Driving Through the Metaphysical

Its been a month since I began practicing the code.

The code consists of 40 multiple answer questions testing would-be drivers on road signs and markings, passing, intersections and turns, etc. An image with accompanying question and responses are played on a screen. One test is played every hour, where a maximum of two different tests are played each day. Occasionally, the staff lets the video go through the explanations, but most of the time an instructor reviews the answers with the class.

Because I know I am a nerd, I can admit that I actually enjoy the class. The hike up to the bus stop and the bus ride itself are not great, but they constitute acceptable inconveniences for an excuse to get out of the house. The testing itself doesn't bother me. Having gone through the New York public school system, I respond well to these types of tests. Of course, the questions can be tricky, but like any sort of standardized test, the more you practice, the better you get. My fellow classmates have proved quite amusing as well. There are the slick young kids who drive fear into your heart with the recklessness in their answers; les mémés (grannies/thi ah mo) who struggle heroically to follow along; and the general comedy of watching somebody else sputter an incoherent answer, only to be sassed by the instructor.

Wrong answers are common, obviously. But certain questions seem practically unfair. Almost all aspects of life in Guadeloupe are determined by the national government 4,000 miles away. The rules of the road are no exception. The problem is Guadeloupe is not France and that fact is all the more obvious when driving.

There is snow, for example (Which headlamps - high or low beams - should be used when snow is falling?). Or fog (What is the maximum driving speed when fog limits visibility to 50m?). These meteorological situations simply do not exist here in Caribbean Guadeloupe.
And there are things like railroad and tramway crossings, tunnels, highways - none of which exist on this island. Yet, here we are, all 20 of us, head down, shoulders hunched, scribbling away.

At the same time, there is an entire range of knowledge pertinent and particular to Guadeloupe that is simply not addressed: How to share a narrow two way road with a ‘titan’ (1) overloaded with cut cane; The significance of incredibly long lines at every gas station; Maneuvers for avoiding a collision with coconuts, iguanas, goats crossing the road.

Above, sharing the road with a tractor overloaded with cut cane.

Above, watch out for falling palm leaves!

The disjunction between our reality and the advertised reality is a ready-made metaphysical exercise. It is entirely possible that certain students have never experienced snow. And yet they must imagine themselves driving through this thing that is called snow. More practically, the disjunction leads to considerable confusion. There was the older woman who took the photo of a pay toll to be a gas station. The short discussion of whether a photo showed falling or fallen snow. It is a distilled example of how France puts Guadeloupeans at a disadvantage.

I improved my scores quickly in the first month and was beginning to score sufficiently high enough to consider taking the written test soon. But, I've been informed that I will not be allowed to take the test without a carte de séjour. And no, a recipssé is insufficient. I've pushed back the remainder of my lessons until August, when I will (hopefully) have my carte de séjour.

I was a bit sad to stop going. Insignificant as it might have been, it gave me a sense of independence. I also felt that a license could be considered some sort of accomplishment; it would have been at least a goal which had, up until this time, escaped me. But more importantly, getting a license represented a positive affirmation that, yes, I was making a new life for myself in Guadeloupe. There could be no clearer sign of acquiescence than the New Yorker who gets herself a license.

Of course, not long after, I was sad that I was sad. Who mourns for the loss of driving exam test prep?


(1) Titan is the nick name given to the massive open bed trucks that are used to transport cut cane from the fields to the factory. They are fear-inducing, and much larger than the tractor pictured above.