boroom taxi

It’s time to talk about the taxis in and around Dakar because they are one of a kind. They are yellow and black automobiles that are usually missing a majority of the interior and sometimes the exterior. In Senegal you tell the taxi driver where you’re going before you enter the car. Then you and the driver proceed to bargain a price for the ride. When they see me approaching the price usually gets doubled. I always have a hard time figuring out how much I should pay so I ask a Senegalese person. It’s usually very hard to get comparable prices but I am beginning to get the hang of it. I am not quite sure how taxi drivers become licensed or if there is such a thing. It seems like there is a taxi for every five people. The drivers drive all around the town, honking their horns, and spraying sand all over the place. There have only been a few times when I did not have to give the taxi driver directions or have the driver stop to ask a person on the street directions. I wonder if they have to take a test to find out whether they know where major places in Dakar are located. I have to say that a reason why I have major problems finding my location is the fact that I can’t fully communicate in Wolof and only about 10% of taxi drivers understand French. All that to say the taxi experience is a unique one.

It is impossible to describe what Dakar taxis look like. Most of them are in a state of utter disrepair but are still tooling around town. I have been in taxis that don’t have door handles, back windshields, or apparatuses for keeping the door shut tightly. In the inside it is common to get into a taxi that is missing locks, door handles, window cranks, the inside of a door, or has huge cracks in the windshield. I love when I get a taxi that has velour interior and the windows don’t open. This morning I took a taxi that had blue velour seats, no window crank, and no place in the steering column for the ignition. The taxi driver started the car by putting two wires together. This is a pretty common practice. The fun does not stop there; taxis, en route to places pull into gas stations and fill their tanks with passengers sitting in the car. This has happened to me three times now. Taxi drivers also feel that is it perfectly fine to cut through gas stations to avoid traffic or drive on the sandy shoulder beeping and shaking their fists at the law-abiding citizens. My second week here I was in a taxi that rear-ended a car rapid. The people in the car rapid spit on the taxi and shook their fists at the driver. I just sat petrified in my red velvet seat hoping that he would just drive away, which is precisely what he did. He later ran over my notebook when he dropped me off. Basically taxis here are out of control.