My week of In-Country Training went very quickly and, before I knew it, it was my first day of actual work! Now there are a lot of interesting things going on at FarmDrive, and I look forward to writing a longer post sometime in the future about exactly what it is that I have ended up doing. But first, I want to tell the story of my first week of work, and the slightly ridiculous road trip that randomly occurred.
I met my new bosses at an EWB dinner the night before my first day of work. It was very exciting to meet these two awesome women in person, and start discussing what I would be working on. One of the first things they told me was that there was going to be some training sponsored by USAID on that coming Friday, and I was going along to observe.
“Oh, it’s in Nairobi?” I asked, with amusing naivety.
“Not… quite,” they responded.
The original plan was to drive down Thursday during the day, do the training all day Friday, then drive back Saturday. We were contemplating taking matatu’s all the way, but since the actual training was not really walkable from a major town, it was decided that we may as well drive. Kelvin, my FarmDrive colleague who was accompanying me on this adventure, said he had a friend who could rent us an SUV, so the plan was set!
However, I was soon to learn that plans are always mutable in this lovely country, and that “set” means nothing.
I awoke that Thursday morning to the normal crowing of roosters and the honking of Nairobian traffic. Despite the fact that we were supposed to leave that afternoon for an epic trip to the border of Uganda, by mid-morning there still seemed to be no clear indication of when we might leave. A little prompting on my part made the story somewhat more clear. Apparently we were waiting for pamphlets to be printed out, and due to some miscommunication, it seems they weren’t going to be ready until very late at night.
“But… we have to be there at 8 am tomorrow morning… right?” I ask tentatively.
“Yes,” my co-worker replied.
“And… it’s an eight-hour drive?” I continue.
“Oh yes!”
“So… what’s the plan?” I ask, confused as to how we would manage to ever make it there.
“Well, we can pick up the pamphlets, then leave at midnight. We will drive through the night, and then make it there for the morning! No problem!”
He smiles at me with confidence, while I stare with growing horror. I quickly convince him that driving through the night on a Kenyan highway seemed to be a slightly foolhardy endeavour, so instead we decide to get the pamphlets shipped by matatu to the place we’ll be staying overnight, and leave the office in the early afternoon. Originally my colleague wanted to leave at 4:30pm, but doing the math, that would place us in the city of Eldorat where we were planning on sleeping at 10:30ish. I felt that the less night driving the better, and we settled on leaving at 3:00 instead.
So the time comes, and off we go. I think that we are picking the car up nearby, but it turns out that the car is quite some distance away. Instead of taking an Uber, it was decided that it would be more cost-effective to take matatu’s instead, a fact I was only aware of after we left. This obviously would have impacted what time I suggested we leave, and I felt the foreboding that settles in your chest when you sense an impending series of events that will lead to adventure or disaster.
Or sometimes both.
Kelvin and I leave for our trip, unaware of what is to follow
Three matatus later, including one that suddenly stops for no reason and sells our fares to a different matatu, we arrive in a random suburb of Nairobi. Thirty minutes of wandering around, and we realize we are on the wrong side of the highway. Finally, we find the car and we are on our way, and it’s only 5:30 pm.
For those of you who have never driven on a highway in sub-sahara Africa, you are missing out on a very special brand of madness. Lanes and traffic signs exist, but they don’t matter. It is a giant free-for-all where finding cars, trucks, motorcycles or goats heading towards on-coming traffic in the wrong lane is not to be feared, but to be expected. Faced with these conditions, you might tell yourself that you simply wouldn’t pass any cars, thus avoiding the risk of a head-on collision. Unfortunately, that is not an option, since some of the ancient eighteen-wheeler trucks won’t travel faster than 30 km/hr. You are therefore left with only one real option, brave the oncoming traffic, or be resigned to have your ten-hour drive turn into a thirty hour one.
Set against this chaotic backdrop, I began my first experience driving on the highway in Kenya. Luckily my years driving in the UK prepared me for driving on the other side of the road, and I was able to concentrate solely on, you know, staying alive. As my colleague sat in the passenger seat frantically making calls about which shade of green was supposed to be on our pamphlets, I dodged trucks, matatus and the occasional cow as we headed across the country. As darkness fell, the frenzy only increased. Street lights were non-existent, and everyone had their high beams on all the time. Oncoming traffic became just a blur of multiple headlights flashing towards you, and more than once we ended up driving on the shoulder of the road to avoid an inevitable collision. After a brief stop for dinner, Kelvin took over driving and we started really flying.
