The Night Bus

Well, I should be packing up my house right now, but I wanted to write about tonight first.

One of the most serious infractions in Peace Corps Kenya is traveling at night. If you are staying within a village or town, it is kosher as long as you take safety precautions (e.g. in a town, you should be traveling in a taxi or other approved vehicle), but going town to town is strictly verboten. One volunteer was administratively separated from the program earlier this year and although the reasons were never clearly explained, we got the impression that it was primarily on account of traveling on the night bus (though there were other infractions in there too).

Well, sure enough, one day out of the Peace Corps and I am riding the night bus. I took a bus to Voi, which arrived around 5:30 PM. I said my good-byes in Voi and bought my ticket at 6:00. I hopped onto the bus where a few people were sitting, glanced around filled with dread for how cramped this vehicle was and pulled out my book. Two hours later the other passengers started making a big fuss and I looked up and realized that there was no driver or conductor. I was a little worked up over this, and spent the next hour trying to get a refund even though they'd disappeared with our money. I thought about taking my sharpie and writing "wezi" (thieves) on the window of the bus, but decided against it (MY REVENGE: Dear readers, if you are ever traveling from Voi to Taveta do NOT travel with the crooked people at Taveta Coach). I had to find another bus, buy another ticket and wait another hour before we finally got on our way. So that was 4 hours of waiting and then a 2 hour ride.

Honestly, this wasn't the first time that I had traveled at night in Kenya. Admin told us that the restriction was in place on the embassy's recommendation and that it was on account of our safety. True, some volunteers have disturbing horror stories about trips on the night bus in Kenya. But there are just as many horror stories from volunteers about trips on the day bus or matatu. On the Voi-Taveta road, I feel just as safe traveling at night as I do during the day and it's usually a whole lot more comfortable on the vehicles that go at night (no loud music, more leg room and a lot fewer stops). One of the first things Enos told me when he visited my site in March was how rough the ride was. If that's his comment after a trip in the land cruiser, I think that I should be allowed to prioritize comfort a little bit.

There are roads that I would absolutely avoid traveling on at night, but Peace Corps doesn't trust volunteers to make those judgments for themselves. This is one of many examples of the parental attitude (a pretty insulting one, at that) I encountered at Peace Corps. Had I followed that rule, it would have interfered with my ability to be an effective volunteer. Sometimes I was breaking it because I had left site for personal reasons (a.k.a. to unwind), but other times it was because I was on Peace Corps business and it didn't make any sense to prolong my travel schedule. Some volunteers told me that they are scared to break the rule not because they fear their safety, but because they fear Peace Corps finding out. It would have been nice if Peace Corps would equip volunteers to make decisions concerning our safety, but they prefer to convey the sense that they do not trust volunteers to make most decisions for themselves.