Under Construction

Martha Mukaiwa

Under Construction

Though the talking envelopes of Hogwarts fame are pretty theatrical, the Construction Workers Academy of Whistling and General Purveying of Humiliation’s recruitment is way more dramatic.

You may be whistling in a park somewhere at age 11, on a baseball field trying to get a teammate’s attention on the third or just pretending to be Dick Van Dyke in ‘Mary Poppins’ and quicker than you can say you’ll find yourself bound, gagged and in the back of a bakkie dressed in blue overalls replete with the strange and sudden urge to whistle for the rest of your days.

I guess you can say construction workers are victims of circumstance, hopelessly held in captivity by a life they didn’t choose yet enamoured with a career that celebrates their wonderfully whimsical way of whistling.

Though people like to think construction workers a somewhat dim-witted and skirt-chasing bunch, in truth, CWs are highly trained operatives fluent in a wordless language that puts Morse code to a dotted shame.

In fact, and despite a lack of documented evidence, the reality is that many a life has been saved on numerous a slippery scaffolding with the help of a whistle.

Though the sounds whizzing through the air seem random enough, it’s all quite ingenious.

A short staccato blast is used to grab the attention of a CW and jerk him instinctively to the left just as an Acme anvil descends at deafening speed on the right.

A short whistled excerpt from ‘Shosholoza’ means everyone should call in sick the next day with a canteen stomach bug because there’s a one day sale on at Blue Overalls Unlimited and a long whistle followed by a sharp click of the tongue indicates that a man has just ignored the short staccato blasts signaling falling anvils and is now pigeon food about ten storeys below.

Also, among others whistle types, and the reason why I am scribbling this today... the long wolf whistle followed by an abruptly stopped short.

The whistle that for decades has set female faces all over the world aflame in shame for daring to walk the streets with ovaries.

We’ve all heard it. We all loathe it. We’ve all shaken our manicured fists at the heavens and threatened to go and find the foremen but blush if we must, the truth is... it’s a compliment!

And sadly, science shows that construction workers are probably the only men who will give them to you when you’re having a bad hair day, when you have a zit the size of Mount Vesuvius on your chin or when you’re just feeling garden variety UGLY.

So in future, when you’re walking past a construction site and you happen upon these oh-so-manly workers who have had to stare at nothing but sweaty men for the last four hours and are thanking the heavens that, in construction work, there is no chance of dropping the proverbial soap.

Be nice.

Whistle back.

I do. And yes I have been chased half a block by someone who may or may not have to look up the difference between seduction and sarcasm but in the end everyone wins. You feel pretty and they get to have a bit of fun in a Minimum Wage World.

Win-win.

But if you’re still not convinced cut to this...

A hot summer’s day, skirt high, shirt low, you, a construction site and suddenly you’re halfway down the block before you realise that your ears are whistling from the utter silence.

Yes.

Imagine being so terrifically terrible to look at that that there is no whistle, no air humping or thanking of your mama...

Just you, walking past in the silence while Tom and Harry wonder whether they’re into Dick.

– marth_vader on Twitter or martha@namibian.com.na