At around 2330 we arrived in Eldorat, where we were spending the night. Kelvin locked me in our room (only one set of keys) and went to go find the infamous pamphlets and I went to sleep. It seemed only hours later that Kelvin was shaking me awake, telling me we had to go. I realized it was 7:30, and the schedule had us arriving at the training between 7 and 8. A slight problem when we are still a 1.5 hour drive away. Also, there is a random third person sleeping in the room, who Kelvin informs me is a friend from the region who will help us get to the training quickly. Fair enough. I quickly pack my gear and off we go. We get breakfast, and my colleagues seem unconcerned that we are pushing 9am, and are still in Eldorat. Finally, we are off! Kelvin is driving, with me in the passenger seat and new guy in the back. Me being who I am, I have already downloaded all the appropriate maps from Google and plotted our course, but I leave Kelvin and his friend with local knowledge to guide us.
We are three quarters of the way there, and we are approaching a large-ish city. My map tells me that we should be turning left for a straight shot to the training, but we go straight. I glance over at Kelvin, and tentatively say, “shouldn’t we be turning left here?” He replies with confidence that they have a better way to go, despite the inevitability of hitting traffic if we go straight. I could have opined on the unlikelihood that any other road would get us to our destination faster, but my mind flashed back to our training in Toronto. To the many times it was drilled into us that we had to spend our first weeks and months doing more listening than talking, and not to make presumptions. So I settle back into my seat and enjoy the gridlock traffic we quickly get ensnarled in. Thirty minutes later we’ve made it through the town and we are now heading in a direction that is clearly directly AWAY from where we need to be. I consider all that I was told in pre-departure training, I look at my watch, and I think “screw it.”
“Kelvin,” I say, “I’m very sorry to be a bother, but I can’t help but notice we are now heading away from training, and that there don’t seem to be any roads turning back towards where we are supposed to go for 100km. Is there anyway you could show me where this route of yours is going to go?”
We pull over. Kelvin looks at the map. He talks to his friend in Swahili. He looks at the map again.
“Okay, we will turn around,” he says. I resist the urge to smash my head against the dash as we head back into traffic. Google is now saying that we will be there at 1130, and so Kelvin ups the ante on our driving. We tear down dirt roads at fast speeds, trying to make up the time lost by errors of mis-navigation. I think to myself, “this can’t end well.” Sure enough, we veer to avoid a pothole, the back end of the car starts to spin out, Kelvin over-compensates and suddenly we are spinning towards the edge of the road and a cliff.
“Great,” I think to myself, “I’ve been in Kenya 10 days and I’m already going to die in a car accident.” Luckily we end up facing back the way we came with no significant damage to passengers OR car. Somewhat hilariously, I was in the midst of texting with my friend Mireille (currently in Japan, check out her blog here) and our conversation went something like this:
Isn't technology wonderful?
We eventually arrive at the event, where no one seems to care that technically we are 3.5 hours late, and where we are surprisingly not even the last people to show up. Fast forward to the afternoon, and we have music, and local dancing… and speeches. Lots and lots of speeches. Mostly in Swahili, with just a little bit of English at the beginning for the speechmaker to thank USAID for sponsoring the event, and for their continued support. The people making the speeches were facing us, and because we arrived late we were seated in a spot that essentially became the front row for the speeches. Because of that, it was only after two or three speeches, that I made a realization.
“Kelvin,” I whispered quietly, “are they… are they talking to ME?”
“Do you see any other white people?” He asked, looking around.
And that is how I accidentally represented USAID to over a thousand farmers in Bungoma. It was especially bad when the Governor of the province got up for the “keynote” speech and pointed directly at me while giving a 5 minute talk on the generosity of the American people. I just waved weakly and tried not to do anything to embarrass “my people”. Luckily, I escaped without having to give a speech of my own.
With the speeches done, we were on our way back to Eldorat. I thought we were done with excitement and drama, but not quite yet. Somehow the person who rented us the car had found out that we had a bit of an accident with it, and was insisting that we drive straight back to Nairobi. Luckily, we managed to convince her that if she was worried about her car, asking us to drive through the night on the highway with no sleep was not a great way to protect said automobile, and we stuck with the original plan to go back the next morning.
And so, with a few stops to enjoy some Road Zebras (as shown below), we finally arrived back in Nairobi. We pulled into a gas station for what I thought would be the end to this epic adventure. Should have known better then to tempt fate. As we were pulling away from the station, we got pulled over by police, presumably because they saw the white guy in the passenger seat. They ignored Kelvin completely, and came to my side demanding to see my passport. You see, as a foreigner, you are supposed to be able to present your visa at any time. If you don’t, you can be arrested or fined, with a trend towards the latter, usually with an on-the-spot fine that never makes its way into any official coffers. Although I was not travelling with my passport, I had cleverly made a photocopy of the passport page and the entrance/visa stamp. After some time convincing the officer that my copy was valid enough that he probably shouldn’t arrest me, we finally made it back to the office, thus finishing my first week of work in Kenya.
Since then, I have had many other adventures I could relate, but I will save your poor eyes from further reading for now. Stay tuned for further blog posts involving self-reflection, happenstance, and serendipity, and not necessarily in that order. Until next time, stay safe and so will I.
