Miles Routledge is an “adventurous” British student who shot to fame last when he travelled to Afghanistan shortly before the Taliban seized control of Kabul and the rest of the country.
He has once again captured the Internet’s attention.
This time around, the 22-year-old who strongly proclaims his love to explore what he describes as the “worst places in the world”, evoked mixed reactions from netizens after documenting part of his current trip through Kenya, headed to South Sudan.
In a tweet sent out via his heavily followed Twitter page, Routledge bemoaned poor customer service from a taxi driver along the northern-western route to Lodwar town in Turkana County.
He alleged that the driver of the van attempted to extort him by demanding a fare of Sh10k, which he felt was an unreasonable amount of money for the trip.
His last offer to the driver was $7 (around Sh800).
“Taxis in Lodwar (North Kenya) wanted 10k Kenya shillings ($83 or £73) for a 2h drive when it’s meant to be like 700 shillings! Laughed at him and I paid like $7 for a shared van. I ride to the refugee camp now,” he tweeted on Wednesday, September 21.
This was followed by a series of two more tweets proudly explaining how he boldly dealt with the “scam” by standing his ground and insisting he would only pay once he reached the intended destination: the Kakuma refugee camp.
Very often a scam to demand money later, claiming they didn’t get it,” he lamented.
Despite Routledge’s attempt to make a case for the purported attempted extortion, Kenyans on Twitter did not have any of it.
Contrary to his expectations, netizens descended upon the tweet and dismissed his allegations as unjustifiable.
His claim that the cost of the 2-hour long 140 kilometre trip should have been Sh700 was quickly debunked as a myth that only exists in his head.
“Imagine coming all the way from Britain to try and rip off a taxi driver in Lodwar?” wrote one Kenyan.
“You want to pay 700 shillings for a 140-kilometre trip? 700 is what you’ll pay for a 15 km trip within Nairobi,” added another.
“You are a clown if you think more than 100km drive in a taxi is worth 7 pounds,” a third replied.
“You just said a taxi bro. Do you want to pay $7 for a 2hr drive in Lodwar in a taxi? The price of fuel just went up and that’s a long drive to be honest. $7 for over 120km in a taxi? You’re a joke bro,” reads another response.
From his last social media post, Routledge says his mission at the Kakuma Refugee Camp is to film and expose corruption by the United Nations (UN), after which he will proceed to South Sudan.
“I’ve arrived at the Kakuma refugee camp in northern Kenya! Gonna spend 2 days here filming to expose some UN corruption and then drive into south Sudan,” he tweeted on Thursday, September 22.
The Loughborough University physics student has been a fan of travelling to dangerous locales.
When he was in Afghanistan, he said he looked up the most dangerous places in the world and picked Kabul off the list.
The end of the Lord Miles Le-vesconte Routledge in Afghanistan saga. From his Facebook: “The happy ending: landed in Dubai thanks to the brilliant people at the British Army. All safe!” pic.twitter.com/TWyoF9cymD
— ꧁꧂𝐖𝐚𝐡𝐝𝐚𝐝𝐝𝐢𝐧 𝐓𝐫𝐨𝐭𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐤𝐲’࿆۞ (@Reach4ACopsGun) August 17, 2021
Routledge’s trip to Afghanistan attracted heavy criticism.
The fact that he was evacuated even as thousands of locals who had helped US and British forces during their time in Afghanistan were left behind only added to the anger.
He said on social media he did not regret his decision to travel to the country.
In past interviews, Mr Routledge has also admitted he traveled to Chernobyl in 2019.
Routledge began updating people about his misadventures on 4Chan, where people know him by his Twitch username: Lord Miles.
He has since been keeping people informed on his Facebook and Twitter profiles.
