The expat is jealous of Kenyans’ work ethic

As we all know, the expatriate is a highly-educated professional, who’s dedicated enough to respect the ‘Protestant work ethic’ that he was raised into in his home country. Unless, of course, he’s Italian, or something else peculiar.

While this might in reality make him nothing more than a victim of capitalism, he instead thinks that it makes him superior to the angels themselves. He’s an arrogant type.

In the morning, he wakes on time for work and, if a traffic jam threatens to make him late, he loathes it for this reason, not just because it’s ‘boring.’ During the gridlock, he’s in agony, worrying that his reputation as a punctual type will be ruined by the chaos on the road.

Similarly, during legitimate breaks and lunches, he spends as much time checking his watch as he does chewing his food.

Lunching with an expatriate is like eating a meal with a pendulum, as he’ll always remind his tablemate, ‘I have to be back in the office in 20 minutes’, ‘I have to be back in five minutes’, and so on, as if your meal is an examination and he’s the invigilator.

Finally, at the end of the working day, the expatriate glances at his computer clock (the computer at which he’s genuinely doing job-related work) and sees that, yes, it’s 5pm. Nevertheless, overcome with Protestant work ethic guilt (odd, because ‘guilt’ is usually a very Catholic sensation), he works on for another 15 minutes so he doesn’t look like he’s shirking.

Then, he goes home, feeling extraordinarily holy.

In Kenya, things are different. Yes, there is a ‘work ethic’, but it ‘works’ (if this is the correct word) in ways alien to the snooty expatriate. In his stereotypical foolishness, he’s likely to fall into the old and probably racist trap of calling certain Kenyans ‘lazy,’ but this is wrong.

In short, if Kenya’s fine Constitution was drafted by a ‘Panel of Experts’ and other stakeholders, then democratically voted for by us all, then I’m afraid it seems, instead, that Kenya’s unofficial ‘Work Ethic’ document was more likely written by a ‘Panel of Drunks’ and voted on democratically by their fellow pub crawlers.

In the morning, a jam is presumed, and so automated as an ‘excuse’ for lateness. Breaks and lunches are fluid affairs (in ALL senses of that word), and sometime after the official lunchtime is over, your lunchmate might say, ‘I’ll have to leave in a while.’

His coat will be draped over his chair back in the office; probably the same chair from which he wrote a letter to his boss, requesting a pay rise. Then, at the day’s end, as his computer clock edges towards 5pm, he will get bored enough, if he possesses the skills, to hack into the office intranet and reset all the computer clocks to 5.15pm.

Finally, he’ll leave, often with the communal office newspaper, his boss’s favourite mug and his unworn jacket draped over his sly shoulders.

The expatriate is, of course, jealous.

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