Turn Left. No, The Other Left!

Here are some more interesting vehicles we see as we move around Monrovia.

We feel sorry for anyone who is trying to learn how to drive in this town, as often traffic laws seem to be "for the other guy" and the lines painted on the roads are just suggestions, not really lanes. We do give student drivers a lot of room on the road. We are not sure what seasoned drivers are going to do, so a student driver is really a scary thing!

Born to be Wild

Motorcycles have become a big thing here in Liberia in the past two years. When we first arrived, there were few bikes on the road. The Chinese begin importing them into Liberia, and now motorcycles are everywhere.

The bikes are relatively cheap (about $900) and often a entrepreneur will buy a bike and hire a young man to drive it for him. The driver gets paid per day and and for a fee, taxis people around town. It is a prestigious thing to be a motorbike driver. One must have nerves of steel, reflexes of a cat, a sense of immortality, and probably the intelligence of an artichoke to drive a motorcycle on these roads! These guys are crazy!

Sometimes, there will be three, four, and even five people on a motorbike. Often a young child will be in front of the driver, and other children will be sandwiched in between adults. Other items transported via bike include: lumber, bags of coal, baskets, vegetables, brooms, and fish. We once spotted a full drum set being taken to church Sunday morning, and we have also seen a goat on a bike. We managed to get a picture of the chickens and ducks (fast food?) and the guy with the keyboard on his way to Praise Team practice.

"Bridge Over Troubled Water"

I consider myself a rather supportive wife, who over the years has silently (yeah, right!) and graciously (hah!) suffered through many of Dave's "good ideas". I have gone chukkar hunting in Nevada when I was eight months pregnant; I have gone fishing in
northern (unpopulated) California when I was eight months pregnant; I have sat on the back bumper of a AMC Hornet to give it traction on a muddy hillside; I have flown in teeny airplanes; I have climbed ladders, sat on roofs, ridden in trucks bearing over-width loads; I have driven in remote Mexican areas; and now I am living in Liberia.

However, I refuse to drive over bridges that do not seem very safe to me. Plunging into a raging river/stream in a foreign country without Medi-flight available is not my idea of a good time. Since we have been here, I have chosen to walk over some of the bridges rather than ride over them. It seems like a a good plan that one of us be able to tell the authorities what happened! This suits Dave just fine, as then I can take some pictures of him in the Land Cruiser, creeping over the unsafe bridge. He always seems so pleased. What it is with men, anyways? Are they nuts? My theory is that estrogen causes rational thinking, and testosterone...not so much.

Wishing you all a good day. Be safe and, fellas, be reasonable, O.K? For pity's sake, think it through!
Babs

This is what I get for not writing the blog on fun and exciting bridges that I was going to write.
Dave