When it comes to taking a bus or train, I'm used to the rather typical model of a single station that you go to and choose your service from. With trains, usually there is only one choice, but for buses, most places have multiple choices of private operators and you can decide which one is cheapest or which one fits your particular schedule.

I found that things work a bit different across Mali in that each private bus operator has their own station. Now, this doesn't appear to be the case in Bamako where it seems that there is one central (and extremely crowded) bus station for all the companies. Upon arriving at the station to catch a bus though, guys will run up alongside your taxi, ask you where you are going and then shuttle you to a single bus line where I'm assuming they get a kickback. It goes a long way to reduce the actual choice in service, but then again, if you know about this, you can "shop" for the bus you want to take at the station. Of course, there is no centralized ticket window, so you're still having to go around to each area for the respective companies, wait in line and ask.

In Mopti, the situation gets a bit more confusing. Somatra has the biggest station and is nearest the center of town. Then, the other carriers such as Binké, Gana, and one other I can't remember the name of have "stations" near the Old Port. Yes, you can still shop for a bus, but you have to meander between the various stations and ask about prices, which can vary quite a bit.

But it's in Ségou where it really goes to hell. Stations are varying degrees of kilometers from one another and shopping between lines is next to impossible given that you essentially have to take a taxi or RickCycle to get between them. It is not ideal and I bet that there are other towns set up in this way.

While centralization can have its downside, in this instance, there is only upside. Having all the buses come in to a singular spot makes everything easier and in fact, in Côte d'Ivoire, this is how they do it. In Ghana, they even go so far as to have a ticket agent selling for all the lines in on spot. It's just so much more sensible because what happens to deal with this lack of centralization is that people then head out to the main road out of town, wait for the buses there, and board whichever one comes first. Initially I was annoyed by this as I thought this people selfish, but then I starting doing it myself empowered by the realization that when companies don't centralize, you have to make them do it your own way.

Taxis are not the most common thing to find in the smallish town of Segou (about 200km East of Bamako.) I assume that it's due to the operating cost of them, but whatever the case, there are few. In their place is what I took to calling the "RickCycle" which has risen to supersede the hallowed ground that taxis are oft to haunt.

For some reason, it seems to me that I've seen these in a great many places, but here in Mali, they take your ordinary, cheap Chinese motorcycle of 250cc or what have you and they chop off/weld on a back carriage to it that has a solid axle from who knows what. The transmission is then tweaked to instead of having it attach to a sprocket to drive the chain to the back tire, it then has an articulating joint with a driveshaft going to the new rear axle.

The plus side is that suddenly a what was once a motorcycle is now a RickCycle that can carry up to six smallish or four normalish people. The down side is that the speedometer doesn't work, it rides pretty rough, and has a maximum speed of maybe 15-20kph. Naturally they don't re-gear the transmission so given all the new weight, it makes for some clunky, heavy clutch shifting.

Pretty cool though and damned cheap. To go 15km to a neighboring village was just 500 CFA ($1 USD). Obviously it wasn't the fastest trip in the world, but the fact that I got the same driver two out of three rides made it an endearing trip if nothing else. Check out Aboubacar and his gleaming piece of machinery below. If you're in Segou and see him, hop on. He's a nice guy and really honest as I saw that the locals were paying the same as I did.

For anyone who reads my writings with regularity, you know that I love trains. So it was naturally the case that I happened upon the main Bamako train station in the center of town. It's quite a regal building that, like many former Colonial stations in Africa, has indeed faded from its past glory. It's not entirely these stations' fault given that they and the lines connected to them were originally built solely to extract from the countries in which they were placed. They weren't like the stations and lines you find in Europe that were built to transport people and promote commerce.

This station was one of the rare exceptions though as it is actually a minor station that exists on a much larger line connecting Dakar in Senegal to Niamey in Niger. Quite a feat really and quite a crucial line to transport goods faster than the Niger river could. Various chunks of this service have fallen apart of the years and it was a sad moment when reported that the line had ceased running altogether from Dakar to Bamako in the middle of last year due to an accident in Eastern Senegal that killed five. There is no projected time as to when it will start running again, although those who are adventurous can take the train from Bamako to Kayes (the "pressure cooker") in the far west of the country and then continue on bus to Dakar.

I stumbled upon a guy who actually wasn't a full of crap, hustler guide and was able to tell some of the history of the station. The disuse he blamed on the Colonialists not maintaining it though. Given that Mali celebrates its 50th year of independence from France this year, that argument holds little water with me, although management by the Belgian firm, Vecturis has probably done very little to improve the rail.

