Today I went to
the car wash. It’s owned by two Lebanese old men. They take pleasure in
pressing the buttons themselves. The car is lathered and washed with electric
pompoms and semi-dried with electric dryers.
A few metres
further down, four Ghanaian lads wipe the cars dry. That’s the real story of
this post. They are filled with so much hate. They insult their employers from
the time you drive in, and theirs is the last voice you hear on the way out –
insulting. They speak in Twi, of course, and try to draw me into their
xenophobia. I ignore them. When I’m ready to drive off in my shiny car, one of
the owners capers up to me and asks in a friendly voice, “It good?” Although it
took longer than your regular one-hose car wash, I’m going back there.
It was those
boys’ attitude that needed to run through the car wash, not cars.
