There are reasons I'd rather drink bleach than ride a bus to Kampala and yesterday I remembered all of them.
We started at 8:45 in theory. Actually, mentally I started two days before, asking staff, "Now, how are are we getting to Kampala?" Praying against hope that we would go in a vehicle other than the bus, this was not to be. One would think, with this conference being on the books for essentially a year, that advance plans could be made. I am not casting aspersions on my NGO - they are lovely, intelligent, people who deliver amazing services under difficult circumstances. This is not about them. It is about busses... The problem is, one cannot actually buy tickets in advance, even if one might perchance go to the bus office (if there is one) and try. Either that bus doesn't run on Sunday (Post bus - the most reliable) no one is there, "tickets are finished," or - well - it's just not done. "You just come and see," means come early and wait to see: if the bus arrives and if so, are there any seats.
This is not as straight forward as it sounds. The drill, with few exceptions, goes something like this:
Arrive at least a hour early and stand around the filthy, dusty, chaotic bus park waiting to see what comes along or which ones are there and planning to go to your destination. Try to keep your hands on your luggage and pray that you have packed light - i.e. a bag you can put between your feet, on your lap or if you're terribly brave in the overhead. But if you do that, put it across from you so you can keep an eagle-eye on it every time someone gets on or off the bus. Don't doze - your bag may walk off while you cat nap. Take it with you when you go pee at the one stop between here and where ever.
When/if the bus arrives run like a bat-out-of-hell to the door and join the crush waiting to force their way in the door as others are trying to force their way out. None of this polite crap about letting people exit, having someone SEE how many vacant seats there are, etc. No, no! The rule is: if there's space for a hair between you and the person in front of you, you are not close enough. Someone else will see this as a break in traffic and insert them selves. As another PCV said, if your front side side is not pressed against their backside (I've cleaned this up - the original version was much more graphic), you're too far apart. Ignore the crush of vendors hawking their wares at the windows and the arms and legs sticking out of the windows for various reasons. This does not insure confidence.
As the door opens, quickly insert as much of your body as will fit, shoving your foot up to reach the step that is two feet off the ground and grab something - it doesn't matter: a rail, foot, arm, peace of clothing, chicken or leg of goat.... Insert self. Force self through one-foot wide isle against traffic and get as far back the isle as possible to be SURE there are no empty seats. When you discover there ARE no spaces, repeat process in the opposite direction. Against all better judgement saying "there are NO FRIGGIN' SEATS N THIS BUS," and I would rather die than get on this bus, our entire group of five persisted in this process (one carrying a two-year-old) and all of us carrying luggage. I followed like a lemming because if they magically get on and I do not, I have to repeat this process alone. And face it - apparently this is really the only way to get a seat. Those that wait don't get on the bus - ever! Unless you take the following approach:
The alternative being... to wait and see if an empty bus waiting (if there IS a bus waiting) will actually fill up to leave sometime that day. After missing that previous bus (called The White Bus), and another (the Homeland Express) which was booked with a private party, and another in a different bus park, I finally pleaded the case of finding a nice window seat on the empty bus 10 feet away, before that one too fills up while we wait for a phantom bus. We do this, just before the crowd emerges out of no-where to take remaining seats. Sometimes this process takes most of a day and - for the most part - busses DO NOT LEAVE until all seats are filled. This usually means not only are all the seats filled, but in some seats there is the passenger (usually a mother) with three to seven small children in or around her lap or standing in the isles as was the case on our bus. Friends who recently took a bus and sat in the front (the most dangerous seats on the bus for obvious reasons) had to climb over mounds of luggage, a baby goat, a pile of live chickens and assorted people to get out.
This scene is repeated hundreds of times per day in bus parks all over Uganda and is absolutely routine.
If you are lucky enough to be traveling on a week-day, one might be able to show up at o-dark-thirty and get on the Post Bus, the one bus that leaves at a pre-specified time and sometimes sells a ticket in advance (but often not). Still, arrival way ahead of time is the only way to ensure a seat and there are still goats and chickens and one latrine stop. They also pray before departing - and I am learning this is a good idea.
Nine hours after we began this foray, we arrived at our hotel in Kampala. There have been seven police security stops, one latrine stop (pay to go) and one stop to argue with a man who had not paid, but somehow found the money as he was being lifted off the bus. When we arrive, there is electricity just long enough for me to take a cold shower and wash ten pounds of red dust out of my hair and dry it before making it down to dinner at 6:00. We are finally served at somewhere around 8:00, by which time "power is finished," and I stumbled up to the fourth floor by the light of my tiny flashlight to tumble into bed.
And that's another story....
P.S. The White Bus we didn't take, but that left two hours before us, arrived after us as we waited for a taxi. The other bus, that was fixing a flat tire and didn't know when it might leave, had an accident en route, colliding with a large transport truck - injuring 30 people. Just another travel day in the Pearl of Africa.
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