If You’ve Been to a Party, You can Foxtrot Oscar

Until this week, our little area had been relatively untouched by the bug…two people who had returned from abroad and that was about it. People took the recommended precautions and all seemed to be going well until a bunch of idiots decided to have a Fathers’ Day party. A well attended Fathers’ Day party. Needless to say, one turned out to be affected with the result that the area is shut down again a week after opening up while the authorities try to trace all the participants.

I suspect that the bug ridden party goer is not exactly flavour of the month locally and his protestations that he thought it was all right to go to a party because he didn’t feel ill just add fuel to the fire.

On the whole, the shut down has not been too bad from a daily life point of view….one could go shopping, attend the farmers’ market, while the prohibition on driving at night has been almost a blessing as has the absence of passing callers trying to sell something you both know that you do not want, an event which starts with the caller honking a horn if in a car, or shouting at the top of his voice if not, both of which start the dogs into sound and action and involve turning off the cooker, finding and putting on my outdoor shoes and trecking down the path to the road. By the time I get there I could guarantee that if you were offering me a free pass to heaven I’d turn it down, so a plastic fir tree car deoderant stands no chance.

I knew that the restrictions had ended when a chap came to the gate selling subscriptions to a cable television service. My argument was that

A. I did not want a television service

and

B. There was no cable provision in this road.

His argument was that as he was working on commission A and B were of no interest to him whatsoever.

The main problem of the restrictions comes with the enforcement of the rules as to which day you can use the car, according to the last digit on the numberplate. We, for example, cannot drive on Thursdays and Saturdays – and, annoyingly, that is every Saturday, while we could drive on Sundays except that there is nowhere to go.

This restriction does not bother one of our neighbours. He rejoices in a car with no numberplates – let alone licence, insurance and all the other administrative inconveniences – but needs a co pilot to manage the Whatsapp which will tell him where the police are currently lurking. He was swearing well last week when he was holed up in the hardware shop’s car park for over two hours while the traffic police set up a road block just down the road. He had contemplated making a run for it but in the end decided it was safer to wait until it rained, at which point the police would be bound to disappear….and did.

He is not alone in his lack of the usual paperwork…wages are low, the costs of keeping a vehicle on the road are high and any number of people depend on old bangers or motorbikes to get to work – particularly important now when jobs are so scarce.

Which is why the Traffic Police – the Transitos – are not flavour of the month either.

While I don’t think they have ever achieved that accolade, their current reputation locally is at its nadir.

First, a little history.

The local official was noted for his habit of haunting the roads round the hospital, ready to pounce on any car or motorbike without the proper plates, insurance sticker or certificate of roadworthyness. He had bumper results which looked good on his record.

Fine, you might say, that’s his job. Well done that man.

Yes, but when you think that people have brought someone ill to be treated, or are visiting someone who has been kept in, the last thing on their minds is making themselves legal before making the trip – even if they could afford to which in many cases they could not. The fines, which are out of all proportion to normal incomes, ensure that those affected cannot easily get back on the road.

So his harvesting round the hospital was not appreciated.

Representations were made, but to no effect. He continued harvesting.

Eventually, someone set fire to his house, which achieved what using the usual channels could not…he was transferred.

Peace reigned…until the arrival of the bug….and with the bug, the Transitos. And with the Transitos – the previously transferred official, on the grounds that he knew the area.

Now, the stated aim is to enforce the vehicle restrictions…no traveling at night unless your work requires it, and having the correct numberplate to travel on any given day. That is fine with almost everyone. The drug dealers have adapted too. Even given the situation the number of home delivery van services is astounding…

However, thse are the Transitos…..not content with roadblocks to check numberplates they are going to town on issuing fines for bad parking, and confiscating the numberplates of cars and motorbikes without all the appropriate documentation. It costs a fortune in money and time to get them back…not to speak of getting all the appropriate paperwork first…

Not surprisingly, this makes for bad feeling. The current government is not popular as its answer to a fiscal deficit that makes a black hole look infinitesimally small is to whop up the taxes and invent new fiscal fines while exempting large companies from the consequences and paying out what are known as luxury pensions to state officials….in some cases to the grandchildren of state officials. So, given the context, a troup of Transitos whopping up the fines in our little town does not go down well…..

Still, people here are nothing if not inventive. The Transitos have noted that, having confiscated a numberplate, they come across it again when doing a control some time later.

Investigation – and probably an informant – revealed that certain lawyers in the town have a very nice business in accepting sworn statements that numberplates have been lost, passing these through the National Registry and thus obtaining replacements before the Transitos’ cumbersome notification system can swing into action.

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