The good in Kigali's traffic jams

The days when the words “traffic jam” and “Kigali” could not feature in the same sentence are slowly but surely ebbing away, past us. As things are at the moment, the two are getting ever cozier, ever closer together. Traffic jams have of late been making their long, arduous journey from the other regional capitals into the C.o.K. But wait before you go all out against the growing trend of automobile gridlock on Kigali’s roads. For starters, a traffic jam offers the rare and perfect opportunity to get very up close-and-personal with the road monsters of choice on Kigali roads –that’s right; the Toyota Land Cruiser V8. The V8, in all its might and glory, is a beautiful sight to behold on the road, off-road, in the car port –anywhere. But even better is the sight of this beast when it succumbs to the laws of traffic and public order, where one would have thought that it’s way above any man-made law. And, lest it skips my mind before sharing it, a Land Cruiser V8 is in a league with no other make of car –well at least on Kigali’s roads. For that reason, it deserves (and usually gets) a different kind of treatment than your usual Starlets and Carina and Corolla and Premio and Ipsum and what not: A V8 is not driven. No. We do not refer to the process of moving this monstrosity of a ride from point A to point B as “driving”. We do not drive a V8. We pound it. That’s right; we pound a Land Cruiser V8 to move it from point C to point D. But after a bout of admiring the V8 in thick traffic for a while, then what next? Shop till you black out It’s the height of immorality to purchase such cheap items of utility as mobile phone credit from big investors’ shops and malls and supermarkets. God is watching you, the culprit in this abominable vice. The reason God created traffic jam in the first place, is so that people who vend airtime can earn a fairly decent income for acting as ill-paid moving billboards for their respective telecom bosses. This way, the temptation to supplement their meager incomes with petty crime is kept at bay. And do not argue with me about the veracity in this assertion because unlike you, I have hustled as a telecom mobile billboard in the past. In fact, my superb communication and persuasion skills partly accrue from this. Traffic jams are also good for students as it’s the perfect chance to delve right into that Chemistry or Physics “homework” because who started this thing of dolling out school work that can’t be finished from school but has to be dragged home? Did it ever cross this person’s mind that some students have to leave their wives and children home to go attend school? The last thing that such students want is someone encroaching on their precious family time. Text away iPhones and smart phones were not invented only so we can post pictures of edited and fanciful versions of our otherwise sad lives. These gadgets were also created to serve the purpose of a conduit for our real life struggles and frustrations. Yes, go right ahead, take selfies of a sad you stuck in traffic gridlock, and share on your social media handles so the whole world will know that the hustle is real.

Lifestyle

The good in Kigali's traffic jams