Sardines anyone?

Okay, so it's not quite this bad, but close

Public transport by bus in Nigeria deserves a mention. My colleague recently asked me if I minded travelling by public transport. It’s worth pointing out that by the time he asked me this question, it was a little late to say anything other than “no, of course I don’t mind”. We were sat on the bus, minutes from departure. The place we were going to was only about five hours away, which in mind wasn’t very far, especially compared to other places like Calabar, a bone juddering, teeth trembling thirteen hours away (the road to Calabar is baaaad). The general concept to follow when filling these buses is to work out how many people the bus can comfortably fit, and then double it. Despite telling myself that five hours really wasn’t a very long time, on our return journey to Abuja it felt like a lifetime.

To start with, we boarded the bus in the midday heat. We were the first people to board the bus. The bus doesn’t go until it’s full. It took two hours for the bus to get full. During this time I lost count of how many people tried to sell me things through the window, and looked like I’d crushed their very reason to carry on living when I said no. But if I had wanted to buy a watch that would never work, a year’s supply of chewing gum, male underwear, or a Bible, then I would have been sat in the right place. So for two hours I pretended to be asleep. This didn’t work; people just prodded me through the window. Finally the bus left. My colleague had insisted we got seats at the back of the bus so that we would get ‘ventilation’. But then it started to rain. Not only did this mean all the windows were immediately slammed shut, but the back of the bus started to leak. This wasn’t normal rain, this was full on In the Middle of Rainy Season Nigerian Rain. We got soaked. My colleague asked the driver to throw us a rag (not entirely sure what this was going to do given the amount of water that was pouring in would have filled a bucket, let alone saturating a small filthy piece of cloth). After about 10 minutes of sitting in a swimming pool, everyone else on the bus decided that everyone on the backseat should move forward and share their seats so we didn’t continue to get wet. Very thoughtful. But as I may have already hinted, the bus was already full to bursting. Removing one entire row of seating didn’t really help to lessen this problem. I was given an area to sit in that a 5 year old child would have struggled to squeeze into. For 5 hours. I got very well acquainted with the two (slightly oversized) people on either side of me. With the windows shut also came another issue – air circulation. These buses aren’t kept particularly clean. Within minutes the bus smelt overwhelmingly of a mixture of dried fish, feet, egg rolls, body odour, vomit, diesel and fizzy drinks. It was an interesting mix of smells. It finally stopped raining, and so I attempted to lean over and open the closest window within my grasp before asphyxiation set in. Sadly the person sat next to the window was passed out and leaning on the glass. Despite many desperate attempts, I failed to move either him or the window. And it seemed that it was only me that wasn’t enjoying the eclectic mix of aromas circulating the bus, as no one else attempted to help or to open any of the other windows.

So all in all, the journey was an experience. The one good thing about this journey compared to a thirteen-hour journey I endured to Calabar in the past, was the soundtrack. Thankfully the driver had reasonably good taste in music. I say thankfully, because given it was being played at ear splitting volume I had little choice but to listen to it. Any attempt to listen to my ipod would have been fruitless. Not so for my journey to Calabar, where the driver played a maths educational CD for children funded by USAID. On repeat. For four of the thirteen hours. I have never become so well acquainted with my times tables before.

Something else about long bus journeys here unnerves me slightly. Before the bus leaves the bus park, a preacher comes onboard to bless the bus. People start chanting and praying with him – this can last for a considerable period of time. I’ve witnessed this several times now, and each time, the prayers said by the preacher include assertions that anything that might go wrong on the journey (such as the bus crashing and people being killed) is beyond the driver’s control. Call me pessimistic, but I really would prefer the option of wearing a seatbelt and the driver attempting to drive carefully, rather than having to rely on some sort of divine intervention to keep us out of harm’s way.

Moral of the story? Enjoy the “experience”. To get anywhere here public transport can’t really be avoided, unless you want to pay considerably more money for a private car/taxi. And when travelling for work, that’s definitely not an option.