I heard the other day about a group of Israeli friends that, with six months of traveling around Ethiopia ahead of them, decided upon a bhajaj (a covered, three-wheeled motorbike) as their mode of transport. Really… it’s true. They’ve bought a bhajaj and will bumble their way around this country at a magnificently slow pace.

I’m not sure this is something I could do (or recommend, having spent four bumpy hours bumbling around Akaki wetlands in a bhajaj), but as someone that’s embracing slow travel in Ethiopia, I’m certainly toasting their efforts. When I first arrived in Ethiopia, there was an air of mystery around how you could explore this country without a car. It seemed you had three options – buy a car and do it yourself, hire a private driver, or go with a tour company. With the former wildly out of reach, private drivers costing a lot, and the latter not quite my cup of tea, I needed to work out public transport.

And it turns out, it’s more than possible; you just need to approach it with no time constraints, low expectations for space, reckless abandon, an expectation that something will break at some point (on the vehicle, not on you), and patience. The latter is where I generally fail.

Slow travel in Ethiopia comes at a number of different ‘classes’ – starting at the bottom (not counting the bhajaj), you have the clapped out mini bus. These go on long journeys and tend to leave from a few bus stations around the edge of town. With a few key roads heading out of Addis, this generally means your journey will start from Kaliti if you’re heading South or East, and Autobus Terra if you’re heading North or West. Check before leaving though – I’ve ended up at the wrong station before. It’s annoying. Unfortunately, there isn’t really anywhere to check, other than just asking people.

These buses leave when they’re full, and will fill every seat available, including chickens on a lap or goats on the roof. Being last on means you’ll leave straight away, but could face up to six hours perched on a wooden stool. Speaking from experience… this is far from ideal! The bus will drive fast, you’ll stop regularly for paperwork checks, and traditional Ethiopian music will more often than not be the soundtrack to your journey. The lack of control over time is annoying, but perhaps that’s something I should be more used to by now? Fellow passengers will laugh at your Amharic, want to know all about you and discuss anything from injera to politics. These buses are my favourite for experience… but you have to be in the mood for them, for sure!

The next class up includes the more official-looking colourful school buses…they leave from the same bus stations, but are slow. Due to their size, you can wait up to two hours for them to fill and leave, and when you do, you literally crawl and drag yourself up hills, being overtaken by everyone. Probably the Israeli bhajaj included. Perhaps that makes them safer, but for someone as impatient as me, they’re painful!

And then you’ve got the gold standard – Selam Bus and Sky Bus. These two coach companies do a number of set routes, usually 6-12 hours long, and they’re more than worth investing in (and the investment is hardly much, at 300 Birr). You’ll be leaving before dawn but you’ll have your own seat, bottle of water, and snack, and it’s a pretty safe and smooth journey. The Sky Bus website lists routes, times and prices online, whilst the Selam Bus office is in Meskel Square.

Now that I’m over the fact I won’t be driving myself around Ethiopia with any CD, AU or AO plates anytime soon, I’ve learnt to embrace slow travel. The longer you live here though, the harder it becomes. At first, it was an adventure. Now, I just want to get to my destination.

Generally though, slow travel wins on cost and experience. I truly believe you see so much more of Ethiopia when you take your time and travel at the same pace as everyone else. You can’t do it all the time, but if you invest time in slow travel, you’ll get an atmosphere and experience that shows you the best (and worst) of Ethiopia, along with some heart-warming respect from your fellow squeezed in passengers!

Warning: It wouldn’t be right to leave this article without including a personal safety warning that travelling by road in Ethiopia comes with risks. Roads are poor, drivers can be careless and many will drive too fast to fit in more routes and income in a day. Whilst new expressways are being built, they don’t mean drivers are driving any more safely and when you see a crash, it’s a horrendous reminder of just how vulnerable you are in the small mini-buses. I’d never travel at night (leave at 5 am to be somewhere before dark) as drivers can be high on chat or drunk, and headlights aren’t good. This is the time when driving yourself or hiring a private driver/tour company of course gives you slightly more control over your safety. If travelling with children, I’d no doubt abandon any idea of slow travel, and invest in a driver.

Getting around Addis Abeba can get a bit tricky. Being a moderately crowded city and seemingly ever expanding in all directions; reaching your destination at the right time and place is not an easy chore. Depending on the amount one is willing to spend and comfort to trade off or not to, there are few options to get around the city. Delivering prayer to the guy upstairs and saddling up inside the belly of the infamous blue demon is one common alternative.

