We arrived 15 minutes before our 4:45 a.m. bus departure, but where was the green bus that was supposed to take us to Mbarara? Nowhere in sight. The only bus outside in the parking lot was already pulling away.It turns out that just because you purchase a ticket on one bus line at a specified time doesn't mean much at all. We hopped on the bus that was pulling away. The more stops we made as we circled through Kigali and out into the countryside, the more I realized that everyone but us understood how the bus "schedule" works in Rwanda.
Instead of a direct line north, we were stuck on the milk run, the bus that stopped at every "station" and bench along the roadside. We didn't even cross the border into Uganda at the correct crossing. Instead, we ended up at a small outpost at the end of the pavement. We dashed from Rwanda to Uganda in a downpour so fierce it took days for my sweatshirt to dry. The books I carried at the bottom of my basket will never be the same.
As we sped along the slippery mud roads that clung to the side of mountains, I reminded myself, "The bus driver does this all the time and he's not dead yet." No one else seemed to mind--no one but Edwin, who flinched every time he looked down the aisle out the front window at oncoming cars, bikes, and pedestrians. I looked out the side window at banana plantations, fruit stands, and an extraordinary number of cell phone businesses in what certainly felt like the middle of nowhere.
When we finally reached pavement, I had to laugh at the first sign I saw. Hand-painted on the front of a building... "Thank the Holy Spirit Merciful God Design Company." Amen to that. The store owner must have named his business after taking the bus.
In Mbarara, we looked for a connecting bus to Fort Portal. No luck. It had already gone. We ended up in a matatu instead, East Africa's taxi alternative.
The joke goes like this:
How many people can you fit in a matatu?
Answer: One more.
And they did. 9 on my row including this boy who sat on my lap against his better judgment. Up to 26 in all in the narrow Toyota van. The more people you can cram inside, the more the driver and his conductor make.
Despite being wet and squished, it was a good day. First up over the mountains where tea plantations stretch in ribbons of brilliant green over one hill and then the next. Then down into a valley so flat and lush I imagined dinosaurs roaming its basin. We didn't see dinosaurs there, but did catch glimpses of elephants, buffalo, impala, storks, and a baboon who barely lost a game of chicken with our taxi. Start and stop, start and stop, over a thousand or more speed bumps and into Fort Portal just in time for dinner.
This year's theme: dragons (a compromise of sorts since the birthday girl figured boys wouldn't enjoy a Hannah Montana party - nice of her to consider their feelings).
