On Riding a Bus Across 1000 km of Zambia

On the night of Tuesday, 21^st of October, 2025, I find a Lusaka-based bus service called “Bili Transport” that goes to Lufubu and decide to give them a call. I am passed around to a few different phone numbers until I am finally put into contact with Sam, “the guy who is working today”.

Sam gets me down for the early morning Wednesday bus without me giving him any information whatsoever. I finally offer my name, in total disbelief that he could make a reservation without having even that! He basically says that he doesn’t need it, and tells me that if I want to bring luggage, I should come to the Lusaka Bus Terminus at 19:00 to drop it off.

I figure I had better at least tell someone about this plan—in case it goes horribly wrong—and I elect to call Fr. Cao, who tells me to talk to Fr. Francois.

I text him and he comes by my room. He says that the company I have made the booking with is reliable (even though it is not the one Fr. Cao recommended (vid. “Peace Soldier”) and volunteers to take me to the station to drop off my bags. As it is already 18:30 we leave immediately.

It is my first time seeing downtown Lusaka at night—which is imminently familiar because it is exactly like Lusaka in the day. Even in the pitch black (Lusaka lacks reliable street lighting), armies of hustlers display their wares to car windows—shorts and belts and fake passports and shoes and headphones and speakers. Every single Airtel Money kiosk and haphazard fruit or food stand along the roadside is still open, and the traders are still screaming at exactly the same volume over jerry-rigged speaker systems: “FIVE KWACHA, FIVE KWACHA, FIVE KWACHA. BISCUIT. FIVE KWACHA BISCUIT. TWENTY KWACHA…”

“Why do they do this,” Fr. Francois says, looking at a guy in a Bulls jersey and bucket hat selling a huge wad of belts at 18:45 at night. “They stand here all day from six hours to nineteen just to make twenty Kwacha profit. If they would just go farm they would spare themselves this mess…”

Flashing police lights bounce off of the passenger side mirror. A convoy of brand new Hilux trucks pass at speed, narrowly missing the crowds crossing the street in streams through the stopped traffic.

“A politician,” Fr. Francois says. “Maybe a big fish.”

For those in the American world, the Hilux is a giga-Toyota truck that is like a way more rough and tumble version of the Tacoma—and is not available on the American market. Top Gun did an episode where they dropped an ‘88 Hilux off a cliff, put it through a fire, submerged it in water—and it still ran. It is this truck (along with the Land Cruiser cab chassis model) that you see in all of the North African and Gulf State conflicts outfitted with 50 cal machine guns and anti-tank missiles. It has (well-deservedly) achieved legendary status in Africa, and in Zambia is available only in right-side drive—along with all the rest of the vehicles in the country. The effect is a peculiar aura of supreme tactical efficiency that makes it extremely popular among politicians, off-roaders, and the giga-wealthy—along with any of those with cargo-hauling or bush-whacking needs (i.e., the Salesians).

After inching along in traffic, we arrive at the bus station at almost exactly 19:00. It consists of a long, open-air L-shaped depot populated by what seem to five-thousand people and fifty busses—turning this way and that and spinning in random circles. Shops line the walls of the alleys around the main drive and bags of luggage are stacked as high as a man in front of tiny, handmade travel company booths sporting neon lights and hand-painted signs. As we enter (still in the car), we are immediately swarmed—literally, like bees around a hive—by hustlers. “Where are you going boss?” “Boss, are you using Road Force?” “Hey boss, Peace Soldier will take you to Kazembe”. Others swarm alongside them, offering sodas, sausages, chips, popcorn, shoes, phone chargers from huge piles of identical goods strapped to their persons or balanced precariously on their heads.

Neither I nor Fr. Francois have any idea where Bili Transport is, and in the sea of hustlers their booth will be impossible to find. He suggests that I call Sam and ask for directions. The phone rings a couple times before he picks up. “Hello?”

“Hi Mr. Sam, this is Ambroise. We spoke on the phone earlier.”

“Hello Mr. Ambroise.”

“We are here at the first entrance of the bus station. Where is your booth?”

“Just come straight.”

“Straight? We are behind a bus that is reversing, can you see us?”

“No, just come straight—behind the Hilux.”

Fr. Francois spots a Hilux in front of us and we move towards it. I thank Sam and hang up. We pull in and I hop out to look for Sam. This is a mistake. As soon as I get out of the car I am swarmed by hustlers in a group about five guys deep. Others congregate around the driver-side window where Fr. Francois is still behind the wheel.

