Breakfast for the Babes in Bim

Last week there was a public plea for government to feed the nation's children some breakfast.

It isn't really a question of poverty,"they" say. Parents have to leave house too early for work thus they don't have time to satsify the swallows.

Truly, getting to work in the morning is a daunting task. Traffic is excrutiating and every second road is under construction. To get from A to B means cutting through C only to find D has been closed. So we detour through E but get lost trying to find F and we weave and we wait, inching our way through the alphabet of chaos and potholes...

That's if we're lucky enough to have a car.

If we don't, we do the same- but as a passenger on a transport board bus with an added bonus of atleast an hour's wait at the bus stop, crossing our fingers at the sound of every diesel engine and making silent prayers that someone we know will pass by and take pity on us.

And as we embark on this glorious 5 am journey each morning, we are forced to leave the tea and toast to providence but alas Jesus Christ is too busy being called to the road rage- the children's belly grumbles are left unheard.

Until they get to school.

Then the growling and the yawning and the disinterest in the work stares those super interesting, highly creative and way informative teachers in the face. No matter how hard they try to make the morning praise a delight, the children do not get aroused. How frustrating it must be to know that a couple of bakes could have awakened the pupils to the majesty of possessive nouns! How ingenious that the decline in literacy could be easily remedied by a boiled egg or a fried plantain!

But woe and befoul those children who attempt to feed themselves! They were caught on camera less than a week after the breakfast blame, buying fish cakes from a street vendor after the bell had tolled. It's a good thing we've got school policy for such a blatant act of impertinence. Any child failing to make their own way through the alphabet of chaos and potholes and dare risk being tardy for a morsel of greasy flour shall be publically spurned and refused any and all entry to the school compound. That'll teach 'em!