Public Health Nursing Adventure: Kenyan transport

Our health team walked a lot-just as many Kenyans do

We've been home 10 days, have returned to work & resumed our normal, comfortable life in America. However, thoughts of Kenya & our myriad experiences there keep flooding our brains. I decided I wanted to write a blog about Kenya's transportation system.

Girls we met near our host's home in Bware

Walking from our home to St Joe's carrying donated medical supplies from Seattle's Virginia Mason Hospital

Walking: This is by far the most dominant form of transportation. People were walking, walking everywhere. They walk on the roads and streets in villages like Bware, small & medium sized towns like Migori, and even the largest city, Nairobi. They carry amazing loads--water, of course, but also children, bags and bundles. We saw one woman carrying a bed on her head! Sometimes people push or pull carts. When people don't want to walk, can't walk, or need to haul something that's too hard to carry by themselves (e.g. babies & small children, groceries, supplies), then they hire a piki-piki (motorcycle taxis).

Kate & BUCHWA members walked daily to making home visits

Kids carrying loads

Delivering passenger to St Joseph Hospital gate

Waiting for passengers outside Migori District Hospital gate

A piki-piki would deliver us to our host family's front door

Piki-pikis: Ubiquitous, they can be found anywhere people congregate. Men on motorcycles wait for passengers at cross roads, outside entrances to hospitals and major intersections in towns. You can phone a favorite piki-piki driver & he will pick you up at your doorstep! Most piki-piki drivers do NOT wear helmets & I never saw a helmet for a passenger. Piki-piki transport is extremely important to Kenya's economy, especially in towns & villages. Besides hauling people, piki-pikis transported a wide variety of materials, including: pipes for a tent canopy at a political rally, steel straps so long they dragged down the dirt road, towers of plastic milk carton-type containers filled with bread, water-filled jerry cans, HUGE stacks of sugar cane (one bunch was strapped side-ways over the gas tank, the other was strapped to the rear of the cycle) and firewood. Loads seem limited only by the driver’s imagination!

Matatus: These are privately operated small buses which run up and down the road. Theoretically Matatus hold 14 passengers, but squeezing on extra passengers maximizes profits. The Matatu staff includes a driver and a conductor. The conductor is an energetic guy who rides on the running board or hangs out the open door of the van. Sometimes he acts like a tout cajoling and bargaining with customers, squeezing them on, tracking their destinations, arranging their baggage. He raps on the side of the van when debarking passengers are out, or boarding ones are on, so driver knows he can take off. Our only Matatu ride was not even a real squeeze by Kenyan standards but it was too much for me. First we flagged down several, waving them off when they seemed too full. With rain threatening, one with 12 passengers stopped. The conductor said they had enough room “he would just rearrange.” A large man moved to the back, a small man moved in next to the driver. Kate and I were levered into the front seat next to him—plenty of room! Seat belts you ask? Forget it.

Bicycles: made with sturdy frames & forks to hold up on the rocky, bumpy dirt roads; often equipped with a milk crate strapped to the rear as a carrier.

A long distance coach with matatus passing in other lane

Another long distance coach in Migori

Long distance bus coaches (similar to Greyhound buses): useful for transporting school groups on outings & members of the public over long distances (e.g. Nairobi to Migori-8 hours, Migori to Mombassa-14 hours); comfortable with good views because you ride high up; holds a lot of baggage in the storage compartment under the seats; on-board toilets? No way.