Day -1

Driving School Day

Who would have thought that we would all have to go back to Driving School! I mentioned all of us even if some of us have our full licenses since our teens! I received my full license when I was seventeen which is quite a while ago! Myself and “Fixer,” were up at 4 A.M. to try to be the first people in the queue. We arrived at the test centre in Mhala at 5 to be greeted by 50 or so others who had been there since 6 PM the previous evening!

The signs were ominous. My fixer told me that we would be out of there by 12.30 latest. Now I thought that this was surely an exaggeration but this is Africa folks and it didn’t turn out to be as easy as a half twelve finish. The Saints patience that I have was tested to the full. We had to form one queue after another and it was really mind numbing stuff. Time in Africa they kept telling me. It’s nothing short of a disgrace. The other people in the class had paid a hefty sum to their own fixer in a so called Driving School but this is just a way to grease palms. The corruption is unbelievable. The Driving School’s get to skip all the queues but that obviously comes at the expense of both the ordinary Joe Soap and the people who pay for the School. It’s a bit of a vicious circle.

The hilarious thing about the day was the eye test. The so called eye test is amounts to a sheet being scrawled on by a government employee. The machine I did the test on wasn’t working so when I looked up to inform the girl of this I saw that all the boxes from one to twelve had already been ticked on my binocular eye test. I my friends have 100% vision!! Another funny one I discovered was that at the bottom of the paper it states that you must take your glasses off when doing the test. Three of the girls on the course had glasses on while doing the test and all got passed even though some of them couldn’t see an Elephant if it was standing in front of them! They paid for the Driving School though! I think you can probably see where I’m going with this!

Finally after the biggest waste of time in history we received our booking date for the actual theory exam. This is only the start of the process. We then have to go to the test centre again and if we pass we will be sent out our Learners Driving License! I’m wondering whether the whole thing is worth it but unfortunately you need to get your Full License to drive any game vehicle. Lots more fun to look forward to. I think you can safely say that even with the waiting list in Ireland it’s a doddle compared to here. Ya gotta love it!