Mbale Motorcycle Madness

So there I sat. Don't get me wrong. If you are going to have a vehicle breakdown in Uganda there is probably no better place to have it than Mbale.

Mbale sits at the base of Mt Elgon, which at 14,176 ft. makes it the second highest mountain in Uganda. Usually the mountain produces afternoon thunderstorms which help to keep the town from getting too hot. But the area has not had any appreciable rain since November. So it is hot.

Mbale has lots of hotels and restaurants for the tourists. Lots of filling stations, parts stores, Asian supermarkets and such but there is not much to do. And when the hotel booted me out the door(checkout time 10:00am) I decided to walk to the shop about 5 miles away. I needed to go to the ATM (Mbale has at least six) to get money to pay for the repairs so walking seemed like a good pastime. Perhaps not my best idea.

One of the drawbacks of walking in Uganda is motorcycles. They drive anywhere they want at any time they want. For someone who doesn't hear very well, a motorcycle driving on the wrong side of the road can hit you long before you hear it. These are small 125cc bikes that sound like a mosquito on steroids. Too high pitched for me to hear. As I walked to town I was brushed twice by these mosquito mounted maniacs, then verbally abused for having the audacity walk on the side of the road rather than in the road as the locals do. I always thought it was absolutely insane the way people here walk in the roadway. But with the pavement having more pot holes than the roadside the walkers stay in the center of the road and vehicles stay on the side. It always made sense as a driver; now I understood as a pedestrian as well.

The bright side was as I walked through town I saw a prisons truck and I struck up a conversation with the driver. Peter told me he was the personal driver for the new Regional Prisons Commander. I found out that the R.P.C. is an old friend Kenneth who had served as O.C. of Kirinya Main Prison So I waited for Kenneth and we had a nice talk. It was actually his first day as the new R.P.C. so he insisted that I come to his office to sign the visitors' book. I did and we prayed together for his new assignment. A real blessing for me!

Heading out again I found that all the ATMs in town were broken except one and it would only give me $20. So now I had to kill time until I could find a working machine. Two hours later with cash now in my pocket I started walking to the shop.

By now it was truly hot. I considered a motorcycle but from the early brushes I still had a bit of an attitude, so I walked. Truth was I couldn't remember where Patel's shop was and I didn't think the boda driver would know, so I thought I'd walk and hoped I'd recognize it when I saw it. I didn't!

Two hours later I gave up walking. I thought I had found it once but when I walked down the street it did not match what I remembered. I walked to the next main street where 20 bodas sat. How to choose? Simple, wave and the first guy there gets to take the mzungu. But since we all know that bazungu always have to pay more the competition was fierce. Six bikes fired up immediately and raced toward me. Five of the six crashed together and one survived. That is how and who I chose.

He assured me that he knew Patel's place very well. After riding around for twenty minutes he ran out of fuel. So I paid him 2000 shillings and got on another boda. After much discussion and finger pointing we took off. After 10 minutes we asked a passing school boy. He said Patel's shop was at the end of this street. Going to the end of the street it was all looking vaguely familiar. Wait a minute, this is where I got on the first boda! And that's the shop across the street. And to think it only took me 35 minutes to get across the street by motorcycle.

Now it is 4:00 pm the car doesn't run yet and Mr, Patel says "Let me take you to the bus. You go back to Jinja and I'll bring the car when it is fixed."

At least I'll be home tonight!