The saga of the driving licence continues.
Today Fraser and I were taken back to driving school (22
years for me, 17 for him after we’d passed our UK driving tests) to take a test
to prove we are worthy of a Nigerian driving licence. The driving school, run by a man about to go
off on a two week mission to Ghana, has a motto: “Something good out of
Nazareth”. I struggle to see the
relevance but I can definitely appreciate the need for divine favour and
protection if you’re a driving instructor in Nigeria. Our test consisted of looking at a sheet of a
dozen road signs and being able to identify ones picked at random by the
instructor. He also waved a copy to the
Nigerian Highway Code at us to ensure that we could recognise the up to date version. We filled in a form and were presented with a
colourful certificate (already graded B so we wouldn’t get too big headed I presume)
which announced that we had satisfied the examiner.
This certificate is our passport to the next stage of the
licensing process. Off we went back to
the vehicle inspectorate office to see what we should do next. Thankfully our “friend” from the last trip
was not there. Instead a helpful officer
gave us another form to fill in, said she’d start processing it and told us to
return tomorrow having paid the fee at the bank and obtained four photocopies of
the proof of payment. If it wasn’t that
people are often stopped by the traffic police I would seriously wonder if it was worth all
the palaver.
If anyone's interested, the puppy's doing well, although he gets a bit nippy when excited (any tips gratefully received). He seems pretty quick at catching on to instructions - we haven't had an accident inside since the day after he arrived. It is a bit like having a baby again as I have to get up to let him out in the middle of the night and, like a toddler, he'd follow me everywhere if he could. Thankfully he sleeps a lot so I'm able to get on with the new book ACTS has sent me. This one considers the influence of traditional culture on African Christians, a very interesting and relevant topic.
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