Daladalas

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Daladalas, this city’s crazy and colorful buses that shuttle the general public from one end of town to another. I could post a million pictures of these things and not get sick of them, and I probably will, so I hope you feel the same.

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They are a big part of city life here- along with the bajajis (tuktuks) that zip along ‘sidewalks’ and in between cars. After spending some time in Dar, one could definitely not picture the urban landscape of this town without them.

These Magic Schoolbus-like Mitsubishi minibuses run to all corners of the city (and beyond), serving as Dar’s only form of public transit. Aside from being fun to say, I am infatuated with daladalas because of all the character that packed into each tiny bus and the mystery behind the system of operations.

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Daladalas, like buses anywhere else in the world, make daily regular pickups at pre-established stops in each neighborhood. Unlike the buses that most of us know, however, there is no schedule, no marked stops (not even any benches or stations to determine a stop), and no information that is listed…anywhere. Forget a public transit card. It’s cash n’ carry, and it’s word of mouth. To someone completely new to this city, he or she would have no choice but to ask around to find out where the closest stop is located, what the fare is, and if there are any rules (there are, but they are few and simple).

From personal experience, location of stops can be deduced fairly quickly based on a few factors: an empty dirt corner on a major street; a place where people seem to naturally congregate at dawn and dusk—Tanzania’s working class heading to and from work each day. To figure out if your home is along a stop, you simply ask your neighbors, and to get to where you want, you might just have to guess (really though, just ask).

Needless to say, it’s extremely daunting for a newcomer or when visiting an unfamiliar area.

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It’s been said that the name of these buses come from a bastardization of the English word “Dollar”, since back in the 70s when the daladalas started servicing Dar es Salaam a trip was in some way equal to a “dollar” or two (hence, “dollar-dollar”). There’s also some legend that says the Tanzanian shilling was once equivalent to the dollar in international market, but I can’t confirm the truth of that anywhere. These days, a trip on the daladala costs 400 shillings to any point in the city, or roughly 25 cents, but the name has stuck. Aside from walking and biking, it’s the cheapest form of transportation around.

Fare is collected once on the bus (at no particular time, often when you reach your destination) by the conductor, a person who is important to one who does not know the system, because despite their seemingly hasty and gruff exterior, they will remember you and help you out (just sayin’). There is always one conductor to to every driver, and I’ve often wondered the hiring mechanisms and contracting details of this entire system. The conductor isn’t distinguished by any uniform or badge, but rather is usually identifiable because he hangs out of the door or is the only one holding a wad of cash in public. Supposedly they call for stops, but I’ve never seen this happen.

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Daladalas are color coded depending on where they go, with one color marking one end of the stop and another color marking another. They are also marked with painted slogans or holographic decals on the back of the bus, anything from photos of Osama bin Laden to random soccer balls and star decals to the words “Inshallah”. All in all, very colorful, and also making me wonder–who is responsible for choosing these images?

Each mini bus seats around 25. Or, I should say, it has enough seats for 25, but usually holds anywhere from 12-40 passengers, maybe even more. If you look through the huge glass front window, you’ll see people crammed in the aisles, some even sleeping while standing up. I have yet to encounter a daladala with a/c, so the windows are always open, even during the rain. The lucky few who do get a window seat are just short of hanging out of the windows, which makes for a photographer’s delight.

As we see daladalas regularly circulate around the peninsula, I wonder where these workers come from—some ride as long as an hour or two from their home to homes like ours, to work at jobs for $80, $100 per month (but, that’s another story).

That’s about it for my musings about the daladala. Now some more pictures! And, follow my thread on Instagram, I’ve ‘hashtagged’ (oh geez, that’s a verb now) it: #daladalasofdar

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Saturday Series / No. 35

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03’08’14 >> So many things going on here; A typical City Centre experience

Went to City Centre’s Uhuru Street today, where a concentration of textile and fabric wholesalers are located. It’s nothing like the wholesale markets in China, but I got a pretty good spread of fabrics anyway (but you guys know, when do I ever have a tough time buying things?). As always, City Centre fascinates me to no end. I love this picture because it could very well be three separate pictures, all on their own. This guy on the left is something else.

Saturday Series / No. 34

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03’01’14 >> Traveling around the Peninsula on a Bajaj, Dar’s version of the TukTuk.

Usually I drive everywhere, even to the grocery store that’s a 10 minute walk away. Until today, I hadn’t taken a bajaj since we first arrived into town almost 9 months ago.

The DiploMan told me today that all the Bajaj’s in town are the same age; they were imported into Dar about two years ago. Before then, absolutely no Bajaj’s existed. Does anyone know if this is indeed true?

 I guess, when I think about it, they all look equally used but not terribly old. Even the junkier ones around here aren’t like the old ones we’ve seen in other parts of the world. It’s just that I’m having such a hard time imagining the city’s landscape without them.

