Dear Friends
To tell the truth I’m a bit of a transport geek…..there I’ve said it…… but don’t get me wrong I’ve never stood at the end of the platform, note pad in hand or anything like that, it’s just that I like, I mean, really like, trains. And it’s not just trains, there’s trams, boats, even buses do it for me, double-deckers of course, and there’s something almost poetic about the turning circle of a black cab. Anyway the point of all this is that until recently I thought it was just me, well maybe me and a few others (Nicholas Gubbins) who hid our anoraks under a bushel, until a chance conversation with some of my colleagues this week.
Most Namibians won’t have been outside of Namibia, and for those who have, very few will have travelled beyond southern Africa. It was particularly exciting therefore for some of the OYO staff and the young people we work with, to be given the opportunity to travel abroad. A collaboration with a Berlin youth dance group, supported by the German government, German and Namibian youth working and performing together, both in Berlin and Windhoek. And on another occasion a Dutch based funder, invited OYO staff to Amsterdam to share their experiences. Interested to hear of my colleagues impressions of Europe, I asked Evelina, our very bright PR and Operations Coordinator, what she thought of Berlin. “Ohhh” she said as if she was remembering biting into chocolate “the public transport, it was amazing…”. And then there was Alfa, our unwaivingly cheerful and polite Regional Coordinator, who when telephoning his OYO colleagues will always say “Hello Mr Lesley” or “Hello Miss Grace” before slipping into the more familiar “brother” or “sister”, who replied when I asked him about Amsterdam “Ooh Mr Alan” his eyes literally sparkling “the trams…”.
These were bright, talented and, frankly, ‘cool’ young people. Maybe, I thought, maybe I’ve been ‘cool’ all these years! The delusion didn’t last, clearly this was not so much a transport love-in, as a comment on the contrast between public transport systems here and those in the wealthy nations of Europe. The vast majority of Namibians don’t have a car, you see. Of the twenty one people working for OYO there’s only one, me, who owns a vehicle, so other than travel by bicycle there are limited options.
Within the city, apart from a limited number of diesel belching municipal busses, which travel irregularly across town, the only public transport is the ubiquitous taxi. Now these aren’t taxi’s like the black cabs we know, these are small saloon cars which have generally seen better days plying up and down the main arterial routes, charging a fixed fare of seven dollars fifty (about 60 pence), picking people up and dropping people off along the route, the drivers tooting at every pedestrian encouraging them to take a lift.
It can be quite interesting as you find yourself squeezed in beside all sorts of folk. An early taxi ride saw me sitting beside two Herero ladies, their traditional dress based on that of the German missionaries of the nineteenth century, unfeasibly layered dresses with lacework edges and starch stiffened head scarves, shaped to resemble the horns of a cow, extending horizontally from each side of the head by some two feet. In the front seat a workman, who appeared to be carrying a dozen bricks, neatly stacked on his lap. “Nice bricks” I said trying to strike up a conversation. “Yes, these are good bricks” he replied. Some folk like trains I guess, others bricks….
In our first week I had taken a few taxis so I fancied myself as an old hand by my first day at work. We live on the main road to Katatura, the large township in the north of the city so there are streams of taxi’s in the morning heading into town. Sure enough as soon as I stepped out of the front gate a taxi stopped. “Can you take me to Saiderhauf?” I said to the driver, referring to the neighbourhood in the south of town where OYO is based. “Oh no, no” he said and drove off. I tried again, a few times, but it was always the same. I changed tack. “Can you take me to town?” “Where?” “Fidel Castro” I said, giving the name of one of the main streets in the city centre. “Yes, yes” and we were on our way. Most of the taxis from Katatura run into town and then back out again, repeating the process until they run out of passengers. To get to work I needed to take a cab into town and then another out again. Not knowing, however, where the taxis running south left from, I made my way up Fidel Castro (Namibians always seem to drop the ‘Street’ from addresses) picking up my step as I went, worried I would be late for work on my first day. I reached Robert Mugabe, (ironically home to the British High Commission), which is a main road running north to south, and looked anxiously for an approaching cab. There was remarkably little traffic. Almost jogging now I was relieved to see a battered old taxi wheezing and coughing its way up the hill. I enthusiastically flagged it down. There was just one passenger, a rather large gentlemen sitting in the front seat beside the ageing, smartly dressed taxi driver, who addressed me, like older Namibians often do, in Afrikaans. ‘Could you take me to Sauderhauf?” I panted, in English. “Yees, yees” he said in his Afrikaans accent “but first I go clean window”, I was a little surprised “First you go clean window?” I repeated. “Yees” he said. The large gentlemen smiled. “Okay” I said.
The cab turned off Robert Mugabe and headed east, the driver frantically slipping the clutch up an incline. I looked at the car windows, they were spotless, in fact, in contrast to its mechanical state, the whole car was spotless. Something here didn’t feel right. We’d been warned about pirate taxis preying on unsuspecting tourists, taking them out of town and robbing them of their belongings, but the large gentlemen passenger, and the ageing taxi driver? They certainly didn’t seem likely pirates. “Where do you go to clean window?” I said. “Not far, nearby, clean window” replied the taxi driver “Not far, nearby” repeated the large gentleman. “Service station, clean window service station” added the driver. This seemed to make some sense, petrol stations in Namibia all being called service stations and when you fill with fuel, the attendant always washes your windscreen. Sure enough, within a couple of minutes we pulled into a service station. The passenger paid his fare and stepped out, the elderly driver immediately pulling the wheel around and heading back the way we came, slipping his clutch as we entered the stream of traffic. There was to be no window washing here. “But you were going to clean window” I said. “Yees, yees” replied the driver pointing to the large neigbourhood sign, the type of sign that marks the boundary to every neighbourhood in the city. The sign read Klein Windhoek, (little Windhoek), which to novice ears, sounds in Afrikaans rather like clean window…
I was late for work. I told my colleagues why, they laughed like drains. Later I told my friend Iita, the tears streamed down his face as he repeated over and over again clean window, clean window….
Some weeks later I was commenting on the ability of my colleagues to speak numerous languages, they all speak at least two local languages, often more, as well as English and Afrikaans. “I’m afraid I only speak one language” I said. “Yes, but Mr Alan we are generalists, you are a specialist” said Selma kindly, and then as she left the room without turning her head.. “Clean windows, Mr Alan”……..
Have a good weekend everyone.
Alan
(editorial note: Alan actually cycles a 10 mile round trip to work every day... the car is all mine...mwah ha ha ha)
