'Buckle up'!: Inside the dangerously reckless world of the average Kenyan Prado owner

And then, all of a sudden, a sudden whoosh – it's a black Prado, all tinted up, windows firmly shut, as the driver dangerously careens past you, nearly knocking your side mirror off as he, like a blinding flash of lightning, spins over to the next lane, recklessly quick and thoughtlessly bold.

As you try to adjust to this abrupt scare, trying to regain your balance and reposition yourself on the lane, the Prado hurtles off into the sweltering tarmac, tears through several lanes and nearly knocks down a couple roadside vendors loitering at the rumble strips.

You turn down Tabu Ley's 'C'est Comme Ca La Vie' and yank off your sunglasses in utter bewilderment and blinding rage as your idyllic Saturday cruise is, once again, violently and discourteously disturbed by yet another shamelessly deranged Prado driver.

Welcome to the world of the Kenyan Prado driver; a brash, brazen and helplessly audacious character who will flagrantly cut through traffic, needlessly bully his way around, pompously swoosh past you and fearlessly squeeze into the tiniest space available.

Armed with the childish knowledge that theirs is the official 'Mheshimiwa' machine, these daredevils care little about highway hierarchy, turning the tarmac into a Grand Prix circuit, tailgating, honking and browbeating motorists in the most hysterically tyrannical way possible.

It's either their way or the highway. And they're not afraid of fatally injuring themselves – or you – in their crazed-out steering frenzy.

Along busy intersections and flooded roundabouts, they will storm their way past you, past the traffic police and past the plexus of motorbikes angling for space as they rumble on, inch by inch, pedal by pedal, through furious terror and blatant entitlement.

Any attempt to call them out or bark them back into their lane is quickly and seethingly met with fierce rage and toxic slurs: You're swiftly reminded of your poverty, your mother makes a cameo, you're reprimanded for having a tiny car, and you're dared to take up the matter with the highest authorities on the land.

Heck, they may even abruptly stop and gleefully ask you out for a quick dust-up. But unlike them, you're not a moron, so you quickly turn down the blood-soaked offer.

Unlike the Subaru boys, who are merely a fleeting nuisance who quickly disappear from the vicinity, the Prado boys make their presence felt, and they linger around long enough to instill palpable horror before sneering their way away. 

And unlike their peers in the 'Big League', the Range Rovers and Porsche Cayennes, these charlatans care little about decorum; after all, their cousins in Parliament, popularised this type of vehicle.

At weddings and public events, they park right next to each other, like a soulless gang of Bolivian mercenaries, eagerly waiting for the drive-off hour to once again whip up a cloud of village dust, cloaked in wretched disgust.

Once in a while, as you drive past a crowd of rubberneckers, you realise there has been an accident, and lo and behold, it's one of them; senselessly perched on a hill, vehicle upside down, as the wheels spin away the last yarns of this self-engineered armageddon.

For the average Kenyan Prado driver, the more brutish you can be, the faster you're getting to your destination.

And it helps if you're a natural swashbuckler, the kind that only needed a massive car to reign untold terror on the stunned peasants.

It gets particularly exasperating if you encounter one of those with flashing strobe lights fitted across the bumper.

As they inch closer, you're tempted to give way, thinking it is the area MP.

You're wrong. It turns out to be a drunk 27-year-old who runs dubious forex tuition from a shared apartment in Mwihoko.

You'll find them at Park And Chill too. In Naivasha, at Naishola and in Tigoni.

With the boot flung open and the windows wound down, they blare the loudest edition of 'The Bag 6', drowning a probably-fake Cognac and struggling to capture the perfect sunset, as the dam glimmers back at their iPhone 17s.

At 10PM, they'll again hurriedly leave the dam resort, tear up the gravel road, haughtily join the highway and then launch their usual crusade of bullish scrambles and roadside mannerlessness as they struggle to arrive at Kilimani just in time to catch a match they won't even sit halfway through anyway.

It is the dark era of the Prado driver.

And you will be banished to the abyss of the dungeons if you ever share a lane with him.

Buckle up, peasant!