Micro Busses

I don’t think I’ve talked much about this particular mode of transportation. Micro busses, also known as mini busses, are quite popular. I haven’t ridden in one yet but I hope to before too long. I’ve been advised that it’s not really safe for foreign women to use alone, so maybe I’ll get an Egyptian friend to go with me.

Anyway, the micro bus is kind of like an extra large Volkswagen van. It has about four rows of seats and a sliding door. They are blue and white. There’s a mini bus depot right next to my regular Metro station, so I get to avoid them every day.

So here’s how it works: At the depot, the driver or his sidekick will shout out the destination. I’m not sure how many passengers it needs to leave the station, but eventually it does. If a person wants to get on a mini bus, s/he stands at a known place, or visible place along the route of the bus s/he wants. That person shouts out the destination to all the busses that pass by. The door slides open, the bus slows down, and the new passenger jumps on. And off they go. You can imagine the chaos of everyone shouting at the depot! Alternately, there are several hand gestures that symbolize the destination. For example, if you want to go on the bus whose final destination is the Pyramids, you either shout out “Haram!” or you make a triangle with your hands.

The mini bus drivers are probably the wildest drivers in all of Cairo. Sometimes it looks like people are about to fall out, as they go careening around traffic circles with the door open. However, they are also maybe the best drivers in all of Cairo, and are perhaps the most popular form of transportation. They are cheaper and faster than the Metro, and probably just as crowded.

One tricky thing about the micro busses is that their routes are not published, neither are the hand signals. So a newcomer could have quite a difficult time, especially if they don’t know Arabic.

Learning all this has helped me adjust to the shouting of my daily walk. It also explains why some people stand on the street, shouting at traffic :-)