Tales of Repatriation

America 101 - Getting Around

I am currently driving a rental car (try carflexi.com) and it's been glorious. I've spent several hours poodling around Los Angeles and many more hours driving to Lake Arrowhead, into Central California and Northern California. My fancy rental car something or other has all of the bells and whistles so it talks to my phone (the ever-acerbic Siri) and plays my music.

Lovely. Driving in America is easy. I know you'll all say that the roads are "crazy" and "dangerous", but, are they really? Let's talk about "dangerous".

Driving in Egypt requires that you know the rules and that you know how to break all of the rules so you can look out for hazards. People will drive on sidewalks, on the wrong side of the road, the wrong way down a one-way street – the list of violation patterns while driving is endless. Mad Maxx comes to mind. In order to drive in Egypt, one must master the subtle art of horn honking communication. One honk – do you see me? Two honks – I'm coming over. Three honks – LOOK OUT! The first thing I noticed when I got to Cairo was in the incessant symphony of horn honking.

Egyptians drive with their lights off at night – to save the battery. So if you're ever driving out to the Sinai Peninsula at night (as one does to go to the beach), beware the vehicles coming at you absent headlights. (Beware the rogue road-crossing feral camels as well.) When I lived in Cairo, there were a system of checkpoints all along the route to the Sinai. We had to stop at each check point, our car was registered, and then they timed our vehicle between points to ensure that we didn't get lost, attacked, etc. If we failed to show up within the prescribed time allowed between points, the military would come looking for us. It was very daunting at first to pull into a checkpoint only to have a tank pointed at our vehicle alongside several machine guns.

Every year drivers had to go to a downtown Cairo office and pay their yearly registration. At that time, they would also find out how many infractions were logged against them. You see, you were never "pulled over" in Cairo. Instead, a traffic policeman stood on a platform at major intersections and if he felt you had violated some arbitrary law, he'd write down your license plate number and file it in the tombs. My friend went for his yearly registration and was told that he had the equivalent of $250.00US in fines. That was a huge amount at the time. He then negotiated the fines to $175.00US.

When taking one of Cairo's old but somehow lovely black and white taxis, I to consider the time of year as there was an annual "flea migration" that passed through the interiors. As long as I wore some sort of repellant, I survived the plague. These things usually broke down often. One time, I was in a taxi and we were driving over the kobri (ko-bree - bridge) near my house when the car just stopped. It wasn't going to make it over the summit. Not to worry, we just sat and waited and eventually a car came behind us and gently tapped us and then pushed us over the top after which my chariot ignited once more and we buzzed along.

In Kenya, in addition to driving a car which takes equal parts grit, aggression and patience, one can also take use of the myriad public transport options – busses, matatus, motorbike taxis (piki piki), taxis, and Uber, etc.

Public transport, particularly matatus (mini-bus) are incredibly unsafe. Matatu drivers are paid "per run". The faster they complete a run from say a suburb to town, the more they can earn. Matatu drivers usually drive 14 hours a day and they chew miraa (a stimulant grown in Somali that looks like alfalfa) to stay awake. I took a total of about 7 matatus in my 11 years in Kenya. At one point, matatus became notorious for showing porn on screens while riders suffered their route to/from town every day. They also took to housing pathetic gold fish in small tanks as decoration. Some matatus offered wifi hotspots so riders could surf while heading to work. That might sound interesting (or not), but matatus are largely very old, destroyed, and held together by luck and duct tape and just incredibly unsafe. In Congo, a matatu is essentially a van with wooden benches in place.

From time to time, I drove a 1970 Land Rover 109 (Defender) in Kenya that I "stole" from friends. This was a rugged, old, hard core vehicle that had survived many battles. I was sitting in traffic one day and a matatu buzzed through a petrol station car park and came out the other side and tried to cut in. I was not having it. I was WEARY of matatus not wanting to wait their turn like everyone else in miserable Kenyan traffic. So, I engaged the matatu driver. I would not budge. I would not let him in. The driver, and eventually the tout (the guy that collects the fare) started to shout and threaten me. Eventually the driver said he was going to hit my tank. Go ahead, I encouraged him, have at it. He then lurched forward (with a vehicle full of riders) and "bumped" the tank. The 1970 Land Rover Defender. Needless to say, the tank had a scratch and the matatu needed a new headlight and some other work. The riders cheered me on. The police ignored us.

#dontmesswithmeinthetank

When I was finally able to have a car in Kenya, I drove a 15 year old Mercedes C Class sedan. It was lovely. It was very heavy, focused, and had some fire despite the years. I took a defensive (tactical) driving course at one point in Kenya and the instructor told the class that my car, of all the cars present, would survive an intentional collision. So, I had that going for me.

Singapore, as you can imagine, is hyper connected and the busses and metro work seamlessly all of the time. Apps, like Citimapper, tell you exactly when a bus will arrive, what type of bus it will be, and how long it will take to complete your journey. And it's cheap. You can spend the equivalent of $1.00US to cross the island. Every bus and every metro car is air conditioned, clean, and very comfortable. I used to take the bus quite often. It gave me podcast time and it was a lot cheaper than a taxi or Grab (Uber equivalent).

I took a bus in LA about two weeks ago as my niece and I commuted to the #BLM protest. It was all very civilized and efficient. I have to admit, however, as a SoCal native, the thought of riding public transportation in LA felt wrong. It just isn't something that anyone I ever knew did in LA – or anywhere else. We have a car addiction.

My best memory riding mass transit was in Egypt. The subway had women's only cars so women could ride safely without getting harassed. Whenever I got into a car and sat down, I was almost always greeted with warm smiles and, inevitably, a mama (a woman over 40 let's say), would stroke my hair and say "jamila" (beautiful).

Sure, having a nice car and driving is fun. But has your car ever greeted you after sitting down with, "hey Jamila", before it started?

I don't think so.

#weallneedamamainthecar

#cairo

#nairobi

#traffic

#expat

#repatriation

#masstransit

#expattales