Reader reaction to last week’s column has pushed up my motivation levels
to a point where I have no excuse not to write Around The World In 80
Rooms! That’s the book I’m planning about my experiences with the
hospitality industry out of Africa and within it.

The experiences have been as diverse as they have been many, ranging
from The Good, The Bad to The Ugly. Of course, I don’t expect every
hotelier to give me a complimentary basket of fruit and sprinkle rose
petals on my pillow to induce sweet dreams—just to make you feel like an
honoured guest. But then again, I don’t expect them to sell me a dank,
cockroach-infested room with a bed crawling with bed bugs either that
will give me nightmares either!

From the letters I have received from readers so far, the inhospitality
of the hospitality industry is one experience many people can identify
with and relate to. However, there are some, like Moses Masiye, who
can’t. He writes: “Dear Edem Djokotoe, I must say I found your article
very revealing because I don’t travel often and when I do, I stay with
relatives and friends.

What did you mean by hospitality not being a game of chance? Also,
what did you mean by the headline, Blame It On Basil Fawlty?”

Well, thank you, Mr Masiye for your letter. I will try my best to
answer your questions as best as I can. Let me start with the first—the
one about hospitality which, as far as I know, is the relationship
between hosts and their guests. Africans pride themselves on being the
most hospitable people on earth.

In fact, when the whites first landed on the continent, our forefathers
were so hospitable towards them that they rolled out the lion skins
(since there were no red carpets in those days), killed whole herds of
cattle, brewed several drums of beer and even threw in a few nubile
virgins for good measure — all in the name of good, old-fashioned
African hospitality. Before we knew it, our people were in chains in
dungeons and on slave ships…

That aside, hospitality is something ingrained deep in the African
psyche. I was touched by a poor, widowed peasant farmer in a village in
Chipata who took out her best china to serve us tea, sweet potatoes and
groundnuts. I have seen families invite guests to table—even when
there is not enough food to go round. In my culture, it is mandatory
to give a visitor to your home a glass of water to drink before you
even settle down to exchanging greetings and platitudes. Whether it is
hopani, monkey or slimy snail, we share whatever we eat with our guests.

They spit on our hospitality. Mind you, the hospitality we bestow on
our guests is not a commodity that can be negotiated or repudiated but a
measure of our civility.

The hospitality I wrote about is a commodity in the marketplace of goods
and services. It is a product that comes with a price tag. And
precisely because this kind of hospitality has commercial value, it
cannot be a play thing in the hands of rank amateurs.

An example. My colleagues and I are at a lodge in Nakonde waiting to be
served breakfast so that we can conclude our business and head for Isoka
before nightfall.

Twenty minutes pass and still no service, even though the restaurant
staff are milling around, looking busy. We soon discovered that they
could not prepare breakfast because this was when they’d sent someone to
go buy bread, milk and eggs! How can anyone in the hospitality business
hope to stay in business this way?

But while we are on the subject of breakfast, let me turn my attention
to the science of food production. Many of us can dabble in the
kitchen, boil an egg, fry an omelette and even make a decent stew to
feed family and friends. However, cooking food for sale to the public
requires a tad more professionalism, finesse and sophistication, and
this is what separates cooks from chefs.

You see, once you open up an establishment that will prepare and sell
food to the public, you enter into the realm of public health—a realm
where regulation and enforcement has to be strict because matters of
life and death are at stake. Public health inspectors in local councils
are empowered by law to monitor food processing and storage plants and
shut down those that are found wanting.

Chefs have to be well aware of the public health risks that come with
buying food from questionable sources or preparing it in unsanitary
kitchens. The slightest oversight could unleash a plague of fatal and
near-fatal diseases such as botulism, hepatitis A, straphylococcus,
among others.

A disease like tuberculosis is spread easily in enclosed places such as
hotel and restaurant kitchens. That is why kitchen staff in reputable
establishments are mandatorily tested regularly for TB. It is on
account of these public health concerns that I said hospitality cannot
and should not be a game of chance.

