After 6 years of commuting to the office, we moved in April of last year to a location such that I can now walk to work from home. That was wonderful as the 6km commute had become a hour-long (plus) traffic nightmare. However, over the time since we moved, the walk has deteriorated somewhat. To get from my house to the office, I pass through the double compound next door (thankfully, the askari (guard) is very friendly, knows me, and always lets me through), onto the road that is parallel to mine. From there, you get a nice view of the Ngong Hills (as in ‘I had a farm in Africa at the foot of the Ngong Hills’), though I’m sure that when I first came that wasn’t the case. An indication of the ‘development’ (aka construction) that has happened in the neighbourhood, resulting in the chopping down of quite a number of trees, thus revealing the aforeto-concealed view. And then comes, what used to be, a pleasant dirt road down a hill, with a footpath higher up on the bank. Over the last couple of years, this has become quite a thoroughfare for vehicles trying to dodge the traffic. In fact, the volume of vehicles coming down this dirt and rather rocky road, is an indication of the volume of traffic elsewhere, ie how bad the jams are. This got to the extent earlier this year that vehicles began using, what had up to then been, the footpath. That’s now quadrupled in width, and the vegetation inbetween the path and ‘road’ has quickly receded. Because of the vehicle traffic, it seems to be that the route to the office is either a mass of mud, or it’s inches thick in red dust. Either way, you arrive rather less clean than when you set out!
Yesterday at some point, someone started dumping building rubbish there (at least, that’s what it looks like).There were piles of it! Was this an attempt to stop cars going down the ‘footpath’; an effort to do something towards paving it; or was it in fact just a convenient place to dump stuff?! Given what was actually dumped, I’m leaning towards the latter: Sheets of glass aren’t generally the best thing for vehicles to be driving over!! On my way home for lunch today, a friend and I were witness to this dumping, as guys with a wheeled cart full of rubble, tiles, and a blue toilet cistern (!) dumped their load. Unfortunately the toilet was nowhere to be seen (buried?) later – it would have made a great picture! It made me ponder briefly whether men might start using that in preference to peeing at the side of the road into the bushes?!!!!
It seems such a tragedy. That road used to be quite pretty, resembling a rural country lane. Now it’s just a dumping ground, with some of the toxic trash being burnt, and is a ‘super-highway’ (well, okay, not exactly!). Still, as I choke on dust and fumes, and twist my ankle on the uneven ground (I’ve got through 3 pairs of shoes so far on that hill!), when I can lift my eyes up from the ground, the lilac-blossomed jacarandas (which are at their best at the moment) still make it look fairly pretty, and the colourful bee-eaters chattering away on the overhead wires make me smile!!
1 comment:
That's very true! It looks really different to the hill we walked up and down just two years ago. There was no way any car could have gone on the 'footpath' back then 'cause I almost remember some of it to be single file width. Aw, It's a shame it's becoming a dumping ground. Give those boys a piece of your mind, Claire!
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