2/27/2003: Nigerian confusion

What the...? This was shot in late January; in Lagos, Nigeria, traffic is entirely stopped while people look at a UFO.

The official caption has it as "Unidentified Flashing Object" - they say it's some mysterious flashing thing that appears, mysteriously, at traffic intersections around the city.

And, seriously, that's all the information given. I tried to get more details and all I learned is that traffic like this is routine in Nigeria. Apparently they have terrible gridlock problems, such that if there is a problem somewhere the entire city winds up locked.

Why are all of their vehicles yellow?

I wonder if the UFO brought the paranormal snake?

Paranormal Snake Kills 7 In Nigeria

[Original headline: Mystery snake kills seven women]

Lagos, Nigeria: [Reuters] A single snake has been blamed for the deaths of at least seven women in a village near the northern Nigerian city of Kano, prompting residents to ask snake-charmers for help in a climate of superstition and fear.
The villagers of Rijiyar Zaki said the victims died last week after attacks by the snake, which residents said can only be seen by women and disappears immediately after striking, The Independent Vanguard newspaper reported on Friday.

Aside from the seven already killed, 19 other women are being treated by traditional snake charmers, residents said, adding that all the mystery snake's victims were all housewives. Local officials were not immediately available for comment.

"The snake charmers are showing me indications that it is the same snake that terrorised Jangusa, a neighbouring village," the newspaper quoted a prominent villager as saying. "We are consulting them (charmers) on how best to get rid of that snake before it finishes our womenfolk."

Villagers fear the snake attacks were caused by a some sort of curse placed on the village. A snake charmer in the village said his fellow charmers were doing everything possible to appease the mystery snake.

Rijiyar Zaki is the village where the late Muhammadu Maitatsine, the leader of an Islamic fundamentalist group that terrorised cities in northern Nigeria in the 1980s, fled to after the army forced the group out of Kano. Local officials told the newspaper that snake antidotes had been supplied to the three clinics in the area to complement the efforts of the traditional charmers.

Re: 2/27/2003: Nigerian confusion

Owie.

(to paraphrase something I said to Russotto in the wee hours of last night ... If I aim for your center of mass and you duck, that will put you in line for a good head shot ...)

Someday science will discover a cure for the pun. I am, however, a realist and understand that this will likely be after the cure for AIDS and the cure for cancer.

To speculate on my own question:

Many of the yellow vehicles appear to be multi-passenger conveyances. If these are part of a mass transit system that leads to another quandry ... mass transit, ride sharing, and carpooling are supposed to reduce congestion, but here appears to be the cause of it ...

My head hurts.

Maybe they're all waiting for me to send them my personal bank info so they can send me the $10M they promised upon dutiful receipt.

I was thinking maybe they were taxis.

A good possibility though, linknoid. Nigerians drive British-style (on the left side), and most bus lanes are the outer lanes on highways.

They export all their <b>Flubber</b>_TM, therefore they are solely dependent on land based transportastion.

I think its just a temporary flea market. You drive until you can't, then set up shop. Nobody has to pay property tax or a user fee. Its the perfect system.

That sounds like a neat idea. They should block off Roosevelt Blvd. one day, and just let sellers drive along until they can't drive anymore. Then they can set up shop. A 15-mile long flea market...how cool is that?