I soon realize that even from behind the Hilux, Sam’s location is a mystery. All I see are huge piles of luggage and foodstuffs—grain bags, fruits, bread—dwarfing the handful of metal stalls behind them. I call Sam again. The phone rings in my ear.

I walk forwards and the hustlers follow, still offering their services into my ear. I go forward a few paces and notice that a guy in what looks like a uniform—black with blue sleeves—has materialized out of the crowd. His polo is embroidered with the Bili logo and a string of large red characters that read: “The Glory of Zion”.

As I catch sight of him, I see him put his phone up to answer a call. I point at him, then at the phone next to my ear. “Is it you? Are you Sam?” He hangs up his call and puts his phone down. Mine continues ringing. Not the right guy. “Yes, hello?”, he says to me, confused. “Hello. Do you know where is Sam?” “Sam is inside.” I turn and see a man behind a small booth barely visible behind a crowd of people and stacks of luggage, lit up like a weird little diorama in the total darkness, Sam shining in a fluorescent white T-shirt, simultaneously keeping books and beginning to speak into a phone. “Hello?”— I hear him answer finally. “Yes hello. I am in front of you.” He looks at me and hangs up.

He remembers me from the phone conversation and assures me that my seat is reserved. He asks how many bags I have. “Three.” He whistles at some guys in Bili Transport polos, and they come over to help me. Hundreds of people look on, and hover in a crowd giving me just a few feet of clearance. I lead the Bili guys over to the car, which is still parked about 15 feet away. I see that the crowd of hustlers around Fr. Francois has grown. He does his best to ignore their entreaties through the window.

With so many people moving around I am unsure how to coordinate the transfer. It ends up working out just fine—the Bili guys grab my bags from the trunk and back doors of the Toyota and throw them on top of the huge pile outside Sam’s stall. A few other Bili guys sit atop the pile with arms crossed, eyes scanning the crowd. “Your luggage is safe now, boss.”

I figure that’s as good as we’re gonna get in terms of a guarantee for the safety of my property overnight, and I return to Sam. I pay for the luggage and he tells me to be at the station by 3:00 the next morning to board the bus. I hop back in the car and we leave without having given a single discernible scrap of identification to Sam besides a phone number—but Fr. Francois assures me that this is fine.

We head towards the exit of the Bus Terminus, passing a huge throng moving to and fro, busses turning and moving and wheeling inches from each other. As we get on the main road to return to the Provincial House, the street hustlers are still at it. It is now almost 20:00. “How long do they stay out here?” I ask Fr. Francois. “Until all the cars have gone. If there are still cars, they are still here.” From within the alleys of Kamwala, I hear cries of “KWACHA KWACHA, TWENTY KWACHA…”

Fr. Francois and I have missed prayer and dinner. We stop at the mall next to the Provincial House and I treat him to a steak and some beers. I head home and try to finish my prayers from the day. I tell Fr. Francois that I will take a Yango (Zambian rideshare service) to the bus station in the morning, as the bus boards at 3:30, but he insists on taking me himself. “Yango, too unreliable…”

We get back to the Provincial House around 22:00, and I say my prayers and continue to pack. I finally fall asleep at 00:00.

At 2:00, my alarm goes off. I awake in a complete stupor before realizing where I am. I tear down my mosquito net and throw my last few things together, then wake up Fr. Francois. We depart for the bus station at 2:30.

The streets are empty and we get there quickly. As we pull in, two hustlers appear outside my window. “Where are you going, boss? We will show you!”

“It’s ok, I already know where I am going.”

“We will escort you!”

“No, really it’s ok.”

“I will carry your hand baggage!”

“Hey, really, it’s fine.”

They end up walking with me all the way to the Bili Transport booth. In the end, I feel bad for them having been out all night, and hand them a few kwacha.

Within the bus station, people sleep in sad, blanket covered heaps on the ground. Others sit in a closed cafe, awake and talking. Traders are already back in their stalls, selling fruits, waters, exchanging currency, facilitating cash withdrawals from Airtel Money—the ubiquitous mobile network / money transfer / shopping / bill paying platform with ten million hand-constructed corrugated steel “branches” in every town and village across the country.