I am an idealist and I wish that the train would run again some day as the bus rides around Mali are absolutely horrendous and having a train option would be great as the fact that bobbing down the Niger to Timbuktu can compete with taking the bus leaves a lot to be desired in land routes.

Buses hate all that is me.

On a trip seven years ago, I was taking a bus from Zagreb, Croatia out to the coastal town of Split. This was on the old road, so it was an eight hour drive (new road is five.) Somewhere around hour six or so, the bus pulled to the side of the road, sputtered, die, and then the engine exploded in a ball of flames. Luckily, I lived to tell about that.

Two years ago, I was taking bus from Belgrade, Serbia to Sarajevo, Bosnia Herzegovina. The bus was doing fine until it lost a radiator hose which was thankfully repaired mid-ride so that I made it in to Sarajevo tired and late, but on the same bus and without serious threat to my well-being.

These experiences all seem like child's play now that I have experience what Sean at Journey without Maps calls, The Most Miserable Bus in the World. Yes, the crappy-bus bar has been set high in this latest experience and I hope it will remain the pinnacle of personal bus crapdom for me, lest one bus run over me, back up, run over me again, and then shoot me dead.

It all started with my wife and I throwing caution to the wind and thinking we could circumnavigate the most hellish part of this bus trip by not taking the route from Abidjan up to the border. That can take from 1-2 days by itself due to the buses not wanting to drive through Yamoussoukro at night due to the fear of roving bandits in the area.

So, we got up at six on Friday morning and mooched rides through various friends of friends who were knowing people going north and we eventually bounced our way to to Korhogo and spent the night at a friend's house there. This part was all well and good, hauling along at 100kph with air conditioning and avoiding the slowdowns that come with the damnable checkpoint "greasings".

Well-rested, we set out from Korhogo the next morning to take the Sama Transport bus from there up to Sikasso in Mali where we thought we'd spend the night as the trip took so long. The bus was scheduled to leave at eight and we were pleasantly surprised to have it leave at 9:30. The trip up to the border was mostly uneventful. Slow would be the primary tag to attach to any article about it though as the bus stops at literally every wide spot in the road to take on more passengers, drop off others, or pick up letters that people are sending. Ah yes, if you want to send something via express mail in Côte d'Ivoire or Mali, you use Sama.

After getting a quick, painless stamp at the Malian border, we then went to customs. I wish I had brought a chair. That took something like an hour as the inspection officers wanted to look through every single part of the bus, come up with a tally and then negotiate the "donation" they were to receive, as our driver put it. I also learned a new word on this particular Saturday which was the "donne-donne" as in the "give give" which is what some kids told us when we asked where the driver was. "Oh he's at the donne-donne."

Once crossing the border, we were puttering our way along in minor passenger transport and mail delivery courier stops until we reach Sikasso. So, here's the funny thing about Sikasso, according to the ticket guys in Korhogo, there is no transfer to another bus in Sikasso to reach Mali, to which I retort, oh yes, there is very much a transfer to another bus in Sikasso to reach Mali and the really really cool part is that they oversell that bus so you have to scramble to get on it. Or you can then wait for the night bus of which the first one of which leaves at 22:00. Not having it in us to fight through the line for the oversold tickets, we took one quick glance Sikasso and opted for the night bus.

The night bus left at a quarter past 22:00 which was pretty good. The driver drove like a maniac and had to listen to his music through the bus sound system at full volume, so sleep was out of the question, but rolling discotheque was very much in the question (or the answer?) Whatever, it was going to be alright as forward momentum to Bamako was the goal and that was happening. Of course somewhere around 1:30 we came across a massive line of trucks and quickly came to a dead stop.

It turns out in the course of all this driving, a strike had occurred that the Malian truckers (or more their bosses) called. They had decided that buses were part of it as well (they weren't) and thus about 5km East of a town called Bougouni, they stopped our miserable bus. The strike was about the fact that the government had reduced the maximum weight that trucks can carry (a good move considering what happens often) and so they had been striking for four days prior to our arrival at the point of blockage.

No amount of negotiating by the bus drivers (there were more than just us stopped) could get up through and so we did what you do when stopped in the middle of nowhere at 1:30 in the morning--you sleep on the ground next to the bus. That was an adventurous night filled with strange dreams of Malian women walking past me dressed in their brightly colored clothes as well as the feeling I was in a zoo as I believe that every single person who walked by shined their flashlight or mobile screen at the beleaguered white guy sleeping on the ground.

At 6:00, everybody got up and we decided to get the hell out of there, walking past the blockage point, hitching a ride to the nearest town, and then taking yet another bus that did eventually get up to Bamako in the middle of the day. In a private car, from Korhogo, Côte d'Ivoire to Bamako, Mali, the trip takes a bit less than six hours. As it went for us, it took 30.

