Bus Adventures

I inquired with many people before booking a bus to Kampala. It was agreed that Queens Coach is the best option. It was certainly the most expensive option. So I confidently bought a ticket to leave Nairobi on Friday morning, fully expecting a smooth ride to Kampala.

On Thursday morning, I got a phone call, informing me that our bus for the following day had broken down. We would need to squeeze onto either the Thursday night or Friday night bus. I opted to go for the Thursday night bus, which left me with only a few hours to pack and rearrange my plans.

Thursday night I showed up at 8:30pm, the designated check in time. No bus. Hours passed, with all of us would-be passengers shuffling restlessly around at the bus station in a sketchy part of downtown. Drunk men stumbled out of bars nearby, while we sat shivering. Finally the bus showed up at 11, we were on the road within 30 minutes.

The night passed slowly. The seats were not terrible, but not comfortable enough to sleep in. Some of the passengers near me passed around a bottle of vodka and got pretty rowdy. We reached the border around 7am and made our way through the immigration lines. I paid 50 bucks for my three month Uganda visa while my East African counterparts passed through for free. A kind Kenyan lady from our bus started chatting with me, which was pleasant.

As we continued our journey into Uganda, the sun was up so the scenery preoccupied me. Uganda is so hilly, green and fertile compared to Kenya. Banana trees grow everywhere. It was beautiful.

All was going according to plan until about 10am. The bus stopped and pulled over. We saw smoke billowing from underneath us. We were still at least two hours from our destination. Customers started panicking and abandoning ship. They stood by the side of the road and hailed taxis (in Uganda, a taxi is like a Kenyan matatu, not a cab).

I, on the other hand, had no Ugandan currency, no Ugandan phone line, and no clue what to do. I remained on the bus as everyone else filed off. Finally, I talked to my Kenyan lady about my situation. She pressed some Ugandan shillings in my hand, which was very kind. Then she disappeared. Still I didn’t know what to do.

Ultimately, the bus company found some taxis (picture dilapidated vans) and paid them to take us the rest of the way to Kampala. So they crammed the remaining passengers along with our luggage into the vehicle. I could not move my legs, and there was a baby breathing on me. But I was grateful to be headed to my destination.

The taxi driver was insane, I couldn’t believe how he was driving. They even stopped by the side of the road and crammed in more passengers, although the vehicle was clearly full already. The drive past Jinja and to Kampala was congested and headache inducing. I somehow slept for a while. I woke up in time to see a naked madman walking solemnly on the side of the busy road. I don’t know a more sensitive title for such a person—but that’s what madmen do here. They walk naked on roadsides. Seriously.

I was so tired when I reached Kampala after the 17 hour journey. But victorious!