It’s been transport to transport in Guinea. It’s going to be like this tomorrow, too.
It’s expensive and maybe that’s why few people use it but I guess it’s also expensive because few people use it or can afford it (I also have ideas about making the routes more effective, i.e. don’t send a separate car to each possible village but create a route through neighbouring villages and make all cars use those routes.) It’s uncomfortable – 9 passengers in a Renault 21 – although I heard there are busses out of Conakry (the capital city). Roads are not even that bad but the distances are not that small.
6:50am I was at Mamou’s garage. It was dead empty, although a shop or two were being opened. No worries, at least I’m not gonna miss my car today.
The plan was to go to a town called Siguiri, an hour from Mali border, so that on Friday I don’t spend the whole day on the road again, just maybe three quarters of the day. The day before, when I got stuck in Mamou, I wanted to go to Kankan, a large town – it has a university – that the Rough Guide recommends for its market, but today I thought to get closer to Bamako.
The ticketmaster arrived shortly after 7am, the driver to Singuiri was already by his car, we had a chat, of course the car will leave very shortly in the morning. I asked the ticketmaster if I can get onto any car who will leave first – Kankan or Singuiri – because I didn’t wanna waste time. I got a long sermon telling me I cannot do it like this, it will create problems, I should just wait and see how people arrive myself and watch the space. Whatever. Anyway, I was sitting and watching people and space.
At about 8am there were three passengers to Singuiri and one to Kankan. Then a man approached me and asked if I was going to Bamako. Yes! Turns out there is a vehicle going all the way, straight and direct, to Bamako from Mamou. Unbelievable. For Bamako there was a different ticketmaster, I went to see him. Ticket is 250,000gnf, with me there are already seven (7!) passengers, we need only two extra, we are going shortly.
Then I thought about the car, it’s 9 passengers. I looked at Google Maps and it showed me almost 12 hours to Bamako. And there is a border and we are almost surely going to be slower than that. Arriving after dark in Bamako, looking for accommodation, being dead tired after this Guinean voiture. I started having doubts.
Too many choices, osiołkowi w żłobie dano. I looked at passengers to Singuiri again, still three. I thought Singuiri would be the best, not too far from Bamako so even if I go in a Guinean car all the way there I shall live. Plus Singuiri is on River Niger so maybe there are nice views. Singuiri it is.
I asked the Singuiri/Kankan ticketmaster for the ticket. Singuiri is 170k (17€,20$,80zł) Kankan is 130k. And he said that the Singuiri driver says I cannot join the car if I don’t pay for two seats because I’m too big. Of course I said I cannot pay for two seats because the ticket is expensive as it already is even for one seat. No discussion. The Singuiri driver – the one I chatted with early in the morning – sits next to the ticketmaster, won’t even look at me.
I asked then for Kankan ticket. And again! The Kankan driver says I cannot join the vehicle if I don’t pay for two seats. I asked again, trying to retain calm, if I can get any of the tickets paying just for one seat. The answer was no.
Rather shaken I went back to the Bamako ticketmaster but then someone called me and said I can go with them to Kankan with only one seat. So I did.
With ticket in hand and no longer having to watch the passengers and space and in need to cool down from the frustration I went for coffee. I know I’m big but I’ve seen people as big as me on the transport, I wonder if they’re asked to pay for two seats.
We left at around 9:20am. I was asked to pay whopping 50k for the baggage, I managed to bring it down to 30k. From what I heard I wasn’t the only one who had to pay that much.
This time I was sitting in the middle row by the window side, four people squeezed like sardines. We made very few stops, where everyone was glad to get out. Two men, one sitting next to me, had guns, pistols/revolvers, nonchalantly carried behind their trousers without any special belt/pouch. The gun was poking at my side when we were sitting squeezed.
The road was empty except some trucks. Villages were few and far between and they looked very poor and simple, with mainly clay thatched huts. There was a lot of signs of burnt out forests. The road passes through a national park, National Park of Upper Niger but the park is being used for agriculture as well.
In one village we almost had an accident. The driver was overtaking a standing lorry while another lorry was driving on the other side of the road our direction. The lorry wasn’t driving fast, it was a village and villages here have a lot traffic stoppers, called here dos d’âne, ass’s back. Anyway, my understanding of traffic rule here is that lorries don’t care for anyone smaller than them and then lorry continued driving onto us. Our driver stopped the car but the lorry kept on going. Only after a short while did he realise what’s going on and started backing off.
We also had a technical food stop. The driver ran somewhere down a dirt road and after a short while a lady and children carried rice and sauce and some meatballs in metal pots and we all could have a few scoops, everyone with hand, I got a spoon. Someone made a remark that for sure I don’t know how to eat the African way.
On a petrol stop at a gas station (Total has built many new shiny ones around the country) I got a video call from a friend. While I was talking, the station crew has reprimanded me for doing so on a petrol station, it’s not allowed! I know it isn’t but filling up petrol while the car engine is running is OK?
