Potholes, drunks, signs, and opinions

Potholes: ties that bind?
A bakkie spotted in a Pietermaritzburg parking lot.
(Photo: S. Galleymore, 2018.)

Potholes, fascinating. Drunks? Not so much. 

“Potholes” is not a sign seen in California, so the first time I saw one in South Africa I assumed isiZulu (as in “ama-po-tol-es”) …until the front end of my car bounced in and out of a crater in a main road: ah ha! (Not South African? See examples of potholes.)

Acclimated now, I veer hither and thither across public roads avoiding potholes like every other driver. Moreover, since shooting the picture of the road sign used as background on this blog (taken near Ingomankulu, KZN), I've come to appreciate the power of potholes. They offer insight into our nation and present enormous potential. 

Potholes potential 

Every South African, from drivers of the fanciest to the humblest vehicles, to passengers and pedestrians, knows a pothole. By presenting “nothing” where “something” ought to be, potholes highlight the conflict between rates-paying South Africans and rates-challenged municipalities. Potholes’ axle-grinding ubiquity forces equality across all people and political persuasion. And therein lies their power. Wouldn’t every South African clamor to support the political party that disappeared the country’s potholes? Fix the potholes, rule the country. (Don’t tell Juju!)

Recently, a local newspaper profiled two eighty-year-old  pensioners, gatvol with the status quo, who voluntarily filled potholes in their neighborhood, and at their own expense. Soon after, municipal road workers binged on partially filling potholes around town. In my neighborhood, workers went further. They filled potholes… resurfaced the road, both sides…painted lines, both sides …for five hundred meters. Then, finished and klaar, they left the rest of that road and all the other roads in the neighborhood as rough, torn, and dangerous as ever.

The cynical might see that as a metaphor, but I’m optimistic. Potholes communicate a positive message in our subliminal lingua franca: we’re all in this together.

More on potholes

Billions needed to fix KZN roads.  Kerushun Pillay, The Witness, 28 December 2017.

City settles pothole damages claim.  Sherlissa Peters. NEWS.  19 September 2014.

Woman sues over pothole in KZN. 27 January 2009. 
This article courtesy of Arrive Alive describes 53-year-old Hluphile Elda Zuma's law suit after she lost her arm in a taxi-meets-pothole  accident.
("Slaggate" is Afrikaans for potholes. "Passop! Moerse Gatte," translates roughly to "Beware! Murderously Large Holes.")

Photo (c) Arrive Alive or the Natal Witness.


Drunks: some facts

Since I’m back and forth—California/KZN—I switch sensibilities as required. My American sensibilities find the photo of the bakkie's bumper sticker funny, poignant... and culturally accurate.

In California, and many other states, penalties for Driving While Intoxicated (formerly DUI, now DWI) on American roads include loss of one's driver's license, higher insurance premiums, and a difficult-to-expunge police record (easier if you're a politician or a rich or prominent person). Worse, MADD, Mothers against Drunk Driving, raises public awareness about and relentlessly pursues repeat offenders (including, perhaps especially, the rich and prominent). Harsh penalties for public intoxication do not prevent drunkenness but they diminish it. Imagine spending a night in a drunk tank (jail cell) with other drunks and puddles of collective vomit. Sobering. 

My South African sensibilities find casual references to drunkenness and drunk driving par for the course here, simply business as usual. Drunkenness is South Africa's national past time, normalized as a way to socialize and communicate with family and friends, and a state of being to which one aspires. WHO ranks  South Africa “one of the top 20 biggest drinking nations in the world”... only behind Poland...and “the third biggest drinking nation in Africa.” The report states, “Among the drinking population...South Africans consume [about] 27 litres of pure alcohol per capita per year, one of the highest rates in the world.”

Business Tech explains, “More than a quarter of the drinking population in South Africa are [sic]...binge drinkers, consuming at least 60 grams or more of pure alcohol in one session within a 30-day period.”

Additionally, Professor David Nutt, Psychopharmacology Unit, University of Bristol rated alcohol “the second most addictive substance” in the world (it scored 2.2 out of a maximum of 3; heroin, scoring 2.5, is the most addictive). 

None of this surprises me. Alcohol grips three generations of males in my family-of-origin and has done so since they were teenagers. The results of alcohol’s effects on them and their families is …sobering… to any observer, yet not to them. Addiction to alcohol prevents them from recognizing effects. They appear to experience drunkenness as a hilarious state of being.

Dangerous combinations

South Africa has “the highest prevalence of road deaths associated with alcohol abuse,” on “some of the most dangerous roads in the world.” In its 2015 Global Status report, WHO claims “about 3.3 million deaths – 5.9% of all global deaths – were attributable to alcohol consumption; 7.6% of deaths among males, and 4.0% of deaths among females.” Further, “Johannesburg has some of the most dangerous roads in the world, ranking as the 13th most likely place to die on the road...around five times more dangerous than New York’s roads....”

 ("Contrary to popular belief, minibus taxis are not the main cause of road accidents in the country, with most crashes and fatalities happening with small motor vehicles.”)

What’s to blame? “Several factors ...including poor or poorly implemented regulations, inadequate road and vehicle quality, a higher proportion of vulnerable road users and increasing vehicle numbers.”

 In other words, a perfect storm....

Signs of the times.
(c) UP Coming. (Netherlands online newspaper.)

(Take a look at other signs not at all on topic but funny anyway.)