Buying a New Scooter in Sudan

                                                                                                 By Dan Wise

March 12 2005

 My work has me living in Khartoum (in The Sudan) about 10 months of the year. I have walked all over Khartoum, Bahri, and Omdurman. It was now time for me to go farther than walking distance, but that required transport. Motorcycles are one of my passions, so I decided to buy a motorbike.

 The "BIG" bikes in Sudan are 250cc Suzuki's . But they cost about 6000USD. That is a bit too much for a Khartoum toy. Cheaper are the Suzuki 125cc. They cost about 3100USD. Still a bit much. I finally decided on a Bajaj Scooter. I had never heard of Bajaj, but they sell 1.3 million scooters a year. It looks just like a Vespa. It is only 1000USD. Cool, I could afford that. Since used bikes are very expensive and rare, selling it should be no problem if my Khartoum contract ends. But first I better ask around , and seek council of others.

 Everybody  said "Are you mad?","You'll be dead in a week!", "Being inside an SUV isn't even safe in Khartoum. Your crazy!!", "These are the worst drivers in the world, you'll be lucky to live.",etc... So that sealed it. Now I HAD to have a scooter.

 About 80% of the scooters and small motorbikes don't have license plates, and aren't registered. Cool! I can do the anarchy bit and be a bit of a rebel. There was a scooter shop nearby with lots of new Bajajes. (Or is that Bajai?) When I asked the shop owner  "How much?" the answer was "24". Now the Sudanese have a funny habit of putting little importance on trailing zeros. Their money devalued about 8 years ago and one zero was dropped. Then new money printed. This is a time honored African way of controlling inflation. Prices written on goods for sale still have an extra zero...sometimes. I asked him how much does registration and licensing cost. He said "7". At work the next day I ask one of our drivers how much a Scooter should cost. He said "2.4". I asked him cost of registration, and he said "70". So the prices seemed fairly constant. (Except for that silly zero thing.)

 The next day sees me at the Bajaj dealer buying a light green scooter. My friends told me to buy a red one so the blood won’t show. Other "friends" said I should buy a black one as it will be taking me to my grave. The dealer speaks no English and my Arabic is "shweshwe". I reconfirm the price at “24”. He hand languages the motions for "Give me the bucks." I hand over 240 Dinars. His hand twitches, so I give him 2400. Another twitch. 24000. Twitch. 240000. Big twitch. and finally 2,400,000 Dinars. He smiles and spends 20 minutes filling out papers. I'm looking through the Maintenance & Service logbook. He takes it from me, and rips out the last 10 pages. So much for the guarantee, warranty or service record.

It has zero fuel in it, and the oil is a preservative type, so I can't even ride it away.  But luckily, there was a “freelance maintenance professional” standing nearby with his small herd of goats, and he, for a not so small fee changed the oil, and filled the tank from a leaky milk carton.

The "freelance maintenance professional" and the shop owner both say that a seat cover is needed as the Khartoum sun on the black vinyl seat is bad news. So a seat cover is installed by the "freelance maintenance professional". I opted for a dull gray instead of the offered Leopard skin or Zebra stripes.
Now for a helmet. All the helmets in the store were the same size. (Huge) It turns out that all helmets in Khartoum are the same size. (Huge) Most people in Khartoum on scooters don't use helmets, but the ones that do have to wear a balaclava underneath. The high temperature today was 41 Degrees Celsius (104 F), and many scooterists were wearing balaclavas. So I bought the very best helmet he had. 25USD. He had a medium priced helmet for 15USD and a cheapie for 10USD. My BMW motorcycle helmet in South Africa cost me 500USD.

 So with my new seat cover installed, and with my head safely (??) in a dull gray helmet (that keeps slipping over my eyes) it comes time to figure out how this thing works. It has no battery. So it must be kick started. And only a magneto, so the engine must be running to use the lights. I kick, and kick, and kick till I sweat, and sweat, and sweat, and am gasping and panting, THEN the "freelance maintenance professional" turns on the fuel, and my Bajaj comes to life. It has a funny gear sifter. The whole left handle bar twists to shift gears, and the clutch is on the left handle bar, so the clutch lever twists from up in first to almost straight down in forth. Real neutral is very evasive, but a false neutral exists between the other gears that is very, very, easy to find. So I drive off in a style the "freelance maintenance professional", and the goats, must have seen before. Kick..Rev..Grind..Lurch..Stop. Kick..Rev..Grind..Lurch..Stop....repeating this till I'm finally home. I have the gardener wash my new toy.

 I come from a culture of Big Bad Boys on Big Bad Bikes in the Big Bad City. After riding around Khartoum for a few hours, in some of the worst traffic in the world, I came to the conclusion that I needed an attitude adjustment. My aggressively cutting people off and passing on both sides, and braking late just wasn't polite. The Sudanese were always very polite drivers, as they accidentally pushed others off the road. They are extremely poor drivers, but not mean drivers. My aggressive Big Bike attitude from the city, was not applicable here. However, there are lots of UN, Red Cross and oil company ex-pats in Khartoum. A white face driving an SUV strikes terror into me. Ex-pats here have a driving chip on their shoulder. I prefer the local drivers to the foreigners.

 I kept getting stopped at road blocks for having a unregistered, and unlicensed vehicle. My "stupid white man" act (I hope it was only an act.) was necessary to keep me from paying a fine. After a few weeks, I decided it was now time to brave the immense Sudanese bureaucratic machine and register my scooter. About 10 Kilometers from my home is the "Jebra Vehicle Testing Grounds". It is hidden away, like they are ashamed of it. I couldn't find it, and finally had to ask a traffic cop. His name was Mohamed. He hopped on the back, and rode with me to the testing station. The inspectors said it would cost 700 ( ?? ) to register the scooter.

