The Left Handed Blogger – 6th in series. Kigali transport, shops, food and drink.

The Left Handed Blogger - 6^th. in series. Kigali transport, shops, food and drink.

 

The transport system in Kigali is very effective once you have worked it out. It works on five levels. Bicycles (no, not for hire, you actually sit on the back on a cushioned seat), I have not tried this; motorcycles (known as motos) are the most popular form of transport and you are provided with a helmet that is virtually always ill-fitting and would not protect you if you fell off at two miles an hour but VSO volunteers are provided with a European crash helmet and mine is a very fetching white patterned, full faced Nitro Dynamo (with air vents!). I have tried motos a few times and the riders vary from the ultra cautious to the maniacal but there are thousands of them so you never have to wait. There are no fixed prices so haggling is a must; minibuses (confusingly referred to as taxis), are as equally common as motos and the prices of these are set at 200Rwf., about 25p in town whilst the price can rise to as much as 7000Rwf. on long journeys which is still excellent value. Excellent value it may be but they are typically African as far as comfort is concerned i.e. they are very uncomfortable. Unlike in other parts of Africa, however, they are really quite roadworthy. They all have tyres with tread on and I have never been on one that has broken down even they look as though they are falling apart; buses and these are my favourite way of getting around because they can be as equally cheap as minibuses but are much bigger with comfortable individual seats. We travelled to the far north over Christmas for the equivalent of £3.50 each and it was a truly spectacular journey. These buses are also roadworthy and can even climb hills without the aid of brick brakes (common in Ghana) or a helping hand. My favourite company in Kigali is The Kigali Bus Service because you do not have to wait for them to fill up and for this you pay an extra 6p; finally what we would call taxis but are known as taxi-voitures here to distinguish them from minibus taxis. These are relatively expensive and only to be used if there is no alternative i.e. if you have a lot of luggage, there are four of you or it is late at night because all the other forms of transport stop at about ten o'clock.

All these vehicles (with the exception of bicycles) are regularly stopped at road blocks by the police and checked for road worthiness and driver's qualification to drive it. In the many roadblocks that I have encountered, I have never once seen money change hands and as this was an alternative form of income for the police in Ghana, I find this very refreshing. There are also roadblocks for other reasons that have nothing to do with transportation but that is not the subject of this blog.

So, once you have worked out the transport system and you know where to go, what will you find? Here I should make a distinction between Kigali and most of the rest of the country. You will get virtually anything you want in Kigali but your choices may be pretty limited elsewhere in terms of shops. The big chains of shops from around the world have not yet descended on Rwanda so there are many small, privately owned specialist shops to investigate from food to plumbing equipment! Real supermarkets are rare even in Kigali and are usually run by Indian Rwandans. These offer most things from the mundane to the exotic.

We are very lucky where we live because we do not have to get the bus into the middle of town to get everything we need to eat and drink. For example, I bought a whole fillet of beef yesterday (for£2.50) – eat your heart out Lon! Gloria has also had some clothes made and we are a short distance from the biggest local market in Rwanda where I will be going shortly to get some vegetables. All in all it is not difficult for us to be here!

This has gone on longer than I thought so there will have to be a third Kigali edition on food and drink because as you know that is my favourite subject and I would not want to rush it. More to come and stay well.

THE LEFT HANDED BLOGGER NEXT IN SERIES KIGALI

THE LEFT HANDED BLOGGER-5^TH IN SERIES-KIGALI

Kigali is built on and in a series of hills. The hills do not have names as do the hills in Rome and they are not endowed with the history of that capital city but they are spectacular. It is difficult to navigate around Kigali because of the hills. The roads do not follow a logical pattern and it is easy to get lost. I have been lost many times not only because of the hills but also because the driver's mates on the buses speak so quickly that I do not always cotton on to where they are going. It is not a disaster to be lost in Kigali. For a start, you are never far away from a beer so you can always take time out to consider your situation in a relaxed manner. I have become even more relaxed here and you might find that difficult to believe but it is true. I like Kigali.

I know my Aunties, Hazel and Heather read my blog and they live in Perth, Western Australia which as they will tell you is a very clean place. There seems to be a certain civic pride in its cleanliness but I tell you now, eat your heart out Perth because Kigali is so full of civic pride that it makes Perth look like nobody cares. If I had fallen into a ditch drain in Ghana I would be dead and not writing this. I probably would have died of something unmentionable. Here the ditch drains are cleaner than our house in Leamington Spa.

We even have a formal clean up, civic responsibility programme. It is called Umaganda and takes place everywhere in the country on the last Saturday of each month between 8.00am and 11.00am. The whole country comes to a standstill, no shops open and no transport allowed. Each Umaganda district (quite small) decides on its own priorities with a head person taking charge. Whenever the activity is done there is then a get together when local disputes are resolved without recourse to law.

The Umaganda seems to work well here but I doubt it would work in Eden Court (for those of you not from Leamington Spa, Eden Court is a high rise block of flats on the highest point in Leamington Spa, not renowned for its civic pride and its nickname is The Golan Heights-need I say more?).

At dusk in Kigali two things of note happen: mosquitoes come out as does the army. The mosquitoes are a force of nature and in truth are not too bad here because we are quite high up. The army clearly is not a force of nature but I have found them to be polite, courteous and not in the least intrusive in their half platoon detachments in strategic positions. Nobody takes any notice of them and people are happy with the idea they are there for protection after some incidents a little while ago. Once again, it may not work in the UK but hey, this is not the UK, it is not my country and I am grateful for the chance to live and work here (albeit unpaid!).

The transport arrangements and shops deserve a blog of their own so that will be next. Stay well and more to come.