Open the Tank: The One Legged Crow

Remnants of a conversation

The One Legged Crow. At least it can still fly!

Each of us has a path to walk, and some of us get to fly. This is the fate of the crow, like the one I saw as I was waiting to fill up at a service station. The service gentlemen who were supposed to help me were occupied with helping a middle-aged caucasian gentleman with his car. They were doing the usual routine check; oil and water levels, but somehow two people were on that task as I waited in the car. A part of me surmised that white people are known to tip, so these two were waiting for a tip. I mean why not, January is known to have a financial disease that comes over many. A money scarcity disease that is born from spending too much during the Christmas and New Year celebrations, the afeared January disease.

As I waited, I got a closer look at the crow way ahead on the ground in front of me. Its feathers were torn up like it had encountered an office shredder in the wild and narrowly survived. I thought that explained the way it bobbed every few moments trying to remain balanced. Then I saw it, the mangled foot. This crow, could not stand on two feet, and could not perch well on a tree brunch. It indeed had narrowly survived something because that foot was not functional. It had only one leg to serve its balancing act. I felt for it, and that's when one of the service gentlemen finally came over to serve me.

“Good morning sir,” he began, and I was distracted by the crow though I had already decided I would use Shona for this interaction. “Sei sei,” I replied and proceeded to order fuel. I handed him the money and he returned the change and ran over to the other side to pour the fuel. I heard him call out, as gently as ever in the sing-song Shongrish way, “Opennn the Tankiiii.” I chuckled to myself and opened the fuel tank wondering why he kept on in English. Usually people in the service business switch once they know which language you want to use to interact. But this gentleman kept on in English even as I replied in mostly Shona. I thought the lever for English had been left switched on after his interaction with that older white gentleman. The remnants of a conversation long finished but whose echoes continue on for a while longer.

I know how that works sometimes. Switching back and forth between languages can take a lot of effort. Sometimes in the USA when I had spent a day with other Zimbabweans switching back to full-time English would take much effort. I remember fairly recently in a video call with some international colleagues, I was mixing English and Shona without even noticing it. Luckily, the context was clear so the Shona filler words and so on did not take away from the conversation and I had a laugh after the call as someone who had been eavesdropping commented on my use of Shona.

Recently I have been struggling to find my English words, sometimes to write and sometimes to speak. It’s taking an extra step to remember as I reach out to becoming a multicultural and multilingual person. But it’s tough to try and aim at meaning only to grope for words. Luckily some of my people help out with words as talk on the phone or in person. But the remnants of Shona conversations all around me seem to be echoing louder. I am struggling to find my balance as I write creatively in both English and Shona. I feel like the one-legged crow and hope though that I at least look a lot better and not like I had parts of my psyche shredded by the language switches.

In the end, I was served, and I decided to step out of the vehicle to take a pic of the crow. I opened the door and realized cars were waiting behind me to fill up as well. I had to go back into the car so as not to hold them up. When I turned over the car and it roared into life, the crow flew away. Then it landed on the driver’s side allowing me to take as many photos as I needed while driving off. It’s like it knew this might lead to its 15 minutes of fame. I thought about migration, language switches, and echoes - remnants of conversations. I thought about being a fish out of water at times and wondered what the expression would be for a bird whose landing gear has been damaged. I am glad it can still fly…here here! 2025!