I find Sam’s booth and go in. I pay for my seat (which he has somehow remembered) and he hands me a handwritten ticket. The massive pile of luggage outside has already been stuffed in the hold of the bus. I am told that mine is in the “first boot”. I don’t get to see it with my eyes, so to my brain it exists in a kind of Schrödinger superposition—maybe it’s there, maybe it’s not!

I sit for some time before boarding the bus around 3:15. One of the Bili guys directs me to my seat, which is right in the front of the bus opposite the driver. He is livid when there is already someone sitting in it. After they argue for a moment, it comes to light that there has somehow been an entire chain reaction of stolen seats throughout the entire bus. Some people play musical chairs and I finally sit down. There is a bit of an argument with the same Bili guy over my carry-on bag, which he wants me to pay for and stash in the bottom of the bus, but after overhearing us, the bus driver takes it without a word and starts to use it as an armrest. “Are you sure it won’t slide?” “Yes, it’s fine.”

Other passengers carry more interesting cargo. The women next to me have a 55” flatscreen TV box propped on their legs, while others carry sacks of mealie-meal, fruits, or packages with ersatz address labels written in Sharpie and taped on the front.

While we wait to depart, an endless stream of the hustlers from outside come freely on and off the bus. They are selling an incredible assortment of goods: 5 Liter juices, phone chargers, headphones, unmarked packages of pills for who knows what, mosquito repellent candles, sausages, “brede” (bread). Fistfuls of Kwacha change hands and the Bili workers act as if this is the most normal thing in the entire world.

In the nearly pitch darkness, a guy gets on selling bluetooth speakers—then turns one on to show it off. It blasts out a super loud start up sound, “BUM BUM BUM!” Super deep voice, “BLUETOOTH CONNECTED.” He proceeds to play very loud Afrobeats with huge bass.

The clock above the bus driver reads 3:46 in the morning.

Five or six Bili workers hang out in the front of the bus—literally in the space between the driver’s seat and the door. It is one of those huge tour busses where the driver sits lower than the passengers and there is about 10 sq ft. of floor space before the front window and the stairs. Several of them take turns plopping down for a time in the seat next to me.

As hustlers continue coming in and out, they chat and laugh. One guy eats an apple. It has the atmosphere of a cafe or a marketplace and not at all a transport bus. A pile of bags has formed on the platform above the driver, and has now bled into the bus aisle. At one point, the Bili guys move them to pop open a floor panel and pour some kind of motor oil or lubricant down into the engine.

I am unsure of who is actually the bus driver. Several guys hop in and out of the seat before a guy wearing a pink plaid shirt with the collar popped comes and takes his seat authoritatively.

Outside my window people move around. A guy in a metal stall sells stacks of whole chicken eggs lit by blue and green neon lights. Others continue with the customary pile-of-fruit-on-head, or crates of sodas, chips.

Suddenly, we’re on our way—the six Bili workers are still sitting and chatting in the front of the bus. The driver is working the wheel like an expert. As we get out onto the highways of Lusaka he passes the cars in front of him at reckless speed, flying by with flicks of the wheel that bring the window next to me inches from station wagons and semi-trucks. The window itself is not well secured, and the glass rattles and crashes at loud volume inches from my head. The bus rocks and rolls like the deck of a ship, with huge bounces landing on blown out and basically ineffective shocks. I fall asleep immediately.

I come to as we pass through Kabwe—120 km down the road, schoolchildren visible in the dawning light making their way to classes. I watch the scenery for a few minutes before feeling the weight of sleep, and it takes me again.

I jump awake to an incredible scene. Twenty Kapiri Mposhi hustlers are crammed into the front of the bus screaming at a guy I quickly realize is in the seat right next to me. Their hands are in fists, gripping Kwacha and waving wildly.

“Blah blah blah EXCHANGE MONEY!” one of the hustlers screams at the man next to me, shoving a fistful of Kwacha in his face. The last part is strangely audible in the midst of an incomprehensible stream of Nyanja.

The guy next to me is absurdly calm. He holds his hands up. “Exchange rate is good, you will make money…” he says, laughing and smiling while the hustlers continue to scream and jab at him with fingers.

One of these jumps up so that he is 2 in away from my face, screams in Nyanja, and snatches a sweet roll directly out of my seat partner’s hand. I realize all at once that this ridiculous sweet roll is the cause of all the contention. He takes it down and off the bus and the chaos continues, with the 5 or 6 Bili guys finally realizing what is going on and trying to control the scene.

