"Well, you can afford it"
Haggling for a motorcycle taxi ride in Ibadan, Nigeria, David and I couldn't seem to get anything less than three or four times a generous estimation of the accepted fare. We understand that as an outsider you're always going to pay a little bit more - I think of it as "the Foreigner Tax" - but the prices they demanded were nothing short of sidewalk robbery. Our last (and most formidable) bargaining weapon, the flat refusal and walk-away, didn't even seem to have an effect.
The prices were actually so ridiculous as to render another unusual tactic viable - that of enlisting crowd appeal. Seeing an unconcerned local chillin' like a villain on the sidewalk nearby, I turned and presented the situation, begging his frank opinion.
The man was indeed frank in the most delightfully Nigerian way, but not to the effect that I had hoped:
“Hey, you’re white, so you’re rich! Eh, you can afford to pay any price he asks,” he chortled jovially, in full support of the motorcyclist. The latter bobbed his agreement.
“The richest woman in my country is black,” I informed them both with alacrity.
It's true, but I don’t think they believed me. For them, having white skin was an almost magical passport to huge sums of money, and my claim that I will never know anything like the fortune that Oprah Winfrey has amassed (and legitimately, with her considerable talents) could only be a lie. Even as a wholly grant-dependent student, maybe I do have more than many Nigerians my age. I'm not sure how you would quantify that in terms of the costs of living of our respective countries, or the quality of living, and it is hardly the object of this asinine blog to conduct methodologically valid comparisions between my income and that of the average Nigerian. But assuming I have more, that hardly means I can afford to pay tripled prices through eight months of travel and have any hope of supporting myself the coming year. Besides which, I am still homeless. And even besides that, I was beginning to be fed up with the institutional one-price-for-us-and-another-for-you-whites mentality. Even the entrance fees shamelessly post the discrepancy – Africans - 50 Birr, reads the sign outside Mekele’s National Museum; Foreigners - 300. Considering the museum was built largely with the financial support of European taxpayers, the fairness there is a little fuzzy. The museum would argue that it's reverse fairness: They're just evening out the historical unfairness... and besides, "you can afford to pay it." This ever-present attitude, uncomfortable at first, becomes annoying before long and after a few months, graduates to down-right obnoxious. Post-colonialists can call it whatever they want, but it’s just racism in another dressing.
We ended up paying the tripled fare to go to the bus station. We didn't have a choice, we wanted to catch a bus to Osogbo, and in sprawling Ibadan it would have been several hours' walk otherwise. We swallowed our pride, hopped on, and soon arrived at the side of a crammed minivan happy to welcome us aboard. It was a bad morning for our pockets, though, for there was to be another race-related battle over our seat prices. Neither of us was particularly disposed for that, and there ensued a small scene before things were settled. It felt good to finally be on our way, but I would be displaying my character in an artificially benevolent light if I omitted my highly cranky response to our price problems. A good twenty minutes of the bus trip were spent in self-righteous reflection on African race-based attitudes... especially with respect to my own purportedly racist country.
"Welcome Aboard"
I’ve come to expect certain depreciated standards from the vehicles we depend upon to bum from city to city. I’ve learned to look past the rips, holes, or lack of upholstery and ceiling, to accept each new iteration of smashed windshield as that car’s personal artistic expression. I know well that the dusty, worn dials for climate control on the dash are really just decoration, and never forget in selecting my seat to check which of the windows – true climate control – are stuck shut or open. I get surprised if someone produces a latchable seatbelt and makes me wear it; less so if they produce a detached one and make me drape it as we roll through checkpoints. I’m familiar with all the grunts and groans of an overloaded engine on its last wretched axle, don’t mind waiting at a stalled car for a bit of a push, and always use the external door handle through the window when I want to get out. I watch for stab-happy screws, the odd nail, and rusty exposed bits of metal. But despite their scars, the vehicles can go, or be persuaded to, and that’s all that really matters.
(One thing, however, is guaranteed to be in perfect working order on any car, station wagon, minibus, van; or taxi – the most important organ of any African transport – the horn. Without a working horn, you can’t do squat with a car in a city, though your chances might be better in the countryside. Even in a small town, though, you won’t get far without your horn.. I once spent fifteen minutes timing the longest silence between honks while waiting on a street curb. The record was 4.12 seconds.)
Occasionally the above guarantee - that of go-ability - collapses, and you end up on the side of the road with your bag while the driver tinkers with the engine, everybody looking a little awkward and cross while passengers make that decision to hope or jump ship. Such happened on our way back from Osogbo to Ibadan later that afternoon. The size of the vehicle and decripitude of its engine meant that soon well over a dozen people were lined by the side of the road with their baskets and backpacks. With little else to do, we desperately waved at any passing driver who might have a mind for pity or profit. Another van pulled up and managed to squeeze in a couple of our party, but other than that it seemed a bit hopeless.
