Taxi-brousse

Wednesday, February 08, 2017
Ambositra, Madagascar
There was one moment when even the driver was badly rattled. A bicycle approached, with a truck closing in on it. In such cases, which had been very frequent on the two-lane national highway south of the capital, the driver of our shared taxi van (taxi-brousse) judges that there is room on the road for all three to pass simultaneously, and assumes that each will take precisely his due portion. Time after time everyone gets it just right -- the skill and judgment involved are incredible. 
But in this case, something happened which, although inexplicable, can only be expected from time to time. The truck gave the cyclist too wide a berth, leaving not enough room for our van to pass. Our driver had not slowed down at all -- the precautionary principle was unknown to him. There was a considerable lip at the edge of the pavement. Going off at 90 km/h would quite possibly have resulted in a loss of control and crash down a slope. Braking suddenly, the driver swerved expertly so that the tires must have been right at the edge of the pavement, and slowed just enough that the truck was able to clear our lane just before we would have struck it. He then slowed even further and took a long look back, and this betrayed the fact that he had been surprised.
That was the one case where our lives were in danger, but we frequently endangered others. We barrelled through towns with streets full of cyclists and pedestrians at 80 km/h. You toot your horn and if they don't get out of the way, that's their problem. A toddler toddling toward the roadway is no reason to apply the brakes. A pedestrian, even though his back is to the traffic, steps off the pavement a fraction of a second before the taxi's mirror would have clipped him; or else he does not step off, and the taxi swerves to miss him by inches.
Now consider that the road in places is full of potholes, and everything about the rattletrap vehicle -- brakes, steering, suspension -- is suspect.  
On this trip Immédia had secured for me the coveted right front seat, so I had a good view. He had picked me up at 6:15 at the hotel for the short transfer to the taxi-brousse station. We were besieged by touts as we approached the station. He impressed upon me that I must always ignore them and go directly to the ticket office. The word was that my taxi was to leave at 7. Time passed, as at least a dozen other taxis departed for the same destination, while I stood beside my taxi watching my luggage on the roof. Around 8 am it was tied down and I could relax a bit. For no apparent reason, our taxi was parked in front of the gate, where the others could only get around it with difficulty -- sometimes they had to reverse in order to make the turn. Vendors were walking around selling various kinds of cheap goods, watches, clothing, children's toys, phones, but surprisingly little food other than some awful-looking fried dough.
A man came up and asked to see my ticket. He said he was the driver and I should give him 10 000 ariary for the luggage (the ticket had cost 19 000). When I started to head for the ticket office to "verify" this, he changed his mind.
We left at 9:30. My seat-belt had no buckle. But in a nice touch there was a small fire-extinguisher strapped below the roof. We were stopped at at least half a dozen police checkpoints along the way, always briefly. They just glanced inside and waved us on. It was one of the most hair-raising rides I have experienced. The driver thought he was at Le Mans, and to give him his due he might do well there.

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2025-02-17

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