About the reference to Basil Fawlty. Many TV viewers will remember the
hit series Fawlty Towers – a sitcom about a wretched hotel in a small
English town owned by Basil Fawlty and his wife, Sybil. Using wry
humour as a vehicle, it pokes fun at the hospitality industry, showing
how not to run a hotel! Instead of employing professionals, the Fawltys
hire a Spanish waiter who barely understands English and thus
misunderstands every instruction and food order he is given. Even those
employeeThe chef and the chambermaid are just as bad at what they do as
he is. The proprietors themselves can’t seem to agree between them how
to run things smoothly and efficiently. The result is a hotel that is
a total shambles.

But hey, this is a comedy and the sheer ridiculousness of it all is
intended to make us laugh. In real life, poor service is no laughing
matter. You can’t just employ people from the streets with no training
whatsoever, with no standards of personal hygiene and then give them
onerous task of running a guest house. That was the reason why I
jokingly accused Basil Fawlty for bringing the hospitality industry into
disrepute. I am sorry, Mr. Masiye, if I took it for granted that
readers would make sense of what I was trying to do.

His letter leads me to another written by HK which reads in part: “In
Lusaka today, there seems to be a lodge in every neighbourhood. The
disturbing thing is that every Jim and Jack thinks they can start a
lodge even without the requisite training that such an undertaking
demands. I would like to know if there is a licensing scheme for lodge
owners along the lines of the construction industry. What happens is
that every construction company that wants to be registered as a
contractor must furnish the National Council for Construction with
details of the qualified engineers it has with certified copies of their
qualifications…”

Well, HK, I don’t know how rigorous the licensing requirements are or
how robust the regulatory framework is. But I know that issuing
licenses to operators is the responsibility of the Ministry of Tourism.
I know that operators also have to comply with local council bye-laws
on public health, including a fire certificate. I also know that
enforcement of these laws is weak for various reasons. Sometimes, the
political complexion of the owner of an establishment determines whether
it is shut down on public health grounds or remains open.

Eight years ago, I happened to be in Livingstone at a time when the
district council was set to shut down a local lodge where a large number
of sex workers lived for public health reasons, among others. A few
hours before council workers swung into action, the town clerk got a
phone call from a senior government official ordering him not to. As it
turned out, the owner was a loyal member of the ruling party whose
generous financial contributions were evidently very much appreciated in
the citadel of power!
Secondly, if his lodge was closed down, he would claim that he was
being persecuted because of his political complexion.

So the lodge stayed open. It still operates to this day, and to the
best of my knowledge, the reasons why it should have been shut down
years ago are still as valid as they were back then.

The hospitality business is turning out to be a veritable cash cow.
Take Solwezi, for instance, where the demand for housing following the
discovery of rich copper deposits there could explain why in less than
10 years, the number of lodges and guest houses have risen from less
than eight to more than 80. But according to HK, if such establishments
are mushrooming all over the place, it is because people want rooms
they can hire for a few hours for illicit sex.

The moral issues aside, what really gets to me about the hospitality
industry is how much amateurism has been allowed to muscle in, gain
ground and take control of the sector.

As a traveller, my needs are simple, and I know I speak for many such as
myself. A clean and comfortable bed to sleep in, good wholesome food,
running water in a bathroom that is not grimy and slippery with algae in
a room that is no worse than what I have back home. A wardrobe with
hangers for my clothes. If the TV set works and has news, sports and
documentaries channels, well, I am happy. If there’s a working socket
where I can plug in my laptop and my travelling iron and charge my
phones, a candle and a box of matches to keep the room lit in case the
power goes, then I have very little to complain about.

But over the years, I have come to discover that the more cluttered with
bric-a-brac a room is, the more expensive it is likely to be. Late
last year, I spent a night in a suite in Ndola that was way over the top
when it comes to clutter. There was an old-school Pioneer hi-fi that
didn’t work, a queen-sized bed with seven pillows and a larger-than-life
headboard, a small dinner table set with chairs, plates and cutlery for
two, seven paintings on the wall, with four of these hanging over the
bed. And oh, there was a lounge suite, a centre table, a vulgar
dressing table, two large bedside lamps that didn’t work and an empty
fridge that hummed off key.

I turned on the big flat screen TV set mounted on the wall and twiddled
with the knobs on the remote control to see what I could get. Apart
from some drab home-grown programme on ZNBC, I had only one choice–a
hip hop channel. Apparently, that what the owner’s son, who was in
charge of guest entertainment that night, thought we deserved. For all
this, I had to pay K300,000 per night!