The yellow cabs of New York give contrast to the tarmac road to the streets of the world capital. On the streets of Addis, the capital of Africa, one color in particular stands out as well. Any direction one looks on the streets of Addis it is virtually impossible not to see at least one, if not more, vehicles painted blue with a white roof top. Either parked or moving, vacant or packed beyond limit the blue minibuses are seen everywhere. If there is none in plain sight then perhaps one might have not arrived in Addis yet.

The blue demons, so called because of their crazy driving habit and all the hustle they create to the rest of the road commuters, are a two-men traveling circus-like taxi service. The driver, besides maneuvering the vehicle, is responsible for music selection, recurrent moving violations and creating constant discomfort to the passengers and other drivers. The master of ceremony who is the assistant or commonly called “weyalla” besides collecting taxi fair from the passengers, is responsible for calling out the route of the travel from the top of his lungs. Since he has to mention a number of places in the shortest possible time he has to came up with poetic phrases to attract attention and arrange it to a melody to sweeten up his words to the ears of the preoccupied audience.

As if his job is not already complex enough, in most cases, the weyalla has to do this while the taxi is in motion. Every time he sees a potential client on the side of the road he picks out his neck through the side window, tune up to the right tone, bring volume all the way to the top, maximize tempo and let his melody do the rest; hopping the person is impressed and gives him a sign to stop. If that happens the Weyalla pounds the body of the car to signal the driver to restrain the galloping demon. Conditioned to this sound the weyalla makes, this sweet drum line of their two piece orchestra, the driver, with complete disregard to the rest of the traffic on the road, instantly pulls the rein of the demon.

Consequently, The drivers behind the mini-bus taxi and the travelers inside the belly of the beast come to experience first hand the essential nature of the blue demon and why it is called so. The abrupt breaking followed by extreme shifting to the right with the least possible angle, The improvisation in this chaotic symphony, makes the heart skip a beat of everyone witnessing the interlude in this act from hell.

Once a passenger finds a blue demon that is destined in the direction as one wishes to go a seat is provided by the weyalla. If all the seats are occupied the weyalla always manages to find a space for the latest comer. No one is left behind is the moto all the blue demons give their allegiance to. There is no such thing as full capacity with Addis Abeba’s minibus taxi service. The term ” full” does not seem to be in their dictionary. In extreme cases, “Almost full” is the term the weyallas prefer to use. A Toyota, Haici van with a design capacity of 12 passengers squeezes together upto 20 passengers in a manner that makes canned sardines feel good about their situation.

The atmosphere inside the taxi is one of a kind. People that has never met each other before are dictated by their shared destiny to seat tightly together without being greedy over their personal space. Some chitchat with one another. While others ponder their own thoughts. Some listen to the live entertainment hand picked by the driver/ DJ while others yell their personal business over their mobile phone. It is not rare to find one passenger that argues with the weyalla over the amount of fair asked to pay. Despite the minibus taxi fair being the second cheapest means of transport, about one Ethiopian Birr per one kilometer traveled, the cheapest being the lion city bus service, provided courtesy of the government, the blue demon is not always free from argument over how much to pay. When this happens every one else in the wagon involves and pass their verdict to settled the matter at the spot.

An individual to use the service of the blue demon effectively it is most important to know the names of places of Addis Abeba. If a passenger has to take one at a terminal, where large number of them get together to feast over their victims, it gets even trickier. All the weyallas shouting at ones calling on their travel routes with no harmony whatsoever even confuses the recurrent user. Even worse to that, the city lacking street number system to help uniquely identify each road puts a maiden voyager in such a predicament.

The other factor for effective usage of the service of the blue demon is to understand few lingoes spoken in the business of denying comfort. One essential lingo is “YEMOLA YEMOLA…” used by the weyallas in between calling out names of places. It simply means the taxi is almost full and they are looking for one passenger to depart. These demons are the most desired ones by those who are in a hurry to reach their destination. In reality the calling “yemola yemola…” is a trick because as soon as the latest passenger is seated the weyalla continues calling out ones again “almost full…almost full” looking for the next victim on his perpetual scam. This is where one is introduced with the oldest trick in the blue demons’ multi-volume book of tricks. This powerful revelation, a foreshadow to the ill journey, adds a funny look to the faces’ of the passengers to mach their discomfort.

Yet again, one Amharic phrase stands to be the most important lingo for a passenger inside the belly of the beast. The password that needs to be entered to disengage oneself from the jaws of the blue demon. Inability to use this lingo leads to permanent suspension in a limbo. It has to be said loud and clear with no room for ambiguity. When one has enough of the crazy circus or simply upon reaching destination just cry “WERAGE ALLE!”… “get me out of here!”