Swerves and Curves, Shoulder to Shoulder

Zooming Around Kigali in a Mini-Taxi

Blessed with courage instead of cash? Kigali's public transportation provides plenty of thrills for the budget-minded.

One of the first things you'll notice in Kigali is a stream of white mini-vans on every road, all jammed with passengers. These are the mini-taxis -- also called minibuses, matutus, or matolas in other African countries.

Private hire taxis are widely available, but mini-taxis are absolutely the cheapest way to travel. A ride during daylight hours is 100 RWF (Rwandan francs), or about 20 cents; at night, the price goes up to 150. The rainy season's sudden storms also tend to trigger temporary inflation, as space becomes premium.

The bottom line: a good bargain involves work. Minibus riding comes with complex challenges and requires a learned set of skills. The first step is to ask, in whatever tongue you can manage, where the van is going, and if it stops where you need it to stop. Public transportation is in some aspects universal. In New York City, there were times that a 2 train would mysteriously appear on the 4/5/6 track, or an R train would randomly find itself in the East Village. In Kigali, the various lines (lignes, in French) are painted on the doors of the vans; but they do not necessarily correspond to their actual routes.


Each van has a driver and a conductor who plays host (his duties include advertising, rearranging seating order, and collecting money). If you cannot understand where a mini-taxi is going from its operators, wait for the next one or ask another passenger.

A side note: vans don't usually depart until they are filled. If you are the first one on, don't congratulate yourself too fast. You may have a good seat, but you'll occupy it longer. A fuller mini-taxi will leave sooner.

Maneuvering in the Galley

You've finally found a van going your way? Well, the challenge has just begun.

Finding a seat requires good luck and/or quick judgment. Each van has four rows of four seats each as well as two seats beside the driver. Most of the time, you will be in the back. This is what guidebooks euphemistically call a 'colorful' experience. The two seats furthest from the sliding door form a solid bench, then there is a 6-inch gap, and closest to the door is a much smaller seat that folds up to let people in rear rows out. You are almost guaranteed to be cramped because a mini-van does not usually carry a cargo four adults wide.

The worst seats to get are the 6-inch gaps as by definition they lack seats. I usually get stuck in them because I don't have that competitive public transportation edge. And like public vehicles everywhere, the rear zone generally operates on Darwinian principles: tiny people get shoved into the cracks left between larger people. I also suggest avoiding the seats closest to the sliding side door. The conductor does not pay to ride and is not allocated a seat. He therefore stands hovering over the laps of the people in the second row so he can open the door and hop out at each stop.

Unless you were one of those kids who enjoyed riding roller coasters right after lunch, you may be sweaty-palmed in the front seat. This is because you can actually see where you are going. Some people prefer the more spacious quarters near the captain, though, and enjoy witnessing an assortment of thrillingly narrow escapes. If you always wanted to star in an action movie, this may be as close as you will ever get.

Finally, you must know the password to stop the ride. When you need to get out, knock on the wall or ceiling when approaching the desired stop. The conductor will then knock to signal that the driver should pull over. Pay the conductor after you get out.

A mini-taxi is human jam, a pay-per-ride clown car. Advice can do little to alter the facts, and you won't always be excited about being so close to unfamiliar people. If possible, try to get a window seat so you can control your airflow. Give babies space -- sometimes they do not come equipped with diapers. Be polite at all costs and keep your tension to yourself.

Don't Be a Stat -- Safety and Mini-Buses

As you may have gathered by now, greenhorn Westerners may grapple with mini-taxi safety issues. (Well, you might not; but I am of a nervous, sheltered constitution.) Driving anywhere involves risk, and more so in many places in Africa.

Kigali is relatively safe because there is a sense of order and reason in the planning of main roads. Smoothly paved roads are also common here. Because the terrain is hilly, however, decent speeds can be reached on uninterrupted downhill stretches. Sometimes these are more than I can comfortably tune out, but I am beginning to be able to tell a reckless binge apart from a mere exhilarating sprint. Try to size up the condition of the van before you get on, although it is difficult to spot a good ride. Even the most battered of vans can actually growl to life and miraculously carry 20 people up the hilly streets.

