Le 16 Octobre 2008

You can’t buy anything for a buck anymore… remember those old commercials? Well, maybe it’s true, but in Guinea, two bucks will buy you more than you could ever dream. Two bucks, which converts to roughly 10,000 Guinean francs, can buy 20 cucumbers, 50 bananas, or even 150 grapefruit. Or, in the case of travel, it’ll get you about 30 miles in a bush taxi.

Oh! but you’re buying so much more than just a ride in a taxi. On a good day, those two dollars will also ensure you make at least a dozen new friends, in the form of other passengers. It also means you’ll probably get to spend an extra two or three hours at the taxi gare people watching or head shopping, the Guinean answer to QVC – instead of actually having to stand up and walk around, you just sit there while women and children solicit you with anything from clothes to food to radio-flashlights from the piles on their heads. And, just in case you were worried you’d be making it to your destination too early, your two dollars guarantees at least one layover of 30 minutes or more in a village of the driver’s choice.

In an effort of frugality, I generally forego these steals of deals by riding my bike to and from Faranah, a 60-mile round trip journey which takes about two hours each way. In other words, biking is about twice as fast as taking a taxi, once you consider the amount of time waiting for the taxi to fill with passengers and all the stops made along the way. This past weekend, though, I wanted to buy eggs, enough of them that I didn’t trust the suspension on my bike enough to keep them from breaking over 30 miles of the local paving. So, I broke down and decided to shell out my two bucks for the taxi.

Sunday morning, I arrived at the Faranah taxi gare around 8am, ready to get back to my site after an impromptu overnight in “the city.” Finding the right taxi was easy; the first guy I asked was headed in my direction. Unfortunately, I was the first passenger to arrive, so we’d have to wait for more to show up before it would be economically feasible for him to leave. That wasn’t a problem, as I still had to find eggs and some hinges for the screen doors I’d commissioned to be made for my hut, so I set off in search of the goods.

About thirty minutes later, I arrived back at the taxi, eggs and hinges in hand, along with some cheese and a knock-off Caprisun (they’re Capri-Sonne here) for the road. After thirty minutes, I was still the only passenger, so I left to find a snack. I felt like I’d discovered the City of Gold when I stumbled upon a guy on a side street operating a frozen yogurt machine. It may have only been 9:30 in the morning, but my motto is, “When you find ice cream in Africa, you buy it!” Not one to go against my own motto, I bought some, happily eating the frozen deliciousness as I made my way back to the taxi, again.

11:30 rolled around and there I sat, now accompanied by two older women waiting for the same taxi. I’d already finished the book I’d brought with me and had spent the last of my money on the ice cream, so all I could do was sit and wait patiently. Finally, around noon, another taxi pulled up and we were told to get in. I took the front seat, as always – apparently Africans think Americans smell really bad because of the dairy in our diet, so they try to sit as far from us as possible. As a result I always get the front to myself (I’m not complaining..). The two women took the back, all three of us wondering where the other four or five passengers were – surely we wouldn’t leave with such an empty car?? When I asked the driver, he explained he didn’t need the extra passengers’ fare because we’d be picking up some beef to transport along the way. Okay, I’ve seen taxis with slabs of meat strapped to the top a hundred times before. No big deal.

Well, when we pulled into the village with the beef 20 minutes later, I realized the “beef” was, in fact, still alive. The driver fully intended to place what must have amounted to 1000 pounds of live steer directly into the trunk of his 1970 Peugot sedan. Instructed to wait in the shade, I watched as 9 men tied and attempted to hoist the beast into the car. After their second failure, I left my roost to give them a hand – I wanted to get home at some point (I also thought hands-on experience would add some validity to this story). With both of my hands placed firmly under its rump – thank goodness for travel hand sanitizer – we finally managed to get the job done.

Cow in place, the driver remarked that there was still some space in between its legs. As everybody knows, the best way to fill an empty space is with two live, bleating sheep. As much as they protested against their predicament, I really didn’t have much sympathy for them. After all, they weren’t hog-tied and were certainly much more comfortable than the cow who hadn’t as much as mooed since the beginning of his quandary.

Having exhausted the requisite hour stowing the animals, we continued on towards our destination, the rest of the trip seeming slightly pedestrian in comparison, in spite of the fact that at one point there were 10 people packed into the car (drivers will pick up anyone, so long as they have a few francs to spare), and the six or seven near-death experiences we all shared as we blindly passed cargo trucks around dangerous bends. So, you see, one really can do quite a bit with two bucks here, so long as you’re not in a hurry and you don’t mind dealing with all the “bull” that comes with riding in a bush taxi.