Lamin and the Learner Driver
This story already exists elsewhere on the charity website in a shorter, tidier and far more sensible form.
Naturally, that version leaves out most of the interesting bits.
So it seems only right to retell it properly and place it among the other stories about Lamin Barrow — because there are moments in life when you realise that, no matter how carefully you plan things in The Gambia, chaos is never more than about thirty seconds away.
This is one of those stories.
Even when I’m not in The Gambia, I’m rarely more than a day or two away from a phone call with Lamin. The business of building and running a charity-funded nursery school is never-ending — in a good way. Some days I’ll get one phone call. Sometimes two. Very occasionally three. If I’m very lucky, I’ll get a video call.
So, despite sitting in cold, wet England, I frequently feel as though I’m still in Lamin’s green taxi, bouncing along orange, dusty Gambian roads towards some exciting adventure, practical problem or small-scale international incident.
Lamin’s video calls are often mildly alarming.
Sometimes he’ll ring quite randomly and, once all the relevant phone cameras have been activated, I’ll be greeted by Lamin’s grinning face and several of his children staring at me as though they’re about to watch the latest special-effects-laden Marvel Summer blockbuster.
I can’t help feeling I’m something of a disappointment.
I wave enthusiastically. They stare back, clearly expecting me to perform somersaults around my living room while counting backwards from one hundred in Mandinka.
Sometimes, Lamin uses a video call for his ever-embarrassing game of:
“Who is this man?”
He’ll point the camera at a relative with whom I may have exchanged brief pleasantries over ten years ago, then look deeply disappointed when I fail to remember the man’s name, full life story and precise position within the Barrow family tree.
“You are getting old,” comes the inevitable verdict.
I have covered this humiliation before in Chapter 2.
Phone calls can also become complicated when Lamin is in Sankandi, his home village. He will tell me that his family misses me and then pass the phone around his compound, one person at a time. Fortunately, many of his family speak English, so we can have short and pleasant conversations.
But inevitably, the phone will eventually be handed to someone who only speaks Mandinka.
More often than not, Lamin’s mum.
She is lovely. She also doesn’t speak a word of English.
So I have to rummage around in my very limited Mandinka vocabulary and hope for the best.
Me: I be naadi?
How are you doing?
Lamin’s Mum: Be jan doron.
I am well. Or, roughly, “only peace.”
Me: Suumoolu lee?
Where are the people of the compound?
Lamin’s Mum: I bee be jee.
They are all there.
Me: Koritana te?
Hope there is no trouble?
Lamin’s Mum: Tana te.
No trouble here.
There will then be a slightly awkward pause while I desperately try to think of something else to say.
At which point, Lamin’s mum will invariably unleash several sentences of rapid-fire Mandinka at machine-gun speed.
Me: “Lamin! Lamin!! What did she say?”
Lamin: “She says she misses you and is asking when you are coming back.”
Me: “Tell her as soon as I can.”
Useful phrases, incidentally, are Koritana te? and Tana te. These appear in approximately ninety percent of all Mandinka conversations…sometimes several times or more.
Other useful phrases include:
M soto kono baayoo — I have diarrhoea.
Jonkono be mintoo le? — Where is the toilet?
M sooloo jonkono le saayin — I need the toilet now!
These particular phrases are sometimes the difference between life and…well…I’m sure you can imagine.
Anyway… back to the story.
In early March 2026, Lamin had been at ‘Building Futures in The Gambia’ Busumbala Nursery School wearing his School Manager charity “hat”. This is not currently a real hat, although writing that sentence has given me an excellent idea for a future gift.
He had been supervising construction work on the new toilet block. This is perfectly normal in Lamin’s world. On any given day, he may simultaneously be acting as school manager, plumber, builder, electrician, negotiator, diplomat, accountant, farmer, shop keeper, taxi driver, agricultural advisor and unofficial Minister for Absolutely Everything.
Once the construction work was finished, I received the first of three phone calls that day.
It was uneventful.
Lamin filled me in on the construction work, explained what needed to happen next and gave me an approximate idea of how much it would cost and when it might happen — making, of course, generous allowances for ‘Gambian time’.
After our phone call completed, Lamin climbed into his trusty green taxi and began driving home.
Now, if this were Britain, that would probably have been the end of the story.
But this is not Britain.
This is The Gambia.
And in The Gambia, the universe occasionally decides that your day simply isn’t interesting enough yet.
Halfway home, Lamin’s phone rang.
He pulled over and answered.
It was a call from the school.
From a gentleman hitherto unknown to Lamin.
A gentleman who was learning to drive.
And where had this learner driver chosen to practise his driving technique?
On the road running alongside the school, of course.
That sentence alone should have set alarm bells ringing.
Unfortunately, the learner driver had not yet fully mastered certain advanced motoring concepts such as “steering accurately” and “not driving directly into large stationary objects”.
He had crashed into the school gate.
Not gently, either.
The gate was bent and part of the wall had been knocked down.
Now, this wall around the perimeter of the school represented over a year’s worth of construction and fundraising from wonderful people in England. It had taken more than a year because, quite simply, about two thirds of the way through the project, we ran out of money.
