The morning began ten minutes before
my alarm, which is normally not anything to loathe, but when the
alarm is set for four-forty in the morning, it becomes increasingly
harder to not miss the sleep that was taken. My day was jump started
when I was awoken by a clatter of doors opening and closing, hushed
voices and the jangle of keys. This was followed by the noise of an
engine starting which grew fainter shortly thereafter. I found this
odd because it was only four-thirty and our driver was not supposed
to take us to the bus station until five. I finished my packing in
a half slumber and put on a forced smile for the journey ahead. I
realized at ten after five that our driver had gone to purchase
petrol and was running a little late. We loaded our bags into the
dala dala and headed to bus station.
A mere twenty minutes later, Jeff and
I arrived at the bus station in a bustle that I was not expecting at
such an early hour. On the south side of Mwanza, Nyegezi station had
at least twenty buses loading concurrently and numerous vendors lined
up to sell to the lethargic crowd. Upon departure, I was less than
delighted to find that our bus was completely full and it was five
seats wide with narrow aisle dividing them. We met John and Braedon
on the bus and tried to get comfortable for our twelve hour ride to
Arusha, despite that our “in flight” music was at full volume and
the overhead lights remained lit. Our driver exhibited less than
perfect skill in manipulating the gear shift along with the clutch
and gas, so we began with a bumpy ride.
After ten minutes, we stopped for our
first of eight police stops along the way. It quickly became clear
to me the reason why this bus ride takes half a day. The police
stops appeared to me random, but altogether unnecessary at every
occurrence. We were boarded a couple of times and told to drive safe
and have a pleasant journey. Most other times they merely spoke to
the driver for a minute and allowed us to pass. One time we were
stopped and then the whole bus was escorted to the police station.
Of course, the four of us guys took advantage of this unplanned stop
and found a spot to relieve ourselves against the back of the police
station wall. Little did we know that only two minutes later we
would stop at a gas station with public toilets!
About halfway through the trip, John
and I came to a realization that should be unnerving, but worried us
little. We were traveling with two half eaten boxes of crackers, a
bag of peanuts and little money to our name. This in and of itself
is not necessarily something to write home about. However, in
traditional World Race style, our concern had the potential to be
compounded by the fact that we didn’t know where we were supposed to
go once we arrived in Arusha and we were not in possession of our
passports. As disconcerting as the aforementioned missing items may
be, we made up for it with reading, catnaps, games of “big 2’s”
and iPod playlists.
I can vouch for myself that I won’t
miss the bumpy, dusty and crowded bus ride. Also, I cannot say that
I learned anything profound or came to some spiritual epiphany while
on the bus, but what I did experience was a day in the life of an
African. The Africans on board did not seem surprised when we were
stopped by the police or when we picked up random hitchhikers along
the way. Also, it didn’t seem imperative for them to stand every
time the bus stopped like it did for us. All in all, with at least
fifteen stops and numerous dirt roads, everything worked out
appropriately and we arrived safely almost exactly twelve hours after
our departure. One would wonder if all the things I interpreted as
unexpected were actually planned all along! Welcome to a typical
World Race travel day.
