11/24/06

Thoughts \ Developed Thoughts \ Rants \ Raves \ Writing

06/27/2005 19:27 +0200 GMT

New Lusaka, Old Lusaka

The New Lusaka is a mosaic of images I've collected over the 2/3rds time I've been here. Sirens of emergency response vehicles are new. They're US style, not UK style, with more analog waxing and waning as opposed to two-tone, high and low alternating tones. Private ambulances numbered one in Old Lusaka; now there must be at least a dozen. Another type of siren is that affixed to coffin-bearing vehicles, drawing attention of passersby. These vehicles, towed, are ornate glass boxes, sometimes with shining objects placed, augmenting the attention that the siren draws. The glass permits the public a view of the casket, its decorations, color and detail. The greater the wealth, the more ornate the casket, the longer the lines, with hazards blinking, of vehicles, with the most prominent deceased posthumously honored with police motorcycle escort. The police wear white helmets, green jumpsuits, dark glasses, and black boots and gloves. The motorcycles have white tanks and blue lights.

The very fact that ordinary police have vehicles is a fairly new development in Lusaka. I remember the traffic collision I had on Great North, and when the police responded on foot, it was my responsibility to arrange transport for the policeman, the minibus driver, and myself to the police station. Driving was much more reckless then, at least on my part, because the only repercussions for driving this way was risk of collision; the risk of citation was small, and limited to police roadblocks, or to the odd intersection where a policeman or woman was directing traffic.

There are fewer roadblocks now. I've only run into one randomly placed roadblock at the Kabulonga traffic circle, very cleverly placed at the crest of a gentle rise, and on the circle itself, in the two months I've been here. The standard checkpoint by the airport remains, but random checkpoints seem to be fewer.

By the Emmasdale copshop, two or three officers were standing around police motorbikes. One bike was mounted and a helmeted officer was straddling it, pumping the throttle with his left, laughing at the powerful sounds of the engine. Teeth showed all 'round, and I thought of the price of fuel, the very high price of fuel, and the cost of motorbikes, fleets of motorbikes, and my thoughts drifted toward the economic upsurge of the New Lusaka as I focused back on making the turn to Emmasdale.

The roads are the most prominent feature of the New Lusaka. Storefronts change, women's dress has altered, though that may be due to the season.  New billboards are up, but at the basest level the roads in Lusaka have paved the way for much of the transformation of this city. Through a Japan-Zambia cooperative aid project, all of the major roads in Lusaka are semi-permanently improved. Great East, Great North, Cairo, Kafue, and scores of arteriole-level roads have proper pavement of vehicle lanes made wide enough even for single file pedestrians. On the major arteries, there are islands in between opposing two lanes of traffic, where before there may have only been a faded paint, dashed line.

Before, also, the two-lane traffic was reduced to one lane each at variable points, due to potholes, erosions on the sides, and what...It used to be risky to take one of the rickety Suzukis out at night along Great East, with no street lights, narrow lanes...facing oncoming traffic became a mild but nerve-wracking game of chicken. Now the major arteries also have two-meter deep drainage trenches on either side, so the erosion is thwarted powerfully. The drainage keeps the water from pooling, from using its silent force to dig new road hazards. This I've seen as I've walked diameters and radii around Lusaka.

I learned the lesson of drainage and concrete borders from Eric Hunter, as we marveled at even modest Mwembelelo Road, where I used to live. Yusef and the Indian community there pooled resources to pave the roads properly in that neighborhood, through the mosque and beyond. As I've learned from reading Jeffrey Sach's The End of Poverty, roads provide one of the infrastructures for economic growth, and I think the Japanese-Zambian cooperative could not have provided a more valuable gift, citywide.

The durability of these investments have proven their worth, at least over the year since I've been here. The rains have not washed a thin film of tar away...no. There are proper roads, and I hope they will sustain true growth.

More images - images that coincide with my ideas of the Old Lusaka, firmly ensconced within the New. Walking the path from Matero Reference clinic to Lumumba Road, I saw a woman dressed in everyday wear, a blue chitenge wrap, midriff to ankle, blue, with white ovals carrying Catholic symbols, a white blouse, tropical sandals, and a 50Kg bag of mealie-meal balanced on her head.

On a separate journey, through Kanayama, a youth with a wheel barrow was moving a bed frame, a dresser, and two chairs along the dusty moguls of the unimproved compound track. More spectacularly, on a separate voyage into Matero, a similar young man carried on his wheelbarrow the two halves, front and rear, of a four door vehicle. These massive pieces of metal, stripped of all vehicular uses, could still be used to make a makeshift wall-fence, or blazers for cooking, or perhaps some other unimaginable - but imaginative - uses.