And we venture downtown...
We have two maps of Manzini, both of which look fairly straightforward. Unfortunately, both of them are also about one or two years old and have already been proven rather wrong on our only known walking route. This means that for our first trip downtown, we’ll be using public transport, despite the fact that it appears to be only a few kilometers to the center of Manzini. The local minibus is known as a kombi, and according to the hospital staff, those that stop outside the entrance to the mission grounds will get us into the heart of Manzini for 2 rand per person, or $0.33 US.
The general idea of a kombi is that of a vehicle about the size of a minivan, which amazingly holds 16 people: the driver plus two in the front seat, three rows of 3 seats (the third of which collapses for entrance/egress), and a back row of four. This sure as heck beats the efficiency of the IT carpool even on our best days, and definitely rivals the Thai song-tow. Each kombi comes equipped with a “runner”… usually a teenager whose responsibility is to jump out at the pauses, and/or run around at the stops, collecting people for the ride, shouting out the destination. This is a critical job, because a kombi does not go if a kombi is not full. The definition of full does have some variance: sometimes the runner counts as the 16th; sometimes the runner shares a seat and becomes occupant number 17; and sometimes, on rare occasions, if there appears to be no hope of replacing whoever just got off (read: the street is deserted), full may be one or two short…. but the rule generally holds. Anyhow, Lisa and I caught a kombi the Friday after her call schedule since she had the afternoon off, and we were soon on our way downtown.
As we whizzed out at high speed on a large divided highway for a few minutes we kept an eye on the road signs to ensure that we were actually heading into Manzini. Satisfied with our observations, we expressed appreciation for the fact that we were not walking – this seems like it would have been quite a hike. There really wasn’t much need for worrying that we were headed in the wrong direction, though. You see, it should be mentioned that while there are a lot of kombis in the area, and all kombis in this area are headed to downtown Manzini (unless, of course, you are coming from there). This means it’s pretty hard to miss the bus to downtown if you have even a remote idea of the direction in which you’re headed. There is another logical conclusion, however, which we failed to consider: All of these kombis end up in the same parking lot downtown, and there are a lot of kombis. That’s a lot as in hundreds of kombis. And taxis. And tour busses. And all of the people they carry. And each of these is competing for space in one overflowing lot.
People, kombis, cars and busses all weave and flow in the Manzini bus “terminal.” Vehicles pull forward and back up, bumper to bumper and mirrors to mirrors, honking to make room or take room. Sometimes there is space to squeeze between the vehicles as a pedestrian, but if you wait a moment to judge whether you’ll make it, the space disappears. This becomes particularly tricky when you need to navigate through two lines of vehicles steadily crawling is opposite directions. It’s like a game of Frogger… except not. I can win at Frogger. There is actually a structure and order to it all: different sections for different busses, somewhat consistant flowlines for traffic, runners trying to herd prospective customers. Somehow the participants all have a mutual understanding not crushing each other or blocking the flow of each party involved. Unfortunately, as this was our first time, we hadn’t quite grasped that structure or understanding yet.
The situation was exacerbated by two coincidences: 1) The Friday we had chosen was at the end of the month… i.e. payday, and 2) The bus we had chosen is stationed at the far side of the lot. This amounted to the fact that everyone was headed downtown, and everyone was between us and the main streets. The driver got us as far into the lot as was geometrically possible, and after the runner opened the door our fellow riders began piling out. Survival instinct kicked in as Lisa and I desperately tried to follow the general flow of people moving up the hill without being run over or pulled into another kombi by an overzealous runner. Some 30 yards and several near death experiences later, we were almost to the market side of the lot. On this side of the lot stand the majority of the taxis, each of which possess a driver, each of whom was eagerly calling out “taxi, taxi” to us. We were half tempted to not admit that we had just arrived, and to hop in one for a quick ride back to the safety and quiet of the hospital. Just a few more steps, however, and we were onto the sidewalk… and suddenly only pedestrians were competing for our space, and only vendors were competing for our attention.
To be continued….
The general idea of a kombi is that of a vehicle about the size of a minivan, which amazingly holds 16 people: the driver plus two in the front seat, three rows of 3 seats (the third of which collapses for entrance/egress), and a back row of four. This sure as heck beats the efficiency of the IT carpool even on our best days, and definitely rivals the Thai song-tow. Each kombi comes equipped with a “runner”… usually a teenager whose responsibility is to jump out at the pauses, and/or run around at the stops, collecting people for the ride, shouting out the destination. This is a critical job, because a kombi does not go if a kombi is not full. The definition of full does have some variance: sometimes the runner counts as the 16th; sometimes the runner shares a seat and becomes occupant number 17; and sometimes, on rare occasions, if there appears to be no hope of replacing whoever just got off (read: the street is deserted), full may be one or two short…. but the rule generally holds. Anyhow, Lisa and I caught a kombi the Friday after her call schedule since she had the afternoon off, and we were soon on our way downtown.
As we whizzed out at high speed on a large divided highway for a few minutes we kept an eye on the road signs to ensure that we were actually heading into Manzini. Satisfied with our observations, we expressed appreciation for the fact that we were not walking – this seems like it would have been quite a hike. There really wasn’t much need for worrying that we were headed in the wrong direction, though. You see, it should be mentioned that while there are a lot of kombis in the area, and all kombis in this area are headed to downtown Manzini (unless, of course, you are coming from there). This means it’s pretty hard to miss the bus to downtown if you have even a remote idea of the direction in which you’re headed. There is another logical conclusion, however, which we failed to consider: All of these kombis end up in the same parking lot downtown, and there are a lot of kombis. That’s a lot as in hundreds of kombis. And taxis. And tour busses. And all of the people they carry. And each of these is competing for space in one overflowing lot.
People, kombis, cars and busses all weave and flow in the Manzini bus “terminal.” Vehicles pull forward and back up, bumper to bumper and mirrors to mirrors, honking to make room or take room. Sometimes there is space to squeeze between the vehicles as a pedestrian, but if you wait a moment to judge whether you’ll make it, the space disappears. This becomes particularly tricky when you need to navigate through two lines of vehicles steadily crawling is opposite directions. It’s like a game of Frogger… except not. I can win at Frogger. There is actually a structure and order to it all: different sections for different busses, somewhat consistant flowlines for traffic, runners trying to herd prospective customers. Somehow the participants all have a mutual understanding not crushing each other or blocking the flow of each party involved. Unfortunately, as this was our first time, we hadn’t quite grasped that structure or understanding yet.
The situation was exacerbated by two coincidences: 1) The Friday we had chosen was at the end of the month… i.e. payday, and 2) The bus we had chosen is stationed at the far side of the lot. This amounted to the fact that everyone was headed downtown, and everyone was between us and the main streets. The driver got us as far into the lot as was geometrically possible, and after the runner opened the door our fellow riders began piling out. Survival instinct kicked in as Lisa and I desperately tried to follow the general flow of people moving up the hill without being run over or pulled into another kombi by an overzealous runner. Some 30 yards and several near death experiences later, we were almost to the market side of the lot. On this side of the lot stand the majority of the taxis, each of which possess a driver, each of whom was eagerly calling out “taxi, taxi” to us. We were half tempted to not admit that we had just arrived, and to hop in one for a quick ride back to the safety and quiet of the hospital. Just a few more steps, however, and we were onto the sidewalk… and suddenly only pedestrians were competing for our space, and only vendors were competing for our attention.
To be continued….
(full post - permalink) posted by Blue November
1 Comments:
great story, cg.
in australia we also call minivans "kombi's". although i always imagined it was spelt "combivan".
you sure have a writing gift for an IT professional.
thanks for keeping us up to date.
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