While the strike was unfortunate, these things can happen. You get snarled up in them rightly or wrongly, but you move on. It's more the issue of Sama Transport that I take issue with. They are Satan. Actually no, they're worse than Satan as you know Satan's rules when you're headed "down under".

In short, Sama is a horrid company, but unfortunately they're the main choice you have to take to get around and they seem to have a monopoly in Côte d'Ivoire as well as Mali. The only other options are scooting along in shared taxis between towns or to take very expensive flights. From Abidjan to Bamako is $500 and it's an hour flight. Needless to say, if I have to fly back, I will if the choice is that or spending another night sleeping in the savanna next to my otherwise illustrious "direct" bus. Sean, I am a fool to not have heeded wise words.

The picture above pretty much reiterates the title more than anything I could hope to explain. Sadly, I see wrecks like this all the time when making the trip from Abengourou to Abidjan. I've also seen them in Ghana, as well as in Congo. Typically they revolve around some idiot truck driver who isn't properly trained on driving a a tractor trailer who then picks up a load that is horribly, horribly unbalanced. One wrong turn or one tap of the brakes at the wrong spot and suddenly the truck jacknifes and goes to hell due to... oh I don't know, multiple laws of physics such as: a big ass overloaded truck in motion will want to stay in motion unless acted upon by the mis-negotiation of a simple turn.

That said most of the wrecks that I've seen have been have been pretty tranquil in comparison to this which happened next to a village called Aniassue about 30km south of Abengourou. The entire trailer is on its side and the truck cab is up in the air like a tree. I mean, look at that wreck. It's mesmerizing in its absolute destruction. Thankfully, there was a village side road that allow us to bypass this nightmare lest we would have been stuck there for the rest of the day undoubtedly.

It also appears that few if any were hurt in this wreck. That's because the worst are the logging trucks, which are always incredibly unbalanced with these massive multi-tonne logs cast about the trailer and lightly held in place by a thin chain. It's often the case that these will lose a log that then flies off to side and kills innocent people who were just standing there. These guys bother me the most, especially as we tried to pass one last Friday who then proceeded to swing in to us and nearly toss our truck in to the bush. Thankfully, there were just a couple of scratches to the paint and we were able to get around him after that with a proper one-finger salute, which fell on blind eyes.

Suffice to say, trucks around here are incredibly dangerous as they just work to haul as much as they can, as fast as the can out of the country for export. This is a shame given the great wealth of talented craftsmen in the country that could actually export finished products instead.

I was cleaning out the memory on my phone and I came across this photo which I took with my Blackberry instead of my proper camera for some reason. These are the rails in Kumasi, Ghana just north of the train station that loop around the top of the Ketejia Market. The market expanded over the rails once the trains stopped running a few years ago. I talk more about it here, but amazingly, the rails are still in pretty good shape despite the price of shirts being debated over them daily.

Naturally on the day that Barack Obama was getting sworn in as the 44th president of the US, other interesting items in the world are going to get overlooked. This is a shame as the BBC reported that Cote d'Ivoire has started building their own buses within the country to serve the public transportation needs of the capital, Abidjan. I love stories like this as a) there are far too few of them and b) they show Africa in a wickedly unjust shades of war, rape, disease, and famine.

Taking the same line that we've been taking at Maneno, the engineers behind the buses (who are from the African "reaspora" *) had obvious reasons for building to their own specs:

In Europe the technology is very sophisticated with lots of electronic devices. In Africa we don't need this.

We just need robust buses because our roads are not very well done like in Europe. This is an African design for Africa.

While portions of the drivetrain are coming from the European company Iveco, I feel it doesn't steal any of the thunder of what they're doing as most every vehicle producers these days has another company building parts of their products. In Cote d'Ivoire, domestic company, Sotra is doing the actual production of the buses. While there is some worry by citizens over the potential reliability of the buses:

If we import buses it's better because we already know their endurance, the pros and cons, so really, I'm a bit hesitant about making buses here.

It's probably not all that justified given that the history of Sotra has been in building "water buses" for use around Abidjan. Given the general layout of the town, it easy to see that these vehicles have been seriously put through their paces. Sure, there are undoubtedly going to be issues down the road, but I'm guessing they'll be a lot less problematic than anything that happens from a standard GM vehicle. And if you don't believe me on that point, go take a test drive of any new GM vehicle. I'll take anything built, tested, and from Africa any day if I want reliability.

* Reaspora: Those who left their original countries, worked and were most likely educated abroad, but have now returned to their country of origin to work and ply their new skills and knowledge.