The Tanzanian Handshake

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My favorite part of learning any language (aside from that “aha!” moment when you figure out how a mess of words fit together into an actual sentence) is in the very beginning, where you don’t know yes from no or stop from go, but regardless you start by learning basic salutations and greetings. There are quite a few unique and funny ways that every culture uses to say ‘hello’, and Tanzania is no exception.

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Some of these greetings are teachable. For example, you can drill a Chinese kid named God (true story) to greet his friends with “wussup”, so that he won’t stop saying the word no matter who he meets, but regardless at every utterance of “wussup” you will smile, God will smile, and everyone who hears will smile.

The physical greetings, though, those always throw me for a loop. Do I kiss once, or twice, or three times? Do I look you in the eye when I bow, or at your feet? Do I curtsey, or touch your feet, give you a high-five? Am I allowed to touch you, and if so, where? Am I exempt because I am so obviously a foreigner? Can someone just tell me what to do?!

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Here in Tanzania, in addition to a very long roster of verbal greetings one must memorize, there are physical cues one must master when greeting a local. For example, the different forms of handshake that are always welcome, or more often, expected.

There’s the mutual-grabbing-of-the-wrists handshake, although I’ve only seen this a few times. More popular is the three-switch-up-handshake, where start with a soft cupping handshake with your fingers facing down, then switch quickly to a handshake facing up, and then switch facing back down, leading me to think of it as the “secret-clubhouse” handshake. Sometimes this handshake is done slow and leisurely, others more quickly where the second switch is barely even existent. Another common one is the handshake-sans-shake, but rather just two hands that meet in the middle and barely grasp each other, then remain as such for the first 10 seconds of a conversation bobbing up once or twice as if to say casually, “oh yeah, this is a handshake”.

Unlike America’s obsession with a firm handshake, the Tanzanian handshake is usually limp and noodle-y.  I’m learning first hand–no pun intended–how to offer my hand, ever-so gently, to each familiar face I meet. I’m learning how not to grasp tightly, as I was conditioned in the States, but rather to barely bend my fingers around that of my counterpart. I’m learning how ten more seconds of holding hands with an almost-stranger is a sign of respect in this culture.

My favorite fruit guy at my market, John, smiles when he sees me. He stands up from a usual napping position to say, “Habari! Jessie, Karibu!” and stretches out his hand with a wide grin. After he takes my hand he doesn’t let go, he proceeds to ask what I want for the day. We continue a conversation–about mangoes, about avocados, about these weird new pears with rough skins that he got in recently–all while this kind man with a huge belly is holding my hand. At first it seemed like forever that this strange man was holding my hand, but I’ve since gotten used to it.

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The guy who sells me chicken feed hollers at me, “Mama, Karibu!” from afar. It’s raining out, so he has some sort of old t-shirt or rag over his head which serves the dual purpose of keeping rain away from his eyes as well as provide padding when he hoists the 50kg bag of chicken feed onto his head to carry to my car. Before he grabs my bag of feed, though, he comes over to me and takes my hand. Mama, Habari? he asks. We exchange pleasantries, ‘Habari za kazi?’ How is work? ‘Habari za familia?’ How is your family? We’re still holding hands, slowly shaking up and down.

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The guy at the fish market knows my car by now, and it seems like the other guys barely bother to get up as quickly as he does when I approach. ‘Hi, sista!’ He yells. ‘How are you’, he says in accented English, the melodic sing-song way that I’ve recognized the Swahili accent to be. He’s a young guy, who wears a red Arsenal jersey almost every single time I see him, and he initiates a three-switch-up-secret-style handshake.

I think back to my hometown in California, where while growing up I must have seen the same cashier at Safeway over and over, and over again some hundreds of times (and still do, when I visit my parents), yet there is nary a feign of recognition–on either of our parts. Here in Tanzania, these limp and barely-there handshakes, these weird wrist-grappling methods of saying hello, and these learned handshakes that make me think I’m in a special club–they do more than simply say “hi”, and they’re certainly a language all their own.

Saturday Series / No. 33 (The daladalas of dar)


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02’22’14 >> So many ideas, so little time. #daladalasofdar

I’m starting a little Instagram pet project, called the Daladalas of Dar. I’m trying to collect snapshots of these local buses that run from one neighborhood to another, big angry barreling containers on wheels, each with so much character (outside AND in). Though they’re everywhere, photos are slightly hard to come by as per the general no-photo scowls I receive in public, so it’s a project that will take some time.

I’ll write more about the daladalas in another post, but search for #daladalasofdar over on Instagram. There are a few posted!

Bear with me if things are a little wonky around here; as usual I’m trying out my amateur web design skills to give this ol’ blog a bit of a much needed clean-up and facelift.