Above all, a van needs brakes and a good driver. Don’t hesitate to change vans at the next stop if you feel either is lacking.

Pimp My Ride


Some mini-buses are completely tricked out: tassels, fringe, paisley velvet seats, rear speakers and subwoofers. Operators also define their vans' images with written tint on the windows. Honoring rap music is popular, and I have ridden in vans that announce our presence by declaring JAY-Z, USHER, KANYE, or the generic GANGSTA from the windshield. Back windshields also display horses and other animals that represent fleet-footedness.

Individual vans do have distinctive personalities. Sometimes the decorative style can reflect the type of ride you can expect. The SHANIA TWAIN van seemed gentler in spirit, the turns less careening. The HELLO van was welcoming.

A personal note: I have made a habit of avoiding the PUT YOUR TRUST IN GOD vans, or ones bearing any other message to that effect. One can make arguments that the driver may be more likely to be moralistic, or that the passengers attracted may provide well-mannered company, or even that these mini-buses may be protected by a higher power. I concede these points. Yet I cannot shake the impression that these operators' attitudes towards danger could be too laissez faire. Faith in your god and faith in your driver are equal preoccupations when riding in a mini-taxi.

Pizza and (Banana) Beer

A Brief First Impression

In Kigali, Rwanda, kebabs are bar food, avocado trees line the streets, and gorgeous hillside vistas appear around every bend.



And it gets better: sidewalks, paved roads, gregarious people, buses that leave on time, turquoise-headed iguanas that scurry across your path. Banana wine - actually a beer - is a local delicacy. Internet access is relatively inexpensive. The temperature hovers between 60 and 75. Not just one, but several pizzerias exist.

The small details are the most intriguing reflections of culture, and Kigali often displays a sunny, polite disposition. An example: Mr. Clean is called by his French nom here. The local market's back shelf is lined with big yellow bottles of MR. PROPRE to disinfect your floors.

Checkered Hills and Silent Hawks

Wheels Down in Kigali

Shortly after departure, the sun rose for the third time in two days.

The flight from Entebbe to Kigali, our final leg, left at five in the morning. I had left home on Sunday; and, after two days of plane rides, it was now technically Wednesday.

Many people have seen the sun rise: pilots, prom night sweethearts, soldiers, night-shift employees. It is an experience often promoted as pleasant, even thrilling. On that flight, I was not in the kind of mood that is easily roused to admiration; and therefore when I say that the immensity of sky lit up, I mean that even in my state I noticed it. I am used to tri-colored sunrises, pink, orange, purple, stretched thin by the distance of the horizon line. This one was miles higher and included, in addition to the usual colors, indigo, yellow, and green stripes at the very top of the sky, almost beyond my sight.

The cloud cover loosened to reveal, at first in patches and then completely, why Rwanda is nicknamed the 'Land of a Thousand Hills.' I have never been anywhere that looks like here, was my first thought. These are not exactly hills, was my second. They were much bigger, more like small mountains, and they never stopped coming. Red soil peeked out from under green vegetation cover like other places in Africa, but a unique landscape became apparent. Squares of various shades of green cascaded down the sides of the hills, separating all the plots of earth devoted to cultivating a variety of crops. It was dizzying to swoop in and out of the tops of these hills in a plane. Below, the rolling countryside was tightly regulated and controlled, parceled out to farmers in tiny bits.

Rwanda's Hawks Lay Out the Red Carpet

The plane touched down. I heard a massive flapping and turned once more to the window. Hundreds of hawks had been flushed from their rest by the plane's landing, and they now swarmed around it in a huge flock. As we taxied over to the terminal, they soared by, flapping, diving, swerving. They really didn't settle down again, even as we stepped down the stairs and onto the runway. Every few seconds, you'd hear a flutter behind you, and if you turned quickly enough, a large brown bird would glide by at eye level and give you a hard look. It was a feeling of air; there was no noise. A nearness, and then far again, as the birds made bold to approach you and then, with a turn of the wing, depart again.