We arrived in Kankan at 5pm. And… I got the first rain on my trip. Truly tropical, heavy and thick, with heavy wind and picturesque thunderstorms afar. The driver asked for a car to Singuiri (2hrs from Kankan) and a car showed up and drove me to another gare routière, 100m away. Then they showed me the ticket and said the price is 90,000gnf. It turned out they say I should buy two seats. This time I wasn’t having any of it, immediately I returned the ticket. They agreed to 45,000gnf provided that I won’t sit in front seat. As if I don’t know.
But it was after 5pm, raining, garage already getting muddy, it gets dark before 7pm and I was the first passenger! Anyway, I went for coffee. It was nice and strong, the tin roof wasn’t leaking very much but there was wind, a lot of people gathered in the coffee house. As much as I wanted to get to Siguiri I didn’t wanna arrive there late. There isn’t much light here on the streets, it’s raining so it will be wet and muddy, looking for a hotel, eish. While I was looking at a phone, one of the young men came up to me and said I should put it away, because the owner doesn’t like it and the phone is going to attract lightning. !!!! There were some faint lightnings but no thunders so I guess the storm was far. I put the phone away. Some half an hour later, I looked at a phone to check the time and another man next to me said I should put it away because if attracts lightnings. !!!! He even complained to the coffee man but he got ignored. Men in Guinea must have a good life if they get stressed by such.
6:50pm, the rain got lighter, some people are arriving but my car only has 2 passengers. Worse. I don’t exactly know who I gave my money too, the men are young and noisy, none of them looks like ticketmaster (old, serious, Muslim, deep voice, projecting an untamed sense of unearthly power) but I manage to locate. Here the ticketmaster is the loudest one. Young man, won’t be easy. And it took me 10 minutes explaining to everyone around why I don’t wanna go at night and they objected that it isn’t late that people are coming that we will soon of course leave. And I can’t blame them but I wanted to get rest.
Rough Guide mentions two “budget” hotels in Kankan and both are successfully located on Google Maps. Hotel Le Calao is according to the guidebook a better and cheaper one but it’s 11 years after the book was published so you never know. It took my young ticketmaster to explain to three different moto drivers where the hotel is. I hopped in without asking for the price and of course I paid dearly when we arrived – the driver asked for 15k, we settled on 10k.
According to the guide book Kankan is nice because of its huge market. You can see the remains of the market, all shuttered shacks, empty and abandoned for the night, filth on the streets, amplified by the falling rain. Pitch dark streets, we arrived at a hole in a wall, on the ground water from one side of the gate to the other. That’s Hotel Le Calao.
They do have rooms, 150k for one. Rooms are spacious. Electricity is until 6am, there is water but in quite small buckets, not in the shower. I will bring you towel later, I am still waiting. Maurice from Liberia is a receptionist, he made my bed after I picked the room. He also promised to take me for food – I haven’t had anything since morning – but some more guests arrived and I went by myself. There is a bar, Guinness at 17k, the bartender has no idea where food is, I search Rough Guide, the 2nd budget hotel has a restaurant and it’s a nice one. I go. First things first, crossing the lake that’s in the hotel gate. I don’t manage to get to the other shore with dry feet. Torch on my forehead, I go through the darkness. The shit that’s the wet garbage and mud on the street is barely visible, sometimes I have nowhere to put my feet on. Lonely cows feed on the streets.
The Hotel Bate is not too far, restaurant is small, service man confused, all tables are full. Food is expensive and choice is limited: only chicken and fillet du capitaine, fish, which I like but with one side dish it’s 80k! Fuck the price, I take fish and green beans. The kitchen has an Ivorian feel, judging by the side dishes. There is aloko, a mountain of fried plantain (I hate plantain), there is atiéké (rice-like structured cassava). Kankan is on the crossroads. North is Mali, South is Liberia, West it’s already Cote d’Ivoire.
The food is tasty but I’m hungry. Everyone gets bread on side except me. When, paying, I tell that to the waiter he says “oh I forgot”. I come out and I see a Mercedes van with Polish registration plates. Polish people here? Nah. The sticker says it’s been sent from Valencia, Spain to Conakry, Guinea. I take a photo nevertheless and of course I get reprimanded by someone who says he’s security. I can’t take pictures, I should ask. But man you were far in the dark, you have no uniform. Men in Guinea should just chill! When I come out of the hotel compound he shuts the gate behind me.
I go to a small supermarket across the street, still open, shelves half empty. The men behind counter chat with me. Poland, where is it, ah between Germany in Ukraine, who is better player, Lewandowski or Shevchenko, have I ever met Lewandowski in person, it’s not easy, is Poland a nice country, can I get a job there?
I come back to my hotel bar, the lake by the gate mysteriously gone, I take a can of Guinness and ask for more bucket water. Good night.
Coming back to Maman 