You're It!

Driving outside of your own country is always a challenge. Road signs are different, the rules are different, even the roads themselves are different (sometimes paved, sometimes dirt, sometimes gravel, sometimes not much more than a trail). Driving in a third world country is a special challenge. Not only are all of the above applicable but frequently one shares the roads with pedestrians, animals, vendors, carts drawn by oxen, donkeys or humans, people who have no concept of vehicles, and so-called VIP’s who have their own flashing lights, sirens and men with guns to make you move out of their way or at least make you feel threatened when there is no possibility of moving out of the way. There is also the challenge of drivers who are afraid of driving, afraid of their vehicle or, worse, have no driving skills and are not afraid of flaunting that. I once read a line in a book describing traffic in India. The author noted that approaching an intersection it occurred to her that the traffic jam looked as though all of the vehicles had been scooped up into a dice cup, shaken, and tossed back out. It’s a much nicer way of describing what I simply call a cluster f*#@k! I have lived in countries where traffic is a game played by millimeters, horns have their own language (and woe to those who do not understand it or how to get those dulcet tones from their own horns), shopping is done from the comfort of your own car, and distance is measured in hours per mile. Dealing with what is known in Nigeria as “go slows” no longer bothers me. For everyone who commutes on a daily basis and complains about the 90-minute trip around the Beltway (Washington, DC area folk get that reference) I say, “Hey – traffic is moving. Sit for 3 hours without moving while in sight of your destination then we’ll talk.” Ok, I complain when I am on the Beltway too so I do understand but, really, it can be worse. Where I live at the moment is worse. The streets are paved, the roads are wide, there are traffic cops and lights that may or may not work (that goes for both the lights and the cops), and relatively little traffic. Sounds good, doesn’t it? Imagine a 6 lane divided highway with two cars going in the same direction that you are going. One is in the far left lane, one is in the far right lane and you are in the middle lane. You would like to go past them as they are moving very slowly. But the car in the right lane begins to drift (slowly) toward the middle lane. The car in the left lane does the same. You must slow down to avoid hitting both of them so you slow down and decide to move to the left to go around them. Now they both begin drifting back to their original positions. There is no way to get around them as they drift with no rhyme nor reason to the pattern of the drift. Now add 25 (or 50 or 100) more cars to the same scene and they all drift inexplicably across the lanes. The only time any of these vehicles speed up is in a residential area (and then it is 65 miles an hour down the street) or when approaching an intersection. The driver of a car making a left turn will look to the right while pulling out to turn across oncoming traffic. A car parked on the side of a road (or highway) will pull back into traffic at the speed of a tortoise without ever checking for traffic. I will not even attempt to describe intersections except to say the descriptions earlier in this blog are both accurate. Accidents here are frequent and deadly. Buckling up is essential. It won’t save your life but it sure makes finding the bodies easier. I have come to the conclusion that driving here is like playing pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. Only everyone else is blindfolded, the room is only 12’x12’, 50 people are playing and you must avoid being stuck by the pin.