We got lucky though; before long a nice-looking sedan - not the type you expect much from in the way of hitchhiking - slowed and stopped a bit ahead. David, I, and another high-class-looking dude, who had been among the most energetic of wavers, all ran up to meet it. The couple inside were quite polite and friendly, and welcomed all three of us to share their leather-upholstery air-conditioned backseat. A moment's guilt about the rest of the passengers - formerly my companions in distress - was admittedly not enough to persuade me to turn down the cushy ride, and we all eagerly hopped in.
The car stereo was playing something saucy that I hadn't heard before and assumed by the language to be local. I was enjoying the style, though I had no idea what it was, when the woman went to change it and pulled out a massive sheaf of CDs. David saw my eyes widen with greed; how I would have LOVED to go through each one of those artists – most of them likely local or regional favourites! – but I would content myself with whichever she chose to showcase for us.
Outside of rap and R&B we were far from American musical territory, but of course the one CD she chose was an American artist, and soon the dinky plinks of a 50s crooner were blaring in the backseat. Gah, such disappointment!
Normally the blessing of such songs is that they’re short - they may be trite, but at least it's only about 90 seconds' worth of trite. Unfortunately, in this particular case the remixed quality of the heavily scratched CD considerably prolonged the song’s original length, and we listened to the singer’s plea to “Put your sweet lips closer to the telephone” for about ten minutes before a bump in the road instantly transferred us to another song. From there we bounced around between half a dozen different verses of about three different songs (without, thankfully, ever landing back on “Sweet Lips”). The couple in the front never noticed a thing, and suspecting it was all for our benefit we never made a peep, but by the time we arrived in Ibadan half an hour later David and I were ready to never hear “Mary.. marry me” ever again.
“Man,” David groaned quietly upon exiting the car, “that’s enough to put you off marriage for the rest of your life..”
But though we had expected to pay something for such by-the-road service, we soon understood the three of us were rather the couple's guests. There would be no payment. If African price-fixing is stunning, let it be said that so is African generosity. But thinking of all the other stranded passengers by the side of the road, I remembered with shame my crankiness of the morning. I said we got lucky, but it wasn't really luck. Though I hated the institution that produced it, David and I had been picked up with Mr. High-Class largely because of being white.
However wrong it is, white means class, white means money; white means that a luxury sedan gliding south in air-conditioned comfort.. that wouldn't normally have stopped for hitchhikers.. did.
Haggling for a motorcycle taxi ride in Ibadan, Nigeria, David and I couldn't seem to get anything less than three or four times a generous estimation of the accepted fare. We understand that as an outsider you're always going to pay a little bit more - I think of it as "the Foreigner Tax" - but the prices they demanded were nothing short of sidewalk robbery. Our last (and most formidable) bargaining weapon, the flat refusal and walk-away, didn't even seem to have an effect.
The prices were actually so ridiculous as to render another unusual tactic viable - that of enlisting crowd appeal. Seeing an unconcerned local chillin' like a villain on the sidewalk nearby, I turned and presented the situation, begging his frank opinion.
The man was indeed frank in the most delightfully Nigerian way, but not to the effect that I had hoped:
“Hey, you’re white, so you’re rich! Eh, you can afford to pay any price he asks,” he chortled jovially, in full support of the motorcyclist. The latter bobbed his agreement.
“The richest woman in my country is black,” I informed them both with alacrity.
It's true, but I don’t think they believed me. For them, having white skin was an almost magical passport to huge sums of money, and my claim that I will never know anything like the fortune that Oprah Winfrey has amassed (and legitimately, with her considerable talents) could only be a lie. Even as a wholly grant-dependent student, maybe I do have more than many Nigerians my age. I'm not sure how you would quantify that in terms of the costs of living of our respective countries, or the quality of living, and it is hardly the object of this asinine blog to conduct methodologically valid comparisions between my income and that of the average Nigerian. But assuming I have more, that hardly means I can afford to pay tripled prices through eight months of travel and have any hope of supporting myself the coming year. Besides which, I am still homeless. And even besides that, I was beginning to be fed up with the institutional one-price-for-us-and-another-for-you-whites mentality. Even the entrance fees shamelessly post the discrepancy – Africans - 50 Birr, reads the sign outside Mekele’s National Museum; Foreigners - 300. Considering the museum was built largely with the financial support of European taxpayers, the fairness there is a little fuzzy. The museum would argue that it's reverse fairness: They're just evening out the historical unfairness... and besides, "you can afford to pay it." This ever-present attitude, uncomfortable at first, becomes annoying before long and after a few months, graduates to down-right obnoxious. Post-colonialists can call it whatever they want, but it’s just racism in another dressing.
We ended up paying the tripled fare to go to the bus station. We didn't have a choice, we wanted to catch a bus to Osogbo, and in sprawling Ibadan it would have been several hours' walk otherwise. We swallowed our pride, hopped on, and soon arrived at the side of a crammed minivan happy to welcome us aboard. It was a bad morning for our pockets, though, for there was to be another race-related battle over our seat prices. Neither of us was particularly disposed for that, and there ensued a small scene before things were settled. It felt good to finally be on our way, but I would be displaying my character in an artificially benevolent light if I omitted my highly cranky response to our price problems. A good twenty minutes of the bus trip were spent in self-righteous reflection on African race-based attitudes... especially with respect to my own purportedly racist country.