Fortunately, further fundraising and kind donations meant we were eventually able to complete it and install lovely, shiny new iron gates.
And it was into one of these brand new gates that the learner driver had driven.
Lamin was not delighted.
In fact, he was furious.
This was when I received my second phone call.
From Lamin’s tone, I could tell immediately that something was amiss.
Me: “Hello again, Lamin. What’s the matter?”
Lamin: “Bro, there’s been an accident at the school.”
Me: “What?! But you were only just there. Is anyone hurt?”
Lamin: “No. I have just received a phone call from a man. He was learning to drive by the school. He has hit the school wall. I said to him why were you ###### learning to ####### drive by a ##### school? It is very dangerous. You must not ###### drive by a ###### school. That is a ##### stupid thing to do. Why would you ######## do that?”
Lamin’s rant continued in a similar style for some time.
I have deliberately removed some of the language for fear of having this website censored and deleted from the internet forever.
Needless to say, Lamin takes quiet pride in everything achieved at the school. The wall had been the latest major part of the project, and he had overseen every stage of it. He had even involved his eldest son, Muhammed, in the construction work on one occasion to save us a few dalasis.
The call ended with Lamin saying he was on his way back to the school to assess the damage.
Now, Lamin very rarely loses his temper.
I think I have only seen him properly lose it once.
And that involved monkeys.
In February 2018, Lamin was acting as guide and taxi driver for me and a small group of friends visiting The Gambia. As tradition dictates, a visit to The Monkey Park was arranged.
There are certain places in The Gambia that every first-time visitor somehow ends up being taken to whether they planned to or not. The Monkey Park is one of them. I strongly suspect there is an unwritten Gambian law stating that, within forty-eight hours of arrival, all tourists must be escorted there by an enthusiastic taxi driver, guide, cousin, brother, uncle or “very good friend” who knows “the best monkeys”.
The Monkey Park sits in the forest near Bijilo, a shady stretch of woodland where the air feels cooler, the flora is genuinely interesting, the trees hum with insects, and monkeys lurk with the calculated opportunism of seasoned pickpockets in a busy European railway station.
The Monkey Park is famous for green monkeys and red colobus monkeys.
And these particular monkeys know exactly what they are doing.
These are not shy woodland creatures observing humanity from a safe distance. These are hardened professionals. Veterans. They have studied tourists for years and correctly concluded that foreign visitors are extremely easy to manipulate with wide eyes and tiny furry hands.
Hold out a peanut and you will instantly find monkeys climbing onto shoulders, arms and heads with the familiarity normally reserved for close family members.
Everyone squeals with delight, mild panic, or both.
And somehow, despite the chaos, everybody leaves grinning.
It is, rather wonderfully, all part of the Gambian experience.
Normally, for tourist attractions like The Monkey Park, guides and drivers accompanying tourists pay either a reduced entry fee or nothing at all. This seems fair. The guide brings tourists. The attraction receives entry money. The driver earns. Everybody benefits.
However, on this particular occasion, the gentleman selling tickets was having none of this normally sensible arrangement.
He wanted Lamin to pay the full entry fee.
Lamin disagreed.
The ticket seller disagreed with Lamin disagreeing.
Unfortunately, the ticket seller — a Wolof man — was also quite rude.
Lamin quickly worked himself up to a full head of steam, and a loud shouting match followed in local languages, with occasional bursts of English and a smattering of language normally heard outside Wetherspoons at closing time on a Saturday night.
Eventually, we had to step between Lamin and the ticket seller in a manner worthy of EastEnders.
“Leave it, bruv. He ain’t werf it.”
We pulled an irate Lamin away, paid the full entry fee for everyone — including Lamin — and went off to find monkeys who, presumably after all the shouting, had sensibly climbed to the tops of the highest trees and decided to wait until we had gone away.
Other occasions when I have seen Lamin become heated have usually involved Senegalese police checkpoints.
Senegalese police checkpoints appear to have one main purpose: to extract as much money as possible from drivers and any hapless occupants of their vehicles.
You will be pulled over. Your vehicle will be inspected for defects, both obvious and highly imaginative.
Broken indicator?
Fine.
Missing registration plate?
Fine.
Paintwork slightly dusty?
Possibly a fine.
Wing mirror angled in a way that offends the aesthetic sensibilities of the officer?
Almost certainly a fine.
And, of course, the fine will more often than not find its way into the officer’s voluminous pockets.
This is common in Senegal. Unfortunately, there can be quite a lot of checkpoints, which means that by the time you return home, you may need to remortgage your house or sell a kidney to make up for the cumulative financial damage.
On one occasion, we were fined because our bags were on the back seat rather than in the boot of the taxi.
Most of the time, Lamin treats this as water off a duck’s back. He becomes philosophical. He pays. We move on.
But occasionally, once we have driven away, he erupts into a stream of furious commentary about the Senegalese police, how they are doing a disservice to their country, and how we will NEVER, EVER return.
