on the road

After Rwanda, my next step was Zambia. Unfortunately, there's the inconvenience of a vast country in between the two: my old friend Tanzania. Crossing Tanzania by land is no easy feat, particularly when coming in through Rwanda. Unlike the well-worn route from Kenya, few people pass this way, except long-distance truckers, so there's not much choice when it comes to transportation. After failing to find any transportation directly from Rwanda, I opted to simply take a matatu to the border and hope for the best. In my experience in East Africa, it's always possible to arrange transportation -- as long as you're not too picky, or impatient.

I left Kigali on January 28th, and finally arrived in Lusaka on February 3rd. That's six days of travel, one of which I took as a rest day. That was in Dar es Salaam, after a particularly gruelling 25-hour bus ride on a terribly old, cramped bus that was so laden with cargo that we had to put our luggage in the aisle. In total, I was traveling for almost 60 hours over the five travel days. I was stuck on every level of transport, from a shared taxi with cracked windows, busted door handles and a peeling interior, to busses seating five across with seats bereft of stuffing, to "luxury" busses with toilets, movies and drink service. I took seven vehicles in total: four busses, two matatus and one shared taxi. Had I come from Nairobi, I could have done the trip with only two busses!

The journey had its hitches. There were unexpected transfers, close calls with the police on an overloaded bus, long stretches of travel without a bathroom break, and sections of road so bad that I feared the windows would shatter from the force of their rattling. There were sleepless nights, and two border crossings by foot (one of which involved quite a strenuous climb with my big pack!). There were chickens stored, untied, in the overhead compartment that made a dash for freedom into the aisle in the middle of the night, giving us all a rude shock.

Two things made the journey bearable, and even enjoyable at times. The first was all the beautiful landscape I passed through -- Tanzania in particular, which made up the bulk of the travel, is so green, with spectacular mountains and lots of quaint villages. I managed to spot some wildlife, too: some elephants, impalas, baboons, and one zebra. The other plus for the journey was the number of interesting and incredibly kind people I encountered along the way. Over and over, I was helped out by absolute strangers; at one point, I felt as if the whole bus was looking out for me. People helped me out in the police encounter; squeezed themselves into awkward positions to give me more room; helped me negociate various transfers; and one kind soul even bought me breakfast when I was starving and short on cash. I'm sure I would still have made it safely without all the help, but the kindness of strangers smoothed things over a lot. In Dar, I returned to the same cheap hotel I had used before, and was greeted like a long-lost sister. The country may have some pretty miserable transportation and terrible roads, but the people -- the people are Tanzania's saving grace.