Rush Hour Ugliness

On Wednesday afternoon, I was heading to town in a dala-dala. Heading uphill toward town, there was a tractor parked on the (non-existent) shoulder blocking most of the lane for oncoming traffic, which made the road rather dangerous as impatient drivers tried to get past. The driver of the tractor was sitting there smiling and even turned the key to show everyone that the vehicle was dead. The driver of the dala-dala shouted at the tractor driver "Move your truck!" and added for good measure "Then go and take a bath!" The other passengers laughed at this, but I was not amused.

Then, just when it seemed like traffic was getting better after we passed the tractor, a column of young men with rifles started moving through the street. The common outfit revealed them to be soldiers, but few of them could be considered marching, more like trying to keep up (to be fair, I would probably be a lousy marcher as well, but I don't think that narrow city streets at rush hour are the best place to practice). At first glance, it looked like most of them were in their early teens, but I was relieved when we moved closer and I saw that most of them were probably around 20. Unfortunately, there was no way to pass them, so we had to follow them at a slow jogging pace until they turned onto another street.

But as we were tail-gaiting them (yep, the vehicle felt compelled to drive right behind them) a bicycle was riding alongside us on the (still non-existent) shoulder. I'm not sure if it was boredom or something else, but the driver decided to steer the vehicle (remember, this is a full mini-bus) right at the cyclist. He tried this twice and the passengers just laughed as he did it. The cyclist struggled to keep his balance while avoiding getting hit and shouted at the driver "I hope your car breaks!" The passengers just laughed harder.

I thought about getting out right there and finding another vehicle, but I knew it was a bad idea to engage with this driver. It's a shame that the other passengers encouraged him. In some ways, I was even angrier with them. I was glad that the last five minutes of the ride were uneventful, but I was disgusted by the whole scene.