Then, five minutes later, his usual laid-back nature returns and we continue as if nothing has happened.
The last time we bribed…sorry, received a fine from a Senegalese police officer, I wandered over while Lamin was in slightly heated negotiation and offered the officer a gingernut biscuit.
Then I gave him the whole packet.
This resulted in a smiling police officer, a reduced fine and a standing invitation to visit his compound in his home village at some point in the future.
Note to self: take more biscuits next time I visit Senegal.
Admittedly, the officer may have been in a particularly good mood because Senegal had won the 2026 Africa Cup of Nations the evening before and the whole country was celebrating. As is now a matter of public record, however, the win was later withdrawn after the Senegalese team left the pitch in a fit of pique following a referee decision they disliked.
I very much hope we do not meet that police officer again. His mood may have shifted somewhat.
Anyway, the point is this: Lamin rarely gets hot under the collar.
But when he does, it is always memorable.
So, back to the unfortunate learner driver.
I apologise. I do tend to ramble.
After the second phone call, Lamin turned the taxi around and drove back to school.
When he arrived, the learner driver was still there, looking extremely sheepish. School ‘Nanny’ Mero had also appeared after hearing the crash and had come running to investigate, presumably expecting either a major accident or the complete collapse of civilisation.
Upon hearing the crash, I have visions of our School Nanny dashing towards the school in a manner not unlike Batman and Robin racing towards a crime scene with their superhero capes billowing out behind them.
Luckily, this is where the story takes a very Gambian turn.
It transpired that Nanny Mero was actually related to the learner driver. He was the son of her sister. Her nephew, as we would say in the United Kingdom.
In The Gambia, however, words like niece and nephew are not always used as convenient shortcuts in the way we use them. Which is a pity, because they would save an enormous amount of time.
Also, one of the learner driver’s children had previously attended BFiG Busumbala Nursery School.
At this point, I should explain that relationships and community ties in The Gambia operate on a level British people can barely comprehend. You can arrive furious with somebody and, within five minutes, discover that they are your cousin, your neighbour, your former classmate, your imam’s uncle, or somebody whose aunt once sold you peanuts at a roadside market in 2009.
This changes the mood considerably.
Because it was Ramadan, the learner driver was deeply apologetic. He promised he would personally pay for the repairs and supervise the rebuilding of the damaged wall.
Ramadan is about far more than simply fasting during daylight hours. It is a deeply important spiritual period centred around prayer, self-discipline, forgiveness and community responsibility. One of the five pillars of Islam is Zakat — charitable giving and the responsibility to support others, particularly those who are struggling or less fortunate than yourself.
And this is especially striking in places like The Gambia and wider West Africa, where many people already live with very little.
Even so, people still share what they have.
Food is given away.
Neighbours help one another.
There is a strong sense that hardship should never be faced alone if it can possibly be helped.
During Ramadan, that spirit of empathy and responsibility becomes even more visible.
In many ways, the learner driver’s immediate determination to repair the damage to the school felt entirely in keeping with those values.
And to his enormous credit, that is exactly what happened.
Lamin carried out a temporary repair to make the school safe, then drove home again, probably wondering whether he should simply stop answering his phone altogether.
This was when Lamin rang me for the third and final time, that day.
This time, he was much calmer and able to regale me with the full details of the day’s tumultuous events. Most importantly, he reassured me it would not cost the charity any money.
Which was a relief, to be sure.
Five days later, because of the generous-hearted driver, Zakat and Ramadan, the wall and gate had been fully repaired.
Building Futures in The Gambia has benefited from Zakat and Islamic charitable giving on several previous occasions. Work on our first toilet block was carried out free of charge as a gift from Morro Fatty of Mojo Construction. The charity has received donations from mosques in the UK. And a teacher friend of mine, Ahmad, has donated generously to the charity and also helped Lamin buy smart clothes for his children for Eid.
In every case, the mosques and kind-hearted people involved have not wanted public thanks or publicity.
As Ahmad said when I asked whether he wanted the charity to publicly recognise his kindness:
“No. I will be rewarded in heaven.”
And who am I to argue?
Oddly enough, the whole literal gate-crashing incident became a reminder of something rather wonderful.
People in the local community genuinely care about BFiG Busumbala Nursery School.
They look after it.
They protect it.
And when things go wrong — even when they accidentally drive into the gate — they help put things right again.
Honestly, there are probably easier ways to demonstrate community spirit.
But, as the well-worn saying goes:
“This is Africa.”
Read the next chapter here:
Lamin and the Maximum Fine | Building Futures in the Gambia
Read the previous chapter here:
Lamin and the Peanut Man | Building Futures in the Gambia
Read the Introduction to ‘Travels With Lamin’ here:
👉Travels With Lamin – An Introduction | Building Futures in the Gambia
Find all the other chapters here:
👉Travels With Lamin: Stories from The Gambia and West Africa | Building Futures in the Gambia
Book Lamin and his taxi here:
👉Lamin Barrow Taxis – The Gambia’s Number One Taxi Driver
And find out more about Lamin’s work with BFiG Busumbala Nursery School here:
