How to Get a Driver's License

First of all, you must go by the traffic office and ask for one. The officer will tell you not to worry because you can drive with a US license for a year. That’s good to know, so, with confidence, you start driving. Eventually, you will be stopped by a traffic officer who will tell you to apply for a license within three months of your arrival. You will be glad that you still have time to work on it.

When you are stopped again (This shouldn’t take long because you can be stopped several times a day), this officer will tell you that you have been misinformed.  He will tell you to enroll in driving school and at the completion of the course you must take a driving test.  If you satisfactorily complete that test, a license will be issued. And, by the way, the driving test must be in a straight shift vehicle.

While your head is still reeling from learning you must go to driver’s school, you will be stopped again, and this officer will tell you your US license will be good until you return to the US and get an international license, and this international license will be legal indefinitely.

By this time you will be thoroughly confused, so you will seek out the advice of an American missionary friend. Maybe he can help clear things up for you. He will tell you that he was driving with a US license, but when he was stopped after only three months, he got a ticket and had to pay a fine.

Because you have found his advice helpful in the past and because he has lived here all his life, you decide to talk to another friend, Abdul. Abdul will tell you that he has a friend, William, who knows how to expedite your getting a license.

Abdul will take you to William’s office in the transportation department. Although there will be several people ahead of you, you will be brought to the front of the line. None of the conversations will be in English, so you won’t know what is going on. Abdul and William will laugh and chat a bit, and slap each other on the back, and then William will stamp his approval on your license application.  

Out in the parking lot, Abdul will inform you that William will mail your application to the capital, and in a month a license will be mailed, not to you, but to William. Then in hushed tones, Abdul will turn and tell you how much William thinks his services are worth. You will think to yourself, “Hmmm. Is this the way things work for everyone?”

When the license arrives, William will call you to his office to pick it up, and if you owe anything more, William will let you know before releasing the license.

Simple enough, right?