Public mini-buses

Public transportation for Rwandans mostly means mini-buses. These are the size of American mini-vans, but have four rows of seats that seat four across, no matter what size person. On the front two rows, the fourth seat back folds down, and then the seat bottom folds to the left so that people can get in and out more easily, “easy” being a relative term. At least two more people sit in the driver’s row.

The fares for the buses are the lowest (motos are next, and then taxi cabs). To the NAR offices, a ride costs 120 RWF—not much at all. All the way back from the Kimironko Market, which is way past Amahoro Stadium, was 500 RWF. I took a moto on the way out, and paid 1000 RWF by comparison. BTW, gas here is posted as 892, which I’m guessing is for one liter. At about 530-560 RWF to the dollar and roughly 4 liters to the gallon.

There is a driver, and the steering wheel can be on either the left or right, depending on the origin of the bus (despite the great number of European cars here, Rwandans drive on the right side of the road). The driver’s job is just to drive. There is another guy (I’ve seen only men in this capacity) who calls out the bus route as the vehicle approaches a stop, adds gasoline at the stations, knocks on the side of the bus when someone wants to get off, and manages the money. This last task posed a problem for the guy on my bus this afternoon.

There was a fairly affluent-looking guy (slacks, ironed button-up shirt, nice shoes and glasses, and the ubiquitous cell phone) who got on and then got off a few stops later. It is common to pay at the end of the ride, so this guy handed the money guy a little bit of money, but apparently not enough. The money guy yelled at him and said what I guess was something like “You have to pay!” The other tried to quickly walk away, but the thing was was that he was basically making fun of the money guy. The smart-alec had a huge grin on his face, maybe like he was too good to pay. (All this was in Kinyarwandan, so I was reading body language and reading into it what I could.) There was a lot of shirt-pulling (the jerk pulling the money guy’s shirt), lots of shoving, and yelling like crazy. There were children watching, too close to the fight for my comfort, as well as a few others who gathered around. The driver got out and tried to intervene, but it was no use. After about five minutes, the money guy and he driver got back in the bus. The money guy was sitting next to me, and I asked him, “Ça va?” He shook his head and said, “Non.” I touched his arm and said, “I’m sorry.” The Rwandans riding the bus I think told him what a jerk the other guy was and generally made noise in the money guy’s support.

As a Quaker, as a woman, and especially as a mom, I don’t want to see people fighting. Let me put that another way: I don’t want people to solve their problems by fighting. A thousand thoughts ran through my head in those few tense minutes. I was probably the oldest person on that bus (yes, 42 is old by Rwandan standards; if I were born here, I might have only a few more years to live—if I’d survived this long—more on age in another post). I thought that maybe I could pay for the thief’s ride, which I would have offered to do if he was apologetic about not having the money. And I do think that he really didn’t have the fare, but was too proud to say so. But what kind of message would that send—a muzungu woman paying for someone who appears to be able to afford the fare? If I were me but Rwandan, I might have gotten out and lectured the jerk and told him to either borrow the money from someone or to trade something of value, but I am an American me, so all they might get is some muzungu lady yacking at them in an unknown language. Not good. I wanted to ask someone if we should call the police; they have a strong presence in the city center, but were not apparent in the suburbs. In the end, I did what the Rwandans (I almost wrote “other Rwandans”) did: I watched.

Rwanda is almost famous now for being a peaceful, safe African nation. Each of the young men displayed the best and worst of not only Rwandans, but people in general: one cheated and mocked the other for being cheated; the other walked away.

Which one holds the promise of this country?