Yesterday, Tabuche continued to show his favouritism for me. Yesterday morning I had asked him to pick me up at 3:30 from work so I could come home early and get some things accomplished before he was to pick me up for my evening outing.

At about 3:15, I got a text from him. He was delayed at the airport waiting for a client whose plane was late arriving. With the heavy traffic that had been around all week he knew that he couldn’t make it to my office on time. So he was arranging for one of the drivers that he uses on rare occasions to pick me up.  This driver’s name is Peter and he had picked me up for Tabuche one other day a couple months ago. It was a disaster!

Peter, formerly was a head chef at very prominent Gaborone eateries. And I am sure that he is probably a great chef. But he is one of the worse taxi drivers I have ever encountered. The first time he picked me up, he got lost twice, was 30 minutes late picking me up, and had to ask me directions three times just to find my work site. So you can imagine my sense of dread when Tabuche told me that Peter was coming for me!

I had pretty much written off the chance of getting home early and getting anything done. True to form, Peter arrived at the Bonaso office, stopped outside the door, waited for two minutes when one of the office staff went out to ask who he was looking for, he promptly backed up and left the compound! I saw the car leaving, recognized it and thought okay,  here we go again!

Just as I was about to call Tabuche 10 minutes later, back comes Peter! I promptly gathered my laptop and other items needed for next week and headed for the door. As I climbed into the car,  Peter was so pleased with himself that I didn’t have the heart to question him as to why he left? In fact, I just wanted to get home so I didn’t want to confuse the poor man any more than he already is so I simply pretended that all was well.

As we were at least proceeding in the correct direction of my place why rock the boat! However, the nervousness came creeping back as he turned way too soon for my neighbourhood. Unable to sit quietly and not question his direction, I simply inquired if he knew where I lived? His response, “oh, yes! I remember very well!”

By now, very evil thoughts were percolating in my head. He couldn’t know where I lived or he wouldn’t of turned when he did. Again, not one to remain silent I told him that I was not familiar with this route to my place so if he got lost I could not be of assistance. That is when I saw the sweat break out on his forehead. And I knew that I was in trouble!

In stead of him turning around and getting back on the highway, he kept going in through the housing divisions. Once again wishing goodbye to my two hours of time off, I settled back for what I figured would be a long hot frustrating drive. Just as I was resigned to being lost for an hour we hit a neighbourhood that Tabuche had driven me through once in an effort to avoid traffic. Recognizing where I now was thankfully I could gently direct Peter to my place. You can not begin to imagine my sense of relief as we finally rounded the corner to home!

Last night when Tabuche picked me up at 6:00 pm it took a few minutes for our conversation to turn to my trip home that afternoon. When I told him what had happened, the two of us could only laugh like kids! He asked me if I had asked Peter why he had left? or turned when he did? I simply told him “no” that I was too afraid to confuse him and simply wanted to eventually make it home!  I don’t think Tabuche will ever send Peter to pick me up again!

And I learned from one of my dinner companions last night that in fact Tabuche had denied her from making a two minute pit stop to withdraw money from an ATM. The reason he told her that he didn’t have time to let her get money was that he was picking me up and he wouldn’t keep me waiting!  I felt guilty of course but I think that people are starting to realize that the bond Tabuche and I have is very special and not even his other regular clients can come between us 🙂