Adventures in Transport

I am going to do something stupid. I’m going to try to sleep inside again. Well, now that I’m typing it I might not because I all of a sudden just got hot. But whenever it gets too unbearable, it seriously does not take long to pitch my tent, the beauty of the REI Bug Hut. I would say it has turned out to be a quality purchase and I would probably buy it again. I’ve definitely used it enough for it to be worth it. Though, at the same time, you can buy mesh tents in Bamako on the side of the road. You couldn’t in Guinea, but you can here. So food for thought. I don’t know how much they cost but I’m betting less than the $60-70 I spent on my Bug Hut.

So I did something else stupid the last time I went to Bamako (this past weekend). I tried to go to Raven’s house using a sotrama, which is a much cheaper way to travel than a private taxi. A taxi from the gare to Raven’s is 1 mille (1000 CFA). Each sotrama (there are two) are about 150 CFA, making the trip 300 CFA, making it less than 1/3 of the cost. But that depends on how you look at cost.

So I get there at 9:15 in the morning. I had gotten really lucky with transport and gotten in super early. So I was like I have plenty of time to try and figure out how to take the sotrama to Aci 2000/Hamdallaye. So I ask these dudes standing by this sotrama that always try to get me to take it and I just tell them I’m taking a taxi. This time they’re trying to get me to take a taxi rather than the sotrama but I was adamant. So they say there’s no direct sotrama from this gare so I have to take this sotrama to this other sotrama stop in the market and then get the Aci sotrama there. I’m like ok. So it takes like 45 minutes for this sotrama to leave. If I had taken a taxi, I would have been at Raven’s in about 15 minutes. But I’m thinking: look at all the money you’re gonna save!

So this sotrama finally leaves but since it has to go into the market, traffic is awful and it takes like 30 min to get to this next sotrama stop. I get there and I ask around about my sotrama and they tell me to wait on the benches, that it will be coming up to the space in front of the benches shortly. So, everybody knows where I’m going. Every time a sotrama pulls up I point at it and I’m like, “that one?” And they’re like, “no”. So eventually one pulls up and they’re like, “that one”. I get in it. It takes like an hour to leave.

So we’re going along and everything’s fine until we start LEAVING BAMAKO. I’m like. Dude. This is so NOT the right sotrama. We go up a mountain into this little village where there are NO other cars. Everybody gets out except me. The driver is like…”where are you going?” And I’m like, “back en ville…I messed up.” And after the breakdown I already had last week, this is just getting my goat and I’m wanting to cry and trying really hard not to in front of all these people and this mango woman is making fun of me and there’s NOTHING I can do but stay in this sotrama until it goes back to civilization.

The driver can see I’m kind of distraught and they are LOADING the back up with tons of mangoes, anyway, so he tells me to sit up front. I was really grateful for this. So when we finally leave he asks me where I was going. I say “Aci 2000” and he’s like, “wow…you REALLY messed up.” And I’m like yeah. Well, this village is supposedly called “Lassi”. So either the people at the sotrama stop thought I said Lassi, not Aci (but I said Aci HAMDALLAYE so I have no idea how this could have happened) OR they were playing a joke on me. Real f-ing funny, guys. I tell the driver just to leave me at the first place I can get a taxi. So we get back to town and he drops me with some taxis.

What does his apprentice do? HE MAKES ME PAY THE FARE AGAIN. I was like you little bastard. I go to the taxis and a driver walks out to meet me. I pay 1000 CFA to get to Raven’s. I get there at 12:15pm. So basically I wasted 3 hours and about 500 CFA on this adventure.

I’ll never do it again. For even the simple fact that even if I DID get in the right sotrama, it would still take an hour and a half or two hours to get out to Aci and it would take 15 min in a cab. I think it’s a worthy investment, personally.

So today when I took a taxi back to the gare, I paid my 1000 CFA and then as I was getting out, I found a mille stuck between the door and the seat. So…free taxi! Awesome!