A lot of people talk about the cult of personality that is Apple Computers and Steve Jobs. It's true that he's really managed to build up a base of loyal followers that will buy anything Apple craps out no matter how expensive, initially broken, or ridiculous. There are two other companies that I think do an even better job of this, but in different ways. One is Coca Cola, which has such deep market penetration that the military regimens of the world should study their strategy. But they only have one product that never changes and when it does, it flounders (I'm looking at you New Coke on the 80's.) Another company that is a bit more like Apple is Mercedes-Benz. They bring out new models all the time and an undying base of fans snatches them up continually no matter what the reviews say about quality or safety. If there is the "land, sea, and air" emblem on the hood of the car, then it is fit for purchase.

My neighbors up the street from my parents' house were your typical Mercedes owners. Every two years, there was a new Mercedes in the driveway and they bought everything from the sports coupe (for the midlife crisis-addled father) to the SUV's (for the on the go soccer mom). But they're Americans and Americans love any semblance of being a VIP or upper class, so they buy these cars without hesitation and in blind faith.

Such it seems is the case in DR Congo. Mercedes-Benzes are everywhere in Kinshasa and other towns. These are not the Mercedes of my neighbors though. Well, actually, they might be the ones that they had 10 or 15 or even 20 years ago. These things are old and they get older even faster because they're driven ragged over the potholed and dilapidated streets of DR Congo. But it doesn't matter if the muffler is being held on to the car with the muffler of another car or three of the doors can't open because they were smashed in an accident; it's a Mercedes and that means status. With status comes the premise that you can be an asshole. I had to laugh at the fact that every time a Mercedes would cut us off while driving or walking that it reminded me of the same behavior I'd see back in the US. It's true that BMW drivers are the absolute worst assholes in the world, but folks with Mercedes are an incredibly close second. In DR Congo it's a funny concept to see someone driving so fast when in reality there really is nowhere to go, as the vast majority of people are unemployed or not employed through traditional means.

So there you go. Even in a country like DR Congo where the infrastructure is in ruin, corruption is rampant, and a good monthly salary for a family of four is $200, the Mercedes still rules as the car of choice for those on the up and up.

If you're driving to work in San Francisco and you're stuck on one of the many highways around the area, you might often yell, "This traffic is insane!" I would counter with the fact that no, it's quite normal, orderly, and even predictable. I will take the traffic of the US or anywhere in Europe, any day, over what I saw in Kinshasa.

The problem of course revolves around the fact that somehow, despite all the poverty, there are what seem to be millions of cars in the city that are hell-bent on moving around the 10 million inhabitants on a daily basis. The great majority of these cars are not in good shape, so they pollute like it's going out of style. They also break down quite often and are either repaired in the middle of the road or abandoned, which is done in the middle of the road as well.

It's a mess that starts around eight in the morning, gets steadily worse until gridlock sets in, in the middle of the day, and then things smooth out a bit near the end of the day, when it gets dark around six. A lot of these cars are missing headlights, so it's difficult for them to drive after dark. If it rains, the roads are abandoned because probably 90% of the cars simply can't drive when there is a downpour.

But it's how people drive that make the traffic what it is. If you ever get mad at some random jerk who cuts you off on I-880, you shouldn't drive in Kinshasa. That is how people always drive. They just kind of slam their way through all the cars to get where they're going. It's a bit like American individualism on crack. There are surprisingly few accidents though, which I attribute more to the fact you can't drive faster than 60kph anywhere, so it lessens the impacts. I did see one though and it was nasty with both cars folded up in what looked like a direct head-on collision.

There are many mundele who drive though and as amazingly as it is, I drove in all of this as well. It was quite an experience, but because everyone is doing it, it makes driving somewhat easy. I mean this only in the sense that you can kind of handle it if you start driving like the Congolese. Trying to be proper and allowing people to merge or obeying the right of way at four way stops will get you nowhere. No one has gone to driving school, although there is one in the city. Most folks either hop in a car and start driving or pay the $50 to pick up a driver's license. That's all there is to it. You pay the money and you can legally drive. No test. No other rules. I almost bought one as a souvenir, but didn't have the time, nor the inclination to go down and deal with it. It's a cool license though, because where in the US you need a different license to drive different classes of vehicles, the Congolese have streamlined the process and have this license allowing you to drive anything from a motorcycle, to a big rig truck, to a steamroller.

Overall, I'd have to say that I wish to never drive in Kinshasa again. One experience was definitely enough and it can be summed up by the fact that when we were stuck in some detour that was causing a massive juggernaut, I was passed by a guy going 30kph (20mph in metric-so-scary-land), on my left, in reverse. If that doesn't blow your mind, then you should consider a future career as a taxi driver in the center of Kinshasa. They can always use a few more.