 I park in line with some very trashed looking taxis and buses. Me and my new unmangled scooter waiting our turn to get it inspected and registered. Time allowed me to sneak off and buy insurance. There were two types of vehicle insurance in Sudan. "Rakhis" and "Galee". I decide that Rakhis must mean "third party" and Galee must mean "fully comprehensive".  My choice is "third party" for 6000 Dinar. Only later did I learn that "rakhis" is Arabic for cheap, and "galee" is Arabic for expensive.

 Finally they test the lights, brakes, horn (called a hooter), and its time to pay the money, only to find out the guy wants 70,000 Dinars to register the scooter. That's almost 400USD. The whole scooter only cost 1000USD. So I say something rude and head for home. The nice traffic cop (Mohamed) stops me and motions for me to come look at something. He shows me a bunch of scooters that are parked nearby. He shows that all the old beat up ones have license plates, but none of the new ones do. Sudan has recently raised the cost of registering new vehicles. He also explained that a used bike with registration costs much more that a new one with out. We drank some cokes, then I went home to think.

 Two weeks later my decision was that resale of the scooter would be lots easier if it was legal. With tons of money in hand I go back to Jebra. The registration process was going well until the guy checking the serial numbers noticed that the scooter had been imported by a company in Omdurman, not Jebra. So he tells me "This is the wrong place, go to 'Omdurman Vehicle Testing Grounds'".

 It was a week later before my schedule allowed me to go to Omdurman. I took the scenic route, and rode along the canals that Pasha Gordon built to hold back the Mahdi's Dervishes in 1885. Then past the last remaining river gunboat that tried to relieve the Khartoum siege, then across the old bridge over the White Nile into Omdurman. Next stop was for a few pictures of the bunkers where the Mahdi's cannons were protected while shelling Khartoum. The bunkers are made of a dried clay that is almost like ceramics. Still there after 125 years. Then through the main gate into the walled city of Omdurman. Very little of the old wall still exists, only about 30 meters.

 After way to much time hunting for the vehicle testing grounds (They must be ashamed of it) I resorted to the "stop a cop" routine that works so well. A friendly cop (also named Mohamed) hopped on back and showed me the way to the "Omdurman Vehicle Testing Grounds". There he got to chat to all his mates about this weird ferenghi. (Arabic for foreigner) He introduced me to a guy named John. John is a Christian living in a Muslim world. John spoke passable English and soon had me on the right track. The scooter passed all the light, hooter, and brake tests, and the serial numbers matched, BUT all the initial registration papers were from Jebra, so I wasn't "inside" the Omdurman computer. Also my insurance was from Khartoum not Omdurman. So John and I sit and drink tea with all the other guys and talk about nothing important for about 6 hours while they try to sort things out.

While we were waiting with some of the vehicle inspectors and policemen for my license plates to be issued, a bus drives up towing a car. The car was coming for its road worthy inspection. The Chief Inspector (also named Mohamed) jokes, "Its flunked the test, and its not even inside the gate yet." John laughs as he translates the humor. There are two very bucolic Islamic guys in the bus and car. One inspector jokes that the guys should be at the camel market down the street, not here. As the bus tows the car through the gate, the tow chain snaps. Now the stopped car is blocking the gate. The inspectors yell at the guys to move the car. The bucolic guys look all around for something to fix the chain with and finally find an old shoe lace. They start repairing the chain with the piece of string. The Chief Inspector goes over to the guys and asks them how they can possibly expect the string to hold when the steel chain wouldn't hold.
 They said "If Allah (Peace be upon him) wants the chain to break it will break. If Allah (Peace be upon him) wants the string to hold, it will hold."
The inspector replied "Allah (Peace be upon him) made this world so that if the Mass of the car times the Acceleration of the car is greater than the tensile strength of the string, then it will break. Now move that car!"
 I had never before considered a basic physics text book to be the work of God.

 After 6 hours they had "finished my problem", and I was now "inside" the computer. With my new license plates in my hand, John and I were walking to the scooter to put them on. Then we heard the Chief Policeman call us. He was yelling at all the inspectors and other cops. They were all laughing, and showing the universal sign language of handcuffs. They were all miming that I was going to jail in handcuffs. Soon John was laughing hard also. There was some humor passing me by. It turns out that one man's job is to check all vehicles that come into the testing grounds on the computer to see if there are any outstanding tickets, fines or arrests due. My new 5 minute old license plates had lots of outstanding fines against them, and the driver was to be apprehended on sight.  Everybody thought that was real funny except me. I had just waited 6 hours for those plates! Apparently someone had been using my unused plates illegally. After lots of laughter they said for me to go home, and come by next week to collect the plates. I  explained that driving around with out plates on my bike, might get me arrested. The Chief cop just laughed and said  "Within a few hours every policeman in Khartoum will know the story about you, so don't worry. If they stop you it will just be to chat." He gave me a letter just in case.

About a year later, after 600 kilometers on the scooter (without a scratch on it). I was leaving Khartoum and decided to advertise it for sale. My total cost was 1400USD and I was asking only 1000USD. A very good deal for a legal and registered scooter. Soon a guy shows up. I am standing there with the helmet, the cover for the scooter, and all the registration and insurance papers. He asks if that is the scooter for sale. I say “Yes”. He reaches in his pocket, and hands me 1000USD. The bills look good. Before I can even hand him the papers and helmet he starts it up and rides away. I thought he just went for a test ride or something. So like a fool I stand in the road for 10 minutes holding all the papers and helmet and cover, then slowly, I went inside. I never saw or heard from him again.

Does anybody want to buy a cheap, Huge helmet?