Go fish!

As a principle, buses in Tanzania leave when the bus is full, not when it’s time. They do this to make the maximum amount of money. The bus conductor begins his pursuit of passengers as though casting a line into a lake.

Standing near the buses but not too near, conductors eye potential catches. Like wary fish, we passengers sidle through hoards of people at the bus terminal and angle to find one of about four competing buses with the most passengers. We want the bus that will leave first.

It’s best if you can hide your identity as a fish, but as a Westerner, I might as well be a whale. Unlike a whale, I am easy to reel in because I usually admit I’m going to Arusha or wherever, and then like a wriggling catch, I find myself in the hands of one conductor who ushers me to one bus, and then another conductor who points to a bus that’s fuller. I step onto the bus, and often the conductor will shout something like, "We have an Mzungu on board!"

Sitting quietly on the second bus, I overhear the bus conductor reeling in the next wary fish by telling her that the fare is only 800 shillings today, rather than 1,000. This is the Shannon Spinner of lures, three hooks with each hook made of three. Your finger or arm gets caught and sliced just by looking at it. While the lower bus fare catches quite a few fish, I realize how the conductor and driver have won once again: a lower fare means they will need more passengers to make up the difference. The fish will have to sit in the tank just as long as those in the next bus with the higher fare.

In the meantime, all these buses want the fish to believe they are about to leave. Despite the high cost of gasoline, all of their engines are running. Conductors periodically pound on the bus, the standard signal for the driver to go, but the bus goes nowhere.

Inside the bus, a catchy song over the stereo keeps the caught fish happy. And the driver needs to keep the fish happy: they can flop out at any moment, deciding they’ve been duped and the next bus is better. But it’s always a risk. The other fish tank looks fuller but it could be worse maybe five of those passengers are friends of the driver keeping him company.

As the bus begins to fill, the driver watches the progress of the conductor outside as he is about to catch more fish. When it looks like the conductor can pull in three to five fish, the driver will roar out of the parking lane and rush toward the terminal exit. This catches even more fish who suddenly hop on board. I get my hopes up. After the five are safely netted, the bus jerks us backward, and we are parked in the same place once again.

Finally, at last, when the bus is more than crowded with passengers standing in the aisle, the driver heads the bus out of the exit gate, turns the corner onto the main road and stops once again we have caught three more fish.

The journey begins. The conductor squeezes himself among the standing passengers and rests only until the bus reaches Arusha, when the conductor and driver will have to work once again to fill up the bus.