"Welcome Aboard"
I’ve come to expect certain depreciated standards from the vehicles we depend upon to bum from city to city. I’ve learned to look past the rips, holes, or lack of upholstery and ceiling, to accept each new iteration of smashed windshield as that car’s personal artistic expression. I know well that the dusty, worn dials for climate control on the dash are really just decoration, and never forget in selecting my seat to check which of the windows – true climate control – are stuck shut or open. I get surprised if someone produces a latchable seatbelt and makes me wear it; less so if they produce a detached one and make me drape it as we roll through checkpoints. I’m familiar with all the grunts and groans of an overloaded engine on its last wretched axle, don’t mind waiting at a stalled car for a bit of a push, and always use the external door handle through the window when I want to get out. I watch for stab-happy screws, the odd nail, and rusty exposed bits of metal. But despite their scars, the vehicles can go, or be persuaded to, and that’s all that really matters.
(One thing, however, is guaranteed to be in perfect working order on any car, station wagon, minibus, van; or taxi – the most important organ of any African transport – the horn. Without a working horn, you can’t do squat with a car in a city, though your chances might be better in the countryside. Even in a small town, though, you won’t get far without your horn.. I once spent fifteen minutes timing the longest silence between honks while waiting on a street curb. The record was 4.12 seconds.)
Occasionally the above guarantee - that of go-ability - collapses, and you end up on the side of the road with your bag while the driver tinkers with the engine, everybody looking a little awkward and cross while passengers make that decision to hope or jump ship. Such happened on our way back from Osogbo to Ibadan later that afternoon. The size of the vehicle and decripitude of its engine meant that soon well over a dozen people were lined by the side of the road with their baskets and backpacks. With little else to do, we desperately waved at any passing driver who might have a mind for pity or profit. Another van pulled up and managed to squeeze in a couple of our party, but other than that it seemed a bit hopeless.
We got lucky though; before long a nice-looking sedan - not the type you expect much from in the way of hitchhiking - slowed and stopped a bit ahead. David, I, and another high-class-looking dude, who had been among the most energetic of wavers, all ran up to meet it. The couple inside were quite polite and friendly, and welcomed all three of us to share their leather-upholstery air-conditioned backseat. A moment's guilt about the rest of the passengers - formerly my companions in distress - was admittedly not enough to persuade me to turn down the cushy ride, and we all eagerly hopped in.
The car stereo was playing something saucy that I hadn't heard before and assumed by the language to be local. I was enjoying the style, though I had no idea what it was, when the woman went to change it and pulled out a massive sheaf of CDs. David saw my eyes widen with greed; how I would have LOVED to go through each one of those artists – most of them likely local or regional favourites! – but I would content myself with whichever she chose to showcase for us.
Outside of rap and R&B we were far from American musical territory, but of course the one CD she chose was an American artist, and soon the dinky plinks of a 50s crooner were blaring in the backseat. Gah, such disappointment!
Normally the blessing of such songs is that they’re short - they may be trite, but at least it's only about 90 seconds' worth of trite. Unfortunately, in this particular case the remixed quality of the heavily scratched CD considerably prolonged the song’s original length, and we listened to the singer’s plea to “Put your sweet lips closer to the telephone” for about ten minutes before a bump in the road instantly transferred us to another song. From there we bounced around between half a dozen different verses of about three different songs (without, thankfully, ever landing back on “Sweet Lips”). The couple in the front never noticed a thing, and suspecting it was all for our benefit we never made a peep, but by the time we arrived in Ibadan half an hour later David and I were ready to never hear “Mary.. marry me” ever again.
“Man,” David groaned quietly upon exiting the car, “that’s enough to put you off marriage for the rest of your life..”
But though we had expected to pay something for such by-the-road service, we soon understood the three of us were rather the couple's guests. There would be no payment. If African price-fixing is stunning, let it be said that so is African generosity. But thinking of all the other stranded passengers by the side of the road, I remembered with shame my crankiness of the morning. I said we got lucky, but it wasn't really luck. Though I hated the institution that produced it, David and I had been picked up with Mr. High-Class largely because of being white.
However wrong it is, white means class, white means money; white means that a luxury sedan gliding south in air-conditioned comfort.. that wouldn't normally have stopped for hitchhikers.. did.
You're quite accurate. Racism does go both ways.
ReplyDeleteI was always particularly annoyed when my fellow PCVs would party in the night clubs in the capital, then pull the 'but I'm a Peace Corps volunteer, not a tourist!' when it came time to pay the excessive price of $2 (split four ways to 50 cents) for the cab ride home in the wee hours of the morning.
And much like your new acquaintance on the road, I, too, took advantage of my white privilege with fairly common frequency.
I think you're wise to call it what it is and reflect upon it. However you come to address the racism that nearly daily faces you, (both from outside and from within if you're much like me), I look forward to reading your thoughts on the matter. Thanks for putting in so much effort to your posts.