A really long and probably boring post about transportation that I wrote like 2 weeks ago and forgot about

My very first afternoon with my family, I went out for a walk with my sister Moussouba and came to this conclusion: “OMG, Africans walk soooooo slooooowly.” Compared to the pace at which I usually tear around campus, Moussouba walks like an 80-year old woman. It was maddening at first, but after a few days, you get used to it and start to understand why people here don’t walk as fast. On a practical level, most of the walkways and a significant portion of the streets are not paved. They’re very fine sand that shifts when you walk on it and makes maintaining a brisk pace a lot more difficult. On a cultural level, no Senegalese person is ever anxiously checking their watch to make sure they’re on time to where they’re going. They’ll set out when they’re ready and they’ll get there when they get there.

Lots of people walk in Dakar. The sidewalks are always busy and there are always people jumping over the barriers to cross the highways on foot. There are some places where the city has started to build walkways over the highways, but the construction looks to be abandoned, so there are just staircases to nowhere on the sides of the road. It takes me about 45 minutes to walk to WARC from my house, and I’ve been told that it takes about 3 or 4 hours to walk from the southernmost point of the Plateau to Yoff or Ngor, the northernmost suburbs on the Cap Vert peninsula. Walking around the city is great because it’s free and there’s always something to look at, but it has its annoyances too. Dakar is not the cleanest city in the world, so you often find yourself tiptoeing around piles of trash or stopping to get a cigarette butt out from between your foot and your sandal. The combination of the omnipresent sand and the wind that blows from the Sahara during the winter means that the air is very dusty and sand gets blown into your eyes all the time, along with nasty exhaust from dilapidated vehicles (which is really the only kind of vehicle in Dakar). There are also lots of beggars, guys selling phone credit, and guys in general who can all be pretty persistent in harassing passersby.

Another challenge for pedestrians is that drivers in Dakar are, without exception, completely insane. They speed, they tailgate, they drive up on the curbs and sidewalks, they ignore lane markings, they do not yield at any time to any one. There are no working traffic lights in Dakar, and most Senegalese seem to think that seat belts are there for decoration. One of the main roads that I walk on to get to school has three lanes: one heading east, one heading west, and one in the middle for whoever needs it. The majority of taxi windshields are badly cracked, most of the doors don’t close properly, and few have two working headlights. Drivers rarely use their turn signals, and often times they signal one direction and then turn the other way. Sometimes, if you’re walking in a street with no sidewalk, the drivers coming towards you will flick on their signal to tell you which way they want you to go, so that you’ll get out of their way. The idea of an “air cushion,” or buffer zone, between your car and the cars/people/buildings near you would be totally laughable to a Senegalese driver. I’ve seen cops directing traffic before, but never pulling anyone over or writing tickets.

Thankfully, along with this complete disinterest in traffic laws or safety precautions, Senegalese drivers have remarkable spatial perception. They know exactly how big their cars are, and if they’re trying to make it down a street just a few inches wider than they are, they can do it. My first few rides in taxis or my family’s car were terrifying. My very first night with my family, I was driving somewhere with Kiki, Fatima, my mother, and her friend Helene. Mama and Helene said Hail Marys the whole way, which was not encouraging. But the more I travel by wheeled vehicle, the more I like it. I’ve never seen anyone get into an accident, and I’ve stopped worrying that we’re going to hit everything in our path. Now, it’s kind of a thrill ride.

Taxis are the most convenient way to travel, but the most expensive. That said, the toubab (white person/foreigner) price for a taxi ride is about 1 000 francs, which is about $2. If you’re going farther, like up to Yoff, you’ll have to pay more, but if your bargaining skills are good, you’ll pay less. There are also the clandos, or clandestine taxis. These are just guys with cars who want to make some money without filling out the paperwork to become an official taxi driver. I’ve never ridden in one, but there’s one girl here who lives near a clando hang-out and takes one to school all the time. I guess you don’t bargain for a clando ride; prices are fixed at 250 francs per person.

There’s also a LOT of public transportation around Dakar, in addition to the taxis. There are the big blue Dakar Dem Dikk buses, the white minibuses, the white and blue minibuses, and the cars rapides. All of those cost between 50-150 francs, I believe. The only ones I’ve actually ridden on are the blue buses, which are by far the least intimidating. The stops are clearly marked, as is the number and destination of the bus, which is helpful. The white and blue minibuses are operated by the city and follow similar routes as the Dem Dikk buses. They were intended to replace the cars rapides, most of which are in disrepair, are operated by the most classic of Senegalese drivers, and are prime targets for pickpockets and thieves. The move would have rendered the city safer, but less interesting, and it failed completely. The cars are definitely still at large. The white minibuses are similar to the cars. I actually can’t figure out how they’re different, except that they’re not as flamboyantly decorated.

The white minibuses and the cars rapides are marked only with the decorations the drivers see fit to add. The minibuses usually just have a tasteful “Alhamidoulilah” (or Thanks be to God) painted across the front. The cars rapides on the other hand, which are bright blue and yellow/orange to begin with, usually have an “Alhamidoulilah” somewhere, the words “Transport en commune,” icons such as eyes, animals, mosques, soccer balls, and other words that might be names of people or places. The place names are certainly not the names of the places that the cars stop. Nearly every single one has “Touba” painted in huge letters over the windshield, which is a town several hours away from Dakar where the Mourides, the largest, wealthiest, and most politically powerful Muslim brotherhood in Senegal, are headquartered.

In fact, nearly everything in Dakar is labeled with the word “Touba.” You see it in the names of businesses, cafes, restaurants, etc. It would be like being in New York City and seeing Chicago Pizzeria next to Chicago Laundromat next to Chicago Café next to Chicago Supermarket next to Chicago Gas Station. It’s a little strange to see, until you realize what Touba is exactly and why everyone here is so obsessed with it. I’m going there on a field trip in March, I think, so look for a post in a few months about what Touba is all about.

Anyway, the cars are pretty much the emblems of Dakar, which makes it sort of unforgivable that I haven’t ridden in one yet. This is because I have no idea how to use them. Usually, 2 or 3 guys ride around on the back of the car, standing on the bumper and hanging on to whatever they can get a hold of. When the car stops, the guys jump off the back and shout out where the car is going. If they don’t think that enough people are getting on, they start trying to physically herd people into them. I’ve been walking by as cars have stopped and have had someone take me by the arm and lead me to the back of the van. That’s the closest I’ve come to actually getting in. I would like to get to know how to use the cars properly, because they look like fun and I’d like to experience how “real Senegalese people” travel around the city. I think I need a “real Senegalese person” to help me out with this, though, and the members of my family seem content to take a taxi or the bus, or drive their own car. So we’ll see.

Some other ways I have seen people get around include roller-blades-plus-car-bumper, a mode of transit favored by younger teenage boys, and horse cart. A horse cart in Dakar is usually a rickety and seemingly homemade cart attached to a horse, which often looks similarly rickety. The carts are big enough to hold a decent-sized load, but very rarely do you see them laden with more than a couple of passengers. I was out with Fatima one day and we were very nearly trampled by a couple of kids who had (probably) stolen the family horse cart and taken it out for a joy ride.