LET THE SYMPHONY START

The traffic in Johannesburg is very bad and the reasons for this uncomfortable situation are not at all important.

 

What is important is that we learn to do everything we need at certain times of the day, to avoid being stuck in the huge traffic jam.

The second important teaching is to drive avoiding accidents with the taxis. Johannesburg taxis are a plague. You can tell yourself You are a good driver when you know how taxis drive and behave accordingly to their absolute lack of respecting the least of the rules of the driving code. Driving code? What language is that?

Those taxis are basically old Toyota minibus that can take up to 12 people; they don’t show the destination on the vehicle but the people in the streets make special signs with their hands which represent the destination required: so the taxi driver, who usually drives at the highest speed, when he sees that the client’s destination corresponds to the taxi one, he stops all of a sudden to get the client. No indicator, of course. To do their respectable job, they cut the way in front of you stopping the taxi dead.

The same when a client has to get off the taxi: if the windows were big enough, I bet people would be jumping outside in motion. The poor one can be left in the middle of a national road.

Once you have avoided the taxi, you must try not to run over the pedestrian still dizzy from the run…

Because they carry cash money and the level of crime is high, the taxi drivers also carry big guns. So, I think it is good to avoid any fight with them John Wayne movie’s style does not work for me.

The “normal “ taxis here are called SAFE CAB DO YOU GET THE POINT? And there are not so many…

 

There is another category of people, working in the middle of the busiest streets: the sellers of soft drinks who are waiting for customers .When the traffic light is green, and cars speed off, they do not move an inch, staying in the middle holding their trays of drinks with acrobatic mastery. They are simply glued on the hot concrete.

It didn’t took me long to get used to those “exotic” variations to the European boring respect of rules not that much in Italy, I must say.

 

There is another exciting unexpected event that can influence a lot the duration of travel. The traffic light OUT OF ORDER.

This usually happens, in the busiest street, at least once a week how kind of you thinking once a week and it creates traffic jams lasting forever… So you plan to get to that specific place in half an hour, and it takes 1 hour and a half… And the same traffic light will be out of order for few days who knows how difficult is to repair a traffic light?

 

Phewww……

 

Once you have learnt that the rule is NO RULES it is easy to have an enjoyable drive having all your senses sharp and focused, listening to your favourite music or to your kids fighting in the car, whatever relaxes you the most.

 

Although I have designed my life in order to avoid the traffic, once a week I drop the kids off at school in the morning (I usually collect…) and get stuck on my way back.

 

Then the symphony starts. 

 

I put the radio on Classic FM and start enjoying the show around me. People’s faces, driving to work. Angry faces, stressed faces, smiling faces. They are all main characters of my play shame they don’ t know about it with their stories and feelings. With their habits too. Drinking coffee and smoking in the car, putting make up on, talking loudly on the cell phone, exploring treasures in the hidden corners of the nostrils…. adjusting bras and underwear… I mean that is a reality show, the only one I watch, something not to miss at all cost.

 

The classical music is still on, I feel like I can see the orchestra director conducting the rhythm, organizing the notes and melody. It is a slow motion image where all my actors perform in a silent film where I, the Spectator, can guess the feelings and enjoy the pictures. Because I feel absolutely detached. I just let myself go to the rhythm of Life, absolutely overwhelmed by the dance around me. All things considered, whether you hate or love the traffic, THE SHOW MUST GO ON.

 

 

Love & Rainbow