I SPENT much of my youth criss-crossing between the city and the countryside. My fondest memories were sown in the countryside. I didn’t realise it then but looking back I realise the great impact that environment shaped my worldview – my thoughts, ideas and views on life.

I developed a special relationship with nature. I don't think there is a better teacher than Mother Nature herself. It is fair to say that I draw a lot of inspiration from nature, which probably explains why I write about it so often.

As Paolo Coehlo wrote in my favourite book, The Alchemist, often the simple things are the most extraordinary. Nature is simple, yet so extraordinary.

Today, I want to write about ants (masvosve), the little but mighty creatures. I love ants. I respect them.

As regular readers now know, when I was a young boy, my friends and I were often required to attend to the duty of looking after the village animals. It was a mundane task. The mornings and afternoons could be long and boring. You can’t spend all the time looking at cattle grazing in the fields. You have to find things to fill up the time.

Sometimes, we had boxing matches, often the bigger boys promoting a fight between the smaller boys; sometimes, we instigated bull fights – if your bull won you were happy but if it lost you would be taunted by boys from other villages. People do odd things to while up time.

I would often sit and observe the little creatures. I was fascinated by ants, the little things. I was and remain impressed by their organisation and industry. I would sit, sometimes for hours, watching the little things operating in perfect formation, each going down the tunnel in a queue, whilst others came up with small loads of soil, depositing them on the sides and going back again and again. It went on for hours. I don’t know how many times they did that. They seemed to keep going.

I was curious to see what was going on inside. I couldn’t help but wonder how such small things could be so organised and industrious, something that we humans often struggle with a great deal..

I think some of them got tired and died in the process. Others would be on hand to pick the tired and the dead, they would drag them down the tunnel. I don’t know what they did in there but I was intrigued by the fact that they too seemed to have some kind of society with traditions and ethics even. They even had ways of dealing with their departed colleagues. Their sociability impressed me. I thought they were clever little things. Perhaps these things had feelings too; perhaps they had brains too, I thought.

How do they do it? Who taught them? How do they communicate? Do they speak a language? I asked an older boy one day and he laughed at me. ‘It’s the way they are!’ he said without a care in the world. He was surprised at my interest in ants. And with his bare feet, he violently kicked the mound of soil on the ants’ nest.

‘Masvosve aya mfana!’ (They are just ants!), he said dismissively as he stamped on the ants that were scurrying for cover. ‘They will build another one!’, he declared, as he walked away.

He did not understand. He could never understand. But nothing could be done. He was a big boy and big boys beat small boys. They don’t like small boys who question their decisions. They like small boys who listen and comply. So I just looked at the ants and their nest that had been destroyed with just one kick.

I thought he had been cruel. How come he didn’t see that these little creatures had a sense of duty and dedication? They were hard workers. They looked after each other, the dead and the living. Small as they were, they would work all day and night. Each one of them may have carried a small grain of soil and might have appeared insignificant but because they were so many, well-organised and dedicated, they managed to achieve so much. And yet this big boy thought it was alright for him to crush it just like that. Because they were just ants, he had judged.

I wanted to ask him if he did not see the work that these little things had put in to build their house. I wanted to ask if he did not admire their tenacity and dedication to duty; if indeed, he could not see some beauty in their organisation and industry. But he was too big.

In the days that followed, he would from time to time call out, “Mamwe masvosve ako aya mfana!” (Hey, little boy, come and see your ants!). Then he would use the same big feet to kick at the nest so violently. It was painful to see a big boy behave like that. But he was a big boy and he had too much power.

I often think about the little ants whenever I observe human behaviour. I see how some people have built their beautiful homes over the years. I see how some people have spent years building their farms, making them better and more productive. I see how some people have built their companies and industries. I see how mothers have raised their children, nourished and educated them from a young age. Yet at some point, someone; some people can simply decide to destroy it all with just one kick.

I see how some people command the bulldozers to bring down homes, farms and industries. I see how people can command laws to capture and bring down other people’s companies – a lifetime’s work brought down to zero. I see how lives and limbs of promising boys and girls have been cut short. I am reminded of the big boy and his attitude towards the little ants. He never cared about them. They were just ants.

When I recently re-read Joshua Nkomo’s biography, The Story of My Life, my attention was drawn to one passage where interestingly, he drew upon the symbolism of the life and work of ants. I cannot do any better than quote the man himself in full. He wrote at page 139:

“The ants build beautiful, intricate nests, with every ant moving in order to its own place along its pathway. There was a wonderful ants’ nest right beside my sitting room, in the corner out of the way. And it gave me hours of pleasure and interest. After we had served seven years the Minister for Law and Order, Mr Lardner-Burke, came to visit us. I suppose he wanted to see when our spirits would break. He was wearing very highly polished shoes. He saw the ants’ nest and ground the heel of his shining shoe down on it, destroying the beautiful, organised home that the ants had built.”

Nkomo was writing about his experience during the period when he was confined to the dangerously wild Gonakudzingwa camp in the sixties and seventies during the liberation struggle. He was with his two colleagues, Joseph Msika and Lazarus Nkala. The passage captures in so few words, the image of how man can so easily and quickly destroy what many others have built over time. At the time, his and the ants’ nemesis was Mr Lardner-Burke.

Things have changed since then. I wonder if he would see those who stand in Mr Lardner-Burke’s shoes. I wonder if he would recall the story of the ants; the little creatures that gave him so much pleasure and held so much symbolism, and whether he would see any of it in today’s Zimbabwe, as he did in the then Rhodesia.

Ants are interesting creatures. I know they can also be a nuisance. But I hope that when you next come across an ants’ nest, you’ll pause for a moment before destroying it. Perhaps you too, could learn a thing or two from these little but tenacious and creative creatures.

Alex Magaisa is based at Kent Law School, the University of Kent, and can be contacted at wamagaisa@yahoo.co.uk