des·per·a·do /despəˈrädō/ a bold or violent criminal; a desperate person who has no hope. If you’ve ever heard anyone say, ‘Desperate times call for desperate measures’ then take a wild guess what they will be getting up to? No Good, that’s what!

Just a few days ago I was looking outside my office window when I suddenly noticed some commotion involving a motorcyclist and some banking officers. In the centre of it all was a man grimacing on the tarmac. It was reasonably safe to assume that the corporate vehicle the banking officers were in had hit the poor man. To my surprise I saw the victim grabbing hold of the grill of the car as the driver tried to reverse. Was this a foiled hit-and-run? Coincidentally a colleague of mine, an eye-witness, narrated what really happened…

The corporate car had just driven out of the car park and stopped by the pavement to pick up the banking officers. The driver came out of the car to put items in the boot before setting off. Unfortunately as the driver was about to get back into the car a motorcycle carrying a passenger clipped the driver’s door even as the driver quickly tried to close it. But what happened next baffled my colleague – the motorcyclist turned his head, peered into the car and after ‘sizing up the talent’ seated in the backseat he proceeded to literally fall off his bike! Everyone around the scene looked on with disbelief…including the motorcyclist’s passenger who had already jumped off the bike unscathed.

The motorcyclist started to clutch his knee with ‘agony’ and strategically positioned himself in front of the rogue vehicle (so as to prevent the embarrassing scenario of the driver zooming off). He deliberately left his bike lying helplessly on its side while standby motorcyclists assisted to get it off the road. The driver knew the desperado’s game but he wasn’t ready to deal. They argued with each other and the fault was knocked back and forth like a tennis ball in a Nadal vs Federer endurance match. When the driver finally called a time-out he attempted to reverse the car in order to make a getaway. The trickster unexpectedly grabbed the grill of the Slow and Furious Toyota Corolla. He was barely dragged 10 inches before the car driver decided to stop and re-evaluate his next tactic.

The next and most effective choice of play by one of the banking officers however was to grease the motorcyclist’s palm (not literally, of course). At least that cut short his endless lament about how he was denied the payment he otherwise would have received from his passenger before the ‘wack-cident’ (nobody heard the passenger shout, YOU LIE! in the background, sigh). After the car sped off the injured motorcyclist miraculously stood on his two feet, mounted his bike and all onlooking motorcyclists cheered and hailed him – not  because he made a quick recovery but because he had made a quick buck! N1000  ($6 or thereabout). The desperado rode off into the sunset and lived happily ever after…

Have you witnessed any acts of desperation? Are you an ex Commando Desperado with a few nasty stories to share? Like Fraiser Krane, I’m listening 😀

See also C is for Cursing