one headlamp

on a 10-hour drive from where i'm based to where i was supposed to go for a training, we left our base around 10 am (even though we were told in no uncertain terms by the operations manager that we were to leave at 8 am - and in the end it was because of him (and his team) that we left at 10!). so we drive along and eventually it gets dark (apparently this is a daily thing - but somehow always seem to catch us by surprise no matter what the situation). so it gets dark and we turn the headlights on - and well, they don't quite work and eventually sputter out. at this point, it's about 8 pm and it's pitch black (as in piiiitch blaaaaack holy shit am i blind??). so being the creative problem solvers that we NGO workers are - we took my headlamp, gave it to the person sitting in the front seat, who then hung out of the car window shining the light on the road in front of us which gave us just enough light to move on (albeit very very slowly).

so there we were, in the middle of the bush in the pitch black, one little headlamp shining in the dark and one co-worker hanging out the window. this is how we arrived at our destination (a big town no less, unlike the small village we came from). on the way, we almost drove into a swamp and also laughed our asses off when we confused the bejesus out of one motorbiker who couldn't decide what the hell we were (he thought we were a very tall person with a torch) and eventually rolled to an abrupt stop on the side of the road where we heard him say the arabic equivalent of 'what the fuck?' as we passed.

and on our way back to our small village, we started out from the big town at 8 am sharp and somehow still managed to arrive at our small village at 8 pm. i have decided that there's definitely a conspiracy against us ever arriving anywhere before dark (this is true - in my old base, no matter what time we would leave our base, we always arrived either just as the sun was setting or long after).

i did have a good laugh though because the person driving (the operations manager, or 'acting driver', as he likes to joke) turned the headlights on long before it got dark. i matter of factly pointed out to him that there was currently no need for headlights, but he just grinned at me. i figured that he was just showing off the fact that he had headlights again and was being over enthusiastic about using them (which i also pointed out to him and at which point he grinned at me even wider).