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Here in Mbale one of the cheapest, most common forms of transportation is the boda-boda, or boda for short. A boda is a motorcycle with a long seat. They zoom in and out of traffic and swerve to avoid any obstacle—pot holes, other bodas, cars. Women ride side saddle while men straddle. Boda accidents are quite common but I have been fortunate enough to have avoided getting in an accident for the last three months . . . until last Thursday.
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| Abby and I on our favorite boda, driven by Habeeb |
Sarah Blackhurst and I were on our way to Manafwa High School to help teach an Empowerment class. It had been raining all day and the roads are always a lot more slick after rain—mostly because there is red mud everywhere and the roads are poorly paved. We didn’t really think anything of it. I’ve ridden bodas through torrential rainstorms before and been totally fine—except for getting soaking wet. As we squished on the back of the boda (yes, we ride double) and started up the hill out of Senior Quarters, I became a little worried. I felt like his boda was about to break down or run out of gas. Then we would have to find a new boda. So, I said to Sarah, “This boda is somehow sketchy.” Not more than 2 minutes later, our boda driver tried to swerve onto a bit of paved road to avoid driving in the mud. In what seemed like a slow motion movie we tipped over onto our backs (remember we were riding side saddle, so the boda tipped to the right). Luckily we had backpacks on which protected our heads and most of our backs, but we were still pretty shaken up. I had red mud all down the back of my pink striped dress and my arm was a little sore from landing on the gravel. As I looked at Sarah and saw that she didn’t look much better than me, the hilarity of the situation registered and I burst out laughing! I could not believe how funny we must look! We had the lesson plan for the empowerment class, so we had to continue onward to town. As we got back on bodas (we took two different ones for the rest of the way), I had to bite my lips to keep from laughing.
Ugandans are so nice! Even if something is not their fault, they will apologize. So, for the rest of the day, random Ugandans were asking what happened and then expressing their sincere apologies—“sorry, sorry, sorry.” Although we were probably the laughing stock of Namatala (the biggest slum in Mbale) as we traipsed through the market, we didn’t mind. I may have ruined an entire outfit and had mud soaked through my clothing all the way to my underwear, but it was worth the memories!
