Driving in Kenya is an interesting experience. You have to drive very defensively and assume that everybody else on the road is out to get you. The national papers frequently carry stories about horrendous pile-ups involving buses and matatus, (mini bus taxis – pronounced ma ta too). The constant carnage on the roads is a national scandal.
Our Landrover is a very old vehicle. It was made in 1987 and has seen some pretty tough action on unforgiving roads. You don’t really steer it. It’s more like sailing, as the steering is probably the most fatigued part of the vehicle. It’s quite safe, once you get used to it, and we regularly have it tightened up. With a top speed of 80 kph, (50 miles per hour), we aren’t exactly setting land speed records on any of our journeys. Driving defensively basically means driving fairly slowly.
The most harrowing thing about driving to Kisumu is the buses. They come hurtling towards you as they race to Nairobi, hell bent on being first there and making a quick turn around for the return journey. I have visions of the bus drivers as drug fuelled speed merchants who never sleep and have a casual disregard for life and limb – especially other people’s. The roads between Kosele and Kisumu aren’t very wide and the drop off at the side of some stretches would be enough to give the Landrover a serious shaking at the very least. In addition to the break neck speeds the buses travel at the way they ‘crab’ across the road is also very worrying. Nearly all of the buses that come towards you look like the body is set at a slant to the chassis – a kind of extra side swipe capability to make sure they get you one way or another. The only thing you can do as they come past is grip the wheel firmly and try to maintain a position just your side of the white line down the middle of the road. Sometimes this manoeuvre feels a bit to close to playing chicken for comfort.
The other problems on the roads are; the matatus, (minibuses that provide a fast ‘bus’ service between towns), white taxis, all the other drivers, motor cyclists, pushbikes and potholes. The matatu drivers are probably nice friendly, home loving kind of guys when they aren’t matatu driving. Unfortunately that probably isn’t very often. The only way the matatu operators can make a living is to pile as many passengers as possible in per journey and to get from A to B as fast as possible to maximise the number of journeys in a day. They too probably stay awake on all kinds of concoctions and hardly ever sleep. They tend to fly up and down the road in packs, racing each other to the next passenger and beeping their horns at anything or anybody that gets in the way. They have inspiring names like ‘Determination’, ‘Never Say Die’, 'Terminator', ‘Jesus Saves’ and the like.
In England white van drivers are, stereotypically, the worse drivers on the road. In Kenya it is, to be honest, hard to differentiate to this extent. I do think, however, that anybody who has the desire to own or drive a white taxi, (these days usually the estate car version that I have blogged about previously), should automatically be barred from driving for life. I have had similar thoughts about white van drivers in England. The economics of operating a public transport vehicle make it impossible to drive safely and make a profit. Speed and turnaround time are of the essence. The white taxi drivers are sneakier than the matatus. As they are generally quicker and less easy to spot in the rear view mirror they can kind of creep up on you. Once rammed up your rear bumper they blast the horn for you to get out of the way so they can squeeze past in the space between you and the oncoming traffic. This is particularly hazardous if you are, at the same time, trying to pull out into the road to avoid the cyclist carrying a wide load on his passenger rack, (like a door frame or settee – I kid you not!).
The rules for driving at night in Kenya are the same as stated above only more so. We were a bit late getting away from Kisumu tonight so it was dark after about the first half of the journey. Three extra hazards present themselves at night. Pedestrians, cyclists and speed bumps. (Actually the speed bumps are also a problem in the daytime, but they really come into their own at night).
As you drive along a road at night in Kenya people and bicycles kind of loom up out of the dark at you. The people are spookier than the cyclists, though usually less dangerous, (apart from those who have a death wish and seem to wait for you to be driving along before they dash across the road). In the early evening you have the impression of some large, ghostly army on the move, made up of every kind of individual. All with the sole purpose of freaking you out and getting you to crash into the vehicle approaching from the other direction.
The cyclists are also a nightmare. More likely to be carrying passengers than wide loads at this time of day, none of the bikes that you pass have lights. There is an almost uniform look to bicycles in Kenya. Most of them are made in China and have black frames. They tend to be pedalled by black people and to carry dark coloured passengers. They are, to all intents and purposes, the ultimate stealth weapon – invisible until you are on top of them, at which point they force you into evasive action.
The west could learn a thing or two about traffic calming from Kenya. Kenya is home to the most effective speed bumps in the world – capable of forcing vehicles to go from 60 to 0 miles per hour in seconds. They come in a variety of forms. The most irritating type consists of two to six thin, shallow bumps with a tiny gap between them Whatever speed you cross them at you feel your teeth rattle and get the impression that your vehicle is going to shake itself apart before the crossing has finished. Then there are the mountainous bumps – only passable in first gear at very low speed. You kind of crawl up and over this type of speed bump or risk serious damage to your vehicle. The most lethal kind is the ‘vigilante’ type. This speed bump is usually made of a combination of mud, rocks and occasionally concrete and is put up by members of a community once they have got completely fed up with the Grand Prix that races through their town or village every day. They are erected without warning or signposts and are just the right height and shape to make every passenger in a vehicle crack his or her head on the roof if passed over at speed. This often happens. The vigilante speed bump must, I imagine, be made in the dead of the night, (perhaps that’s what all the people on the move are doing), as this gives maximum advantage to surprise the following morning in the war against reckless driving.
Having said all of this we did get home safely - shaken by the last bit of rough road and surprised by the number of new, deeper potholes, but otherwise OK. I was, at least, able to see all of the hazards described above with extra clarity thanks to the new windscreen, and was able to dodge around obstacles with ease because of the newly tightened steering. Thanks Hamir.
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