Dinner Talk

Ever since I can remember, we’ve gotten Dad to tell us his snake prank story.

I remember hearing it in Zimbabwe many times, sitting around our dining room table after a meal of rice and chicken or sadza and relish. We used to say, “Tell us a story of when you were naughty.”

And he’d say, “I was never naughty!”

Then he’d tell the snake story (among others).

It’s not much of a story, but for some reason we like hearing it...again and again.

Here is the hundredth retelling:

Me: Tell the snake one.

Dad: Snakey Snakey it’s called. Do the proper names, Taralyn. How we supposed to know what you’re talking about?

[Serious now]

Dad: We used to make snakes out of different things, but the best was a pair of pantie hose.

[Laughter]

Tasha: Who’s? Your Mom’s or your sister’s?

Calvin: Was it like a double snake?

Dad: You cut one leg off and fill it with newspaper and make this long, fat snake.

Mom: You didn’t use rubber snakes?

Dad: We didn’t always have rubber snakes. But we did it at night time, not the daytime. We couldn’t do it in the daytime. You’d tie a piece of string around the neck of the snake and pull it across the road. When a car came past, they’d reverse over it, backward and forward, killing the snake. But the best was if there was someone walking, or on a bicycle at night. Then we would: [rubs hands together with a naughty grin]. You couldn’t pull it out too fast, because if the person was too far away, he'd just stop and turn around and go back. So, they needed to be quite close and you’d pull it out and: “Maiwe!!”* They’d jump and if they’re carrying stuff, they would drop their stuff. Once, the string got caught on a man’s bicycle somehow, so the snake was now chasing him. That was a funny one, ‘cause he was peddling as fast as he could go and that snake was still coming.

Mom: At least my sister and I only did it once, because we felt really bad. The little girl dropped her—

Me: You had a little conscience.

Mom: She was carrying her little can of water on her head. She dropped it and went, “Amayi! Amayi! [Mother, mother]

Dad: Yeah, but we didn’t do it to such people.

Mom: We felt really bad.

Dad: We wouldn’t have pulled the snake if we saw a little girl with—

[Drowned out by laughter]

Tasha: Oh yes you would.

Dad: Well being in the town, that wasn’t something that happened, so we weren’t tested, but I’m sure our consciences were such that we would not have done it.

Taralyn: Only to old men on bikes.

Dad: Only to old men on bikes who could have had heart attacks.

[Laughter]

Dad: So we would go’n hid in the bushes and do that. We did it many times.

Mom: We only did it once.

Taralyn: Do you remember any other?

Dad: Oh, they were all pretty similar, you know, the reactions are very...

Mom: Then it gets old?

Dad: Yeah.

*Shona equivalent to, "Ahhh!




Let me know what you think =) I always enjoy eavesdropping (not in a bad way) on dinnertime conversations. They can be so funny.


Taralyn Rose~