Imagine yourself sitting at traffic. Your destination is only 10 kms away and it takes you an hour to get there! Ok, I know all of you are saying that all metropolitan cities have bad traffic. But let’s not compare Nairobi with any metropolitan city we know. Even the population of Nairobi doesn’t compare to metropolitan cities around the world.
Anyway, since we moved here, I try not to drive as much as possible. It’s not because there is traffic (I drove in Istanbul and beltway in DC), but because of the reckless driving of matatus and buses, very slow moving people and cars (it is like watching a movie in a slow motion!), huge holes in the roads, no traffic lights or signs whatsoever.
So I was driving my kids to school on Langata Road this
morning, when all of a sudden, traffic stopped. Still being naive about Nairobi
traffic, I thought there was an accident or something pretty bad had happened,
otherwise why would you stop and not be able to move an inch for 30-40 minutes,
right? There’s gotta be a reasonable explanation.
Well, not really! After the cars started to move little by
little, I saw a man standing next to his car, in the middle of the road talking
on his cellphone. It seemed like his car broke down, which is totally
understandable, but neither he nor people around him bothered to move his car
to the left, where you let the traffic move. Here, people do not bother to
provide assistance-- you are on your own. If you do not have basic common sense
(like moving your broken car to the side, or giving way to other cars if you
drive a heavy weight truck), you ruin other people's days in the traffic for
something could be solved very easily!
Drive safe, and stay away from matatus!
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