Last week we left, fighting for an ideal had cost me a salary. Reason? Refusing to stay home waiting for an unnecessary police call because our Boss who once told us he would deduct salary if we even said we forgot to bring a CD to a performance had forgotten to register us with the Police, hence the ensuing fracas.

Todate, the Police are yet to visit.
I had also awarded myself a day off, primarily because in issuing a missive for me not to dance the Boss had transplanted our difference of opinion from the Police station to the stage, and also because if I was literally paying for it, I figured I might as well make a merry night of it.

But as affairs turned out, I performed and shared a quiet ride home with the Boss. Next day was the turn of the rats who had volunteered my services as sacrificial lamb to taste of the Boss's whimsical style of management.

The two girls left without telling the Boss where to, imagining that since this was the day he had sanctioned, all would be ok. But in the post-midnight meeting summoned for the purpose, they learned the amazing fact they had been in error, and therefore also involuntarily donated part of their salary to him.

For an event that had happened a month before where, in the effort of rescuing a drum I suffer with while tuning from a client who had placed on it wet drinks that would de-tune it, I accidentally hit another guest on the head with it, I also earned another delightful deduction.

But these losses are worth every cent if they serve what seems like an increasingly collective, bigger-by-the day struggle against situations that belittle, exploit, sub-humanize and disrespect us as human beings, Africans, and performers.

For instance the next day we had a performance and Boss said to leave everything at Elephant Club where we used to perform daily before we were fired two days ago for political reasons that will be explained in subsequent paragraphs.

To cut the long story short, at the venue is when he says a CD he said we didn't need was required for the performance. So his mistress rushes over with it, and either she spoilt it in transit, or the DJ was understandably confused with the sound effects on the track we were meant to use, but we ended up doing things other than those we went onstage to do.

In the post-mortem discussion he tried to fault us, invoking the I'm-Boss-will-cut-salary dictum. We reminded him he was the one who had said to leave everything at the club, so if any money was to change hands, it should be from him to us for messing our show.

How we stand now is we were sacked from Elephant Club, not for artistic incompetence, but because our Bosses took it for granted we would be spending money they hadn't given us to taxi our tired selves to another soul-less performance after earning money for them in another district.

What happened is for two days before that we had been doing ambush-style performances, most of which we were told were gratis. The day we left for Shandong province on the overnight train we had left home at 6am for a show to be at 6.00, another at 7pm, and another from 9:15-10:00 pm, all in different locations.

After our 2-minute cameo in Shandong, we had to sprint to the train where upon boarding, we asked our original Boss if after we had made his money, he would transport us like he had found time to when driving us to get to the train to Shandong.

He said he would call back, and 4 hours later when we arrived in Beijing, he still had not found time to call. But he had found time to tell one of the mercenaries we performed with that we should take taxis to Elephant to perform.

This was the perfect excuse for us to just go home, since already our Director had pleaded in vain for us to be let off, saying if the venue had managed to survive without us the day before, they could another while we recovered our energy.

What happened next? Tune in next week. blog comments powered by Disqus

< Prev		Next >