Night Flights and Night Life

Flying with Ethiopian Airlines

You must have stamina to find an obscure airline's ticket counter in Washington Dulles' departures terminal. The ceilings are impossibly tall, and the rows of counters stretch beyond sight. Glancing down the length from domestic ticketing, even the few souls checking luggage at Alaska Airlines are no taller than matchsticks.

I didn't know there were so many airlines. Weaving my rolling bag crazily around luggage carts, security checkpoints, and small children, I caught glimpses of an incredible variety. Thai, Mexican, Irish, Malaysian, Kenyan, German, and Peruvian counters, each manned by a different looking woman wearing a different length of skirt, were all shuffled together.

I asked directions from an assortment of bored (and imprecise) employees and passed an airline servicing every other member of the United Nations. Many minutes later, transit to most inhabited continents behind us, we reached the end of the line. Windows had long ceased to figure into the architecture down here. Birds chirped from nests in the rafters high above. A small banner reading 'Ethiopian Airlines' peeked out from behind yet another counter. It hung unevenly, stretched out awkwardly with white twine. Nearby, a family sat together eating samosas out of Ziploc bags and chatting with the baggage handlers. Slight apprehension at informal state of affairs.

Earplugs and Eye Masks for All

Luckily, first impressions are not always accurate. The plane, in contrast, was clean, new, and as technologically advanced as any other airline can claim. The only outstanding feature of this particular journey was that a surprisingly large number of children were on board for a 20-plus hour flight. Of course, they were all seated near us. Before departure, we endured 10 minutes of an adjacent two-year-old boy's tantrum. A patient Rastafarian sitting in front of me tried to distract the child with a game that involved a dollar bill. The rules were manipulative but simple: be quiet, and keep the dollar. Cry, and it gets taken away. The arrangement worked for approximately 30 seconds before the boy learned to scream at the man for taking the dollar out of his hands. With speed, we moved to a vacant row in the back of the cabin and remained ignorant of future sobs for the rest of the flight. All else was pleasant and comfortable.

Marble Madness

Addis Ababa boasts a stately airport. It is constructed mostly of marble, and the resulting aura registers somewhere between a museum's knowing authority and a tomb's peacefulness. The first floor's massive halls are divided into endless unmarked cubicles, and every doorway looks like it leads somewhere off limits. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was going to barge into an important confidential meeting at any second and single-handedly instigate a breakdown of a random international relationship. By some miracle, though, the sight of a proper place was always waiting when a door swung open: a baggage claim, or passport control counter, or snack bar.

We had a scheduled layover of 6 hours, beginning at 9 pm and lasting until 3 am, and decided to reject the fuss of using a hotel voucher for such a short period of time. A meal of very dry red wine, rice, and spicy Ethiopian beef was a satisfying substitute. We ate silently, the only two people in a balcony cafe dwarfed by 30-foot ceilings. For the second time in 24 hours, I noticed small birds nesting high above me. Two waitresses giggled softly at the buffet line. A cart rattled down a distant hallway. A horn honked in the parking lot outside. All else was still.

For about thirty minutes. It started as a slow trickle. The cafe had around fifty empty tables. First, two Nigerians made themselves plates from the buffet and sat down at one of them. Then three ladies in traditional Muslim garb sat and ordered beverages from another. An Indian family took over the back corner, the children laughing and eating spaghetti with their hands. Within the time it took for me to drink a glass of wine, every table had filled. Conversations in countless languages ricocheted off the marble walls.

A dance beat started from the bar down the hall, and the lounge opposite sprouted a bouncer and red ropes. I suddenly became aware of the presence of tall, made-up women strolling up and down the concourse. Soon after, I became aware of the presence of young men, dressed in silk shirts, following them. The gleam of gold jewelry was everywhere. A brief fresh air outing to the curb outside baggage claim revealed a packed parking lot, crowded with cars and people. Watch check: midnight. The Addis airport was absolutely jumpin'.

When we finally boarded our connection to Entebbe at 2 am, the airport was still filling up. Not a seat in the house remained unoccupied. Every hallway, every duty-free store, every cafe was brimming with people.