Passing Strange

Awhile ago I rode my bike south along Lake Tanganyika.  Except for a short distance at the north end of town, there is no water-side promenade.  Instead, I wound through city neighborhoods, often sensing rather than seeing the lake.

Eventually the high-walled compounds of the city gave way to a maze of under-construction houses - proof that Bujumbura is expanding - and then to gardens and grassland.  And a view of the lake.

Though I am getting used to being in Burundi, on this ride I still found a multitude of strange things to make me think, "Wow, I'm in a new place."

There was the heady scent of palm oil, the smell of orange dust, of burning garbage, sniffs of the lake.

There were teenage vendors walking the street with their wares - sneakers, hair dye, belts, dandy-style hats - draped over arms and shoulders.  There was a line of twenty men digging a roadside ditch by hand.  There was the River Kanyosha with naked boys swimming in it, with workers laboring to extract sand and gravel from its sluggish course.

Even the other bicycles - perhaps especially the bicycles - presented their strange sights.  One carried, on its rear rack, a man (not really unusual) and a dog (definitely unusual).  Another had ten live chickens hanging from its handlebars.  A third supported stalks of bamboo twelve feet high.  Others bore huge bunches of bananas or two butchered pigs or a wooden rack from which hung round loaves of bread for sale.

Then there were, of course, the periodic shouts of "Mzungu!" - or, sometimes, just "White!" - from people I passed, marveling to see the shorts-wearing pale-skin ride by carrying that weird helmet on his head.  Who's the strange and new sight now?

But, on this ride, the strangest sight of all made me feel, somehow, less strange.

I saw a man pedaling a three-wheeled bicycle.  He wore a white motorcycle helmet, the clear visor pulled down over his face.  Between his two back wheels he carried a pile of luggage in teal and purple duffel bags.  Before him flew the flag of Burundi and behind the American stars and stripes.  Water bottles proliferated around him.  A blue fanny pack cinched up his blue sweatpants.  And, taped to the handlebars, staring perpetually into his eyes, a Santa Claus doll.

I confess, I gaped as I rode past.  Then I went back to talk.  Unfortunately we spoke no similar language.  But it was clear: he's just a guy touring the country on his decked-out tricycle.

If we had been able to talk, I would have bought him lunch, asked him a thousand questions, soaked in his story.  But as it was, I was holding him up on a busy and narrow roadside.  I snapped a few photos and let him go.

Bon voyage, fellow biker (well, tri-cycler).  And thanks for being a more outlandish sight than me.