Clash of the Generations...

By; @Zamaradi_M

 

I have this lovely Mama Mkubwa who has retired and is now working for a private firm. We were not very close before but we are now what people say super tight. We are each other's shosti even with almost 40years age difference. 

Well enough with dolidoli. So, we were talking and me being the planner and dreamer I always am I told her that if I have it my way I would like to be able to retire by 35, meaning if I will be working it will be for the love of my job but not for financial dependence to my employer.

She was proud and went on telling me about her friend who was told by her daughter that she is working past her retirement age because she did not plan her life well enough. (I swear I am not the daughter!)

So, we talked and talked talked. And the two generations of Mlege came to agree that it was not easy for the retirees to plan an early retirement in those days as opportunities were very limited. The only things people could do was work for a government, or a private company if they can find any and the very lucky ones made it into politics.

That was their curse, there were no enough opportunities.

Come to this generation, millions and millions of opportunities. People are employed yet own businesses that sometimes make even more than their salaries. And let us not talk of those who double/triple their salaries while working no overtimes and exceeding no targets, we reserve them for another day!

So we are blessed with opportunities, Thanks to the Almighty.

But our curse is, we know no loyalty, we have no respect for friendship and we don't even value family! How many of us have been betrayed by their friends? How many of us have been conned by our very own relatives? How many of us have lost money just because our decision was based in trusting the information from a person close to us gave?

Now, we hear stories of shop owners in Zanzibar who would leave their shops unlocked for almost 30 minutes and go to the mosque to come back to the exact same shop they left! (WARNING: Don't try this anywhere.)

We hear stories of people who worked under one company for more than 40 years! (This is my second job/company in 4 years.)

We hear stories of friends who cut themselves to mix their bloods just to show how deep their friendship is! (Don't try this now, unless your Doctor approves).

Those are now just stories. Stories I wish I lived to see!

So, we might retire at 35 but we will get there with no friends and no family. Our emotions will be so played with that we will not even trust our own children and the poor kids will probably be below 15!.

And sadly, we might not even live long enough to be 35. We just have to stay out of people's ways, people we are not even aware of their existence, because nowadays killing and harming another human being to protect one's interest seems like an okay thing.

You are still working at 60+ but I could trade places and live in that era where there was loyalty, true friendship and relatives were your last line of defense, I will do the trade in the blink of an eye!