Dancing in Bamako
Don’t you love the scenes in period films where they dance
the quadrille or some other stylized dance so beautifully? I always wish I knew
the steps so I could join in.
Driving in Bamako is a little like one of those dances, and
I’ve actually learned to enjoy it! For one thing, one is not limited by nuisances
such as red lights. Oh, they are there, but they don’t always mean Stop, like
in America. Sometimes they mean, Turn left now that oncoming traffic has to
stop. Or turn right now that the motorcycles have to stop. (There’s not a
blanket “Turn right on red after stop” rule like in America; do this at the
wrong intersection and you risk getting a
ticket)!
I most enjoy the intersections where the traffic lights are
not functioning. That’s where you really learn to dance, edging forward to look
for your opening and then plunging gracefully through.
It’s not all as graceful and perfect as it sounds, of
course. Remember the scene in BBC’s Pride
and Prejudice when Lizzie Bennett had to rebuke Mr. Collins for his
missteps? The local minibuses which provide public transportation to the
masses, called SOTRAMAs, are the Mr. Collinses of Bamako traffic. They go where
they will and as they will. Most of the drivers have not learned the correct
steps to the dance (I’m not even sure if most of them have actually learned to
drive), and they don’t care to, either. They plunge willy-nilly into traffic as
if they didn’t even know it was a dance!
Finally, imagine again that scene in P&P. What if a prankster had released hundreds
of cockroaches onto the dance floor, and suddenly everyone had to dance La Cucaracha at the same time as the
minuet or the scotch reel? That is what it’s like dealing with the myriad motorbikes
of Mali, massing and merging like a swarming horde of maggots, making
the dance miserable and maladroit.
If it weren’t for them, driving in Bamako would be perfect.
Almost. [To be fair, Bamako traffic was evidently the worst part of my daughter's-in-law trip here last year, so not everyone sees it from the same perspective.]
