between perception of the word to be typed (or its imagination) and the movement of the muscles. That was something that could be acquired only through practice, and through the constant performance of standard exercises. Within a few weeks, if the student had any aptitude at all, words could be typed slowly but accurately, even making allowances for the fact that men have larger, more ungainly fingers.

The class was due to begin at six, which gave time for the students to make their way from their workplaces to the hall. Well before that time, however, they had all assembled, and Mma Makutsi found herself confronted with ten expectant faces. She looked at her watch, counted the students, and announced that the class would begin.

The hour went very quickly. The students were instructed in the insertion of sheets of paper and in the function of the various keys. Then they were asked to type, in unison, on the command of Mma Makutsi, the word “hat.”

“All together,” called out Mma Makutsi, “
h
and
a
and
t
. Now stop.”

A hand went up.

“My
h
does not work, Mma,” said a puzzled-looking, smartly dressed man. “I pressed it twice, but it has not worked. I have typed ‘at.’”

Mma Makutsi was prepared for this. “Some keys are not in working order,” she said. “This does not matter. You must still press them, because you will find that these keys will work in the office. It does not matter at this stage.”

She looked at the man, who had his hair parted down the middle and a neatly trimmed moustache. He was smiling up at her, his lips parted slightly, as if he was about to say something. But he did not, and they moved on to new but equally unchallenging words.

“Cat,” shouted Mma Makutsi. “And mat. Hat cat mat.”

At the end of the hour, Mma Makutsi made her way round the desks and inspected the results. She had learned at the Botswana Secretarial College the importance of encouragement, and she made sure that she had a word of praise for each student.

“You will be a very good typist, Rra,” she would say. “You have good finger control.” Or: “You have typed ‘mat’ very clearly. That is very good.”

Once the class was over, the men made their way out of the hall, talking enthusiastically amongst themselves. Mma Makutsi, tidying up in the background, overheard a remark which one of the students passed to another.

“She is a good teacher, that woman,” he said. “She does not make me feel stupid. She is good at her job.”

Alone in the hall, she smiled to herself. She had enjoyed the class and had discovered a new talent: an ability to teach. And what was more, she had in the small cash box on her desk the first week’s fees, in carefully counted notes of the Bank of Botswana. It was a comfortable sum, and there were virtually no overheads to pay. This money was hers to dispose of, although she planned to give a small portion of it to Mma Ramotswe to cover the cost of the telephone and as a recognition of her contribution to the business.
Once she had done that, she would put the balance in her savings account. The days of poverty were over.

After she had locked up, she tucked the cash box into her bag of papers and started the walk back home. She walked along an untarred back road, past small houses from which light spilled, and in which she witnessed, framed in the windows, scenes of everyday domesticity. Children sat at tables, some upright, attentive, while others stared up at the ceiling; parents ladled the evening meal into their bowls; bare lightbulbs in some rooms, coloured lamp shades in others; music drifted from kitchens, a young girl sat on the kitchen step, singing a snatch of song which Mma Makutsi remembered from her own childhood, and which made her stop for a moment, there in the shadows, and remember.

S
HE DROVE
down in the tiny white van, the morning sun streaming through the open window, the air warm against her skin, the grey-green trees, the browning grass, the plains stretching out on both sides of the road. The traffic was light; an occasional van, minibuses crowded and swaying on their ruined sus pensions, a truck full of green-uniformed soldiers, the men calling out to any girl walking along the edge of the road, private cars speeding down to Lobatse and beyond on their unknown business. Mma Ramotswe liked the Lobatse road. Many trips in Botswana were daunting in their length, particularly the trip up to Francistown, in the north, which seemed to go on forever, along a straight ribbon of a road. Lobatse, by contrast, was little more than an hour away, and there was always just enough activity on the way to keep boredom at bay.