Outside the bus window, I see the hustler who had grabbed the sweet roll confer with another guy. He then angrily points back at the bus and right towards us. This second hustler gets angry as well, promptly grabs the sweet roll, rushes back on, sticks it in my neighbor’s face and demands that he pay—with Kwacha! Cornered, he finally produces the money, which the hustler roughly snatches, throwing back his other bills—what kind they were I have no idea.

The hustlers are still shouting, and the Bili guys have had enough. One of them comes up to our seats. He looks at the sweet-roll-pilferer with a scowl. “Can’t sit here. Boss seat only.”

The guy, already having a very rough bus ride, makes his way to the back. I am in such a daze that I simply fall back asleep. I drift in and out, oppressed by the kind of exhaustion that feels like a lead blanket has been draped over your chest.

At about 10:30 I finally wake up for good. The rest of the bus ride is a smear of green and brown as we fly up the entirety of Great North Road—swerving wildly to avoid bikers, trucks, schoolchildren, animals, motorbikes, and huge, gigantic washouts that sometimes stretch on for miles.

Villages with thatch-roofed cottages begin to appear on the sides of the road. As we cross the Luapula river (really a marshy collection of rivers), large groups of Bemba women and children appear along the banks—wearing clothing of the brightest colors, arms full of fruit and fish-baskets, trying in vain to sell their catch to passengers on a bus speeding by at 100 km/hr. Their husbands ride sampans along the bending river, casting their fishing spears here and there into slow-moving, water-lily and rivergrass covered depths.

The dryness of Central Zambia gives way to the lush green of Luapula province. The bus makes impromptu stops to pick up more passengers, who clamber over the piles of luggage and foodstuffs to lay haphazardly along the aisle. On the TV screen at the front of the bus is a several-hour-long mix of Pentecostal hymnals, followed by a series of flashy Afrobeats music videos.

As we pass through other small towns, we are met on the road by scores of women with fruit baskets, bread, water stacked on their heads—trying their hardest to earn a few Kwacha. One man along a more deserted stretch of road has placed a large branch across the left lane, extracting a kind of charitable and voluntary toll from passing vehicles. To my great surprise, one of the Bili guys pays it.

We roll along at an incredible clip, the bus driver making liberal use of the horn to facilitate wild passing and swerving. After many hours with no break, an announcement comes over the intercom that we will be stopping for “seven minutes” in Mansa bus station. This was kindly translated by one of the Bili brothers—who struck up a conversation with me after occupying the seat to my right. He is interested in sending his son to the school I am headed to in Lufubu—to the electronics program, no less! We exchange contact information and he disappears into the crowds in Mansa.

It goes without saying that we are swarmed by hustlers as soon as we arrive in Mansa. They run up to the bus and begin to bang on the luggage hatches before we have even stopped. They hand bread, sausages, drinks, phone chargers through the bus windows to passengers who pass back fistfuls of Kwacha. The Bili brothers unload packages marked for Mansa, and one of them disembarks and runs into the distance. As we leave Mansa along the main road, I spot the same guy running out of a Hungry Lion restaurant (kind of a Zambian McDonalds) with a fistful of greasy brown food bags. He jumps into the open door as the bus flies along and the Bili brothers sit back to feast on burgers and fries.

These same scenes play themselves out in each town we pass through. The day drags on and on. Finally, at the 14 hour mark, I conclude that we must be close to Lufubu. I lean down into the front platform and catch the eye of a Bili brother. “Hey boss, will the bus stop at Lufubu?” He gives me a thumbs up and relays the request to the driver.

A few minutes later, we arrive, and the bus clatters to a stop. I climb up and over the seat divider onto the front platform and give all of the Bili brothers the Zambian dap, then jump down and out to retrieve my bags.

Waiting for me with two motorbikes is Schubert—the electronics instructor at DBATC—and a handful of students. He comes up to me as I am taking stock of my luggage. We load my three huge bags onto the backs of the bikes with a clever system of rubber tie-downs and hitch knots. As we tear off down the road to the school, the villagers we pass shout hello and wave.

After a few minutes, we arrive at the place I have been anticipating for months: Don Bosco Agricultural Technical College. Three separate plane rides totaling 39 hours and a 14 hour bus ride over some of the wildest road I have ever seen have led me to the place