Dhiziri Rese Rarasika (All the Diesel has spilled out of the tank)
Forest Forest Gump
I didn’t realize what I was looking at as we approached a haulage truck - semi / gonyet - that was broken down in the middle of the road. It was kind of an uphill climb, and the stretch of the road was thin with tall savannah grass on either side. The road had effectively become a one way, blocked by the gonyet and cars had to wait for each other to pass this truck and not collide. To pass, we had to drive around the gonyet on the right side. I was aware of this, the driver in the white car - SUV - ahead was aware of this, the lorry behind that car - sandwiched between us - must have been aware of this. The white car ahead stopped to check oncoming traffic and there was a car coming. Suddenly the lorry veered out of the road on the left side to pass instead of taking the right side. But the passenger door of the haulage truck as open. I wondered how the driver planned to circumvent that challenge when the lorry lurched forward as though suddenly stopped by an invisible wall like a mime. It leaned left then right, and came to a halt. I jumped out of the car i was in and went over to find out what had happened. As I approached the lorry, someone fell out of the left side of the passenger door. He was uscathed. I thought it was the driver and I went over to ask him how he was. “Ndiri right, ndiri kutotyira Moses anenge arovera.” he said pointing (I am alright, but I am concerned for Moses he bumped into something.) I ran over to the driver side. The driver, Moses, had a deep gash on this upper forehead and it was bleeding profusely. We tried to calm him down as he kept on asking if the lorry was right. “Mota iri bho here? Mota inobuda here? Ichafamba here apa?” he kept asking questions about the lorry. (Is the lorry okay, can we extricate it from here, will the lorry drive on after this” to Which his friend replied, “Dhiziri rese rarasika” referring to the tank (All the Diesel has Spilled out of the tank)
We tried to calm Moses down as I realized I had just witnessed an accident. It had happened in so many ways, “Slowly” then all of a sudden. I was shocked at how the journey had taken a turn for these people. The gonyet / semi’s driver was taking a video, which he sent to his bosses promptly. “I told you guy kuti huyai fast, truck richakonzeresa iri” (I told you to come quickly, this truck will cause accidents) he was saying on the phone now on speaker. The driver of the white SUV car had passed the gonyet and stopped as well to come and check on the lorry.Moses narrated that he had tried to increase speed as they appraoched the truck, preparing to pass using the now “One way lane” on the left side. But the white SUV car had hesitated and stopped, which forced him to swerve to the left to avoid hitting it or crashing into the gonyet. In my humble opinion this was a genius but problematic solution to the problem. He had tried to cause a far less tragic accident because the white SUV was packed with passengers. I realized how easily life can change, and fortunes and turn. One minute someone out there has a lorry and the next, the drivers crash it and in Zimbabwe, there may not be insurance to fix or replace this vehicle. I had to leave before learning more.
My next accident this week was less understandable because there was no one to interview. It happend at night and we were now passing the now “One way lane” between 3 gonyets broken down and in an accident. One of the trucks had been carrying chrome, the other, mills for grinding something and a third we do not know. The wreck blocked both sides of the rode leaving a strip between the gonyet trucks which now controlled by the police. There was debris strew all over and a black powdery substance that I learend was chrome. As we passed by the driver of my gonyet said, “Oh, its a side swap. Aitwa side swap.” In that moment I knew what he meant and I kept wondering if I should correct him to “Side-swipe.” But did it matter? He was communicating and I could understand him. I had passed this accident earlier in a bus, and I was now passing it again, but in a gonyet. A true wanderer hitchhiking up and down Zimbabwe and talking to strangers. But it was necessary for me to be going around. I feel like Forest Gump who ran for 3 years, 2 months, 14 days, and 16 hours, going until he was “pretty tired and ready to go home.”
Someone asked once of someone running, “Are you running from or towards something.”
Even I can’t answer that. Because hitchhiking around Zimbabwe as I am doing is in some ways a necessity whose purpose I don’t yet understand. Its an adventure whose results or intended results I do not know. Its an accident I can’t explain. Am I trying to avoid a bigger accident like that lorry, or am I in an explicable 3 way collision of huge heavily laden haulage trucks? If only someone was able to account for how this accident came to be it would help as I wonder to myself too as Moses did, will this human extricate himself from this qundary, is this human okay, will he be able to move on from the mess. If only I had a friend like Moses did who could check and see if all the diesel is still in my tank. I am going though so maybe dhiziri rese harisati rarasika. (All the diesel has not entirely spilled out of the tank.)