Runnin' With the Bikes

It's taking me a long time to get the news in Burundi.  There's interesting things going on, but all the notices are in French, and besides, I don't know where to look for them.  Mostly, I've been hearing about cool stuff after the fact.

The last couple weeks have been better, however.  Now, I'm hearing about events as they are happening, at least.

But only because I have a well-situated house, and a house guard who is much more clued in than I.

Last week, for instance, I caught a soccer match at the central stadium.  How could I miss it?  I could see it happening from my porch, the red and white-shirted players tiny running blips on the green soccer pitch down below.

This week, it was the Burundian president being honored upon return from a trip to Italy.  This time, I could hear it happening.

For fifteen minutes the rise and fall of sirens, the sound of music and a crowd, had been wafting up the hill on the lake breeze.  I was engrossed in writing, and couldn't be bothered.

The guard, however, knew something was happening I might want to see.  When I walked onto the porch, he caught my eye.

"The president is coming.  It's a big time.  Many people are there," he said.

I went out to the road in my house-shorts to look.  I could see a crowd of people at the major intersection just down the hill.  Lots of action, just like the guard promised, the people welcoming their president back home.

"I need some pants," I said to myself.  I ran back, changed, and hopped on my bike to go join the throng.

I didn't get far.

The presidential motorcade was already promenading past.  From a pickup, men in dark blue gestured emphatically that I should get off the road.  The men had guns.  I obeyed.

I stood with my neighbors and watched the president slide by behind tinted windows.  Then I continued down the hill.

There was still a press of bodies and vehicles blocking the intersection, backing up traffic on two of Bujumbura's largest central avenues.  There was a festive air, and a brass band in forest green uniforms trimmed with gold braid.

But what really caught my eye were all the two-wheeled taxis.  Several hundred motorcycle and bicycle taxi-men had congregated.  They clogged the road en masse, their bikes decorated with sprigs of celebratory greenery.

I admire these taxi-velo (bicycle taxi) guys a lot.  They fashion a rear rack out of gaily-painted rebar, slap a cushion on it to make a seat, and call their single-speed rig a cab.  They get paid peanuts, maybe 25 American cents, to pedal a passengers a few blocks.  One would think they have little reason to give the state any loyalty.

But, the president is an avid bicyclist.  When visiting rural towns, he often, folks say, stops his motorcade to pedal the last kilometer.  So, when there is a presidential occasion, the taxi-velo guys break off some greenery and show up in force.

By the time I got to the scene, police had begun their struggle to unblock the road and get traffic moving again.  I hung out, though, wanting some action photos of the bike taxi guys.

Thankfully, they started heading off in clumps on an impromptu parade past the university.  I joined a clump, and got some shots of my first occasion runnin' with the bikes through Bujumbura.

Gliding down the hill with my impromptu posse...

...we stop for no man, woman, or car, clogging intersections as we roll.

There's mugging for the camera...

...stunts for the crowd...

...and a final line-up of bikes before they all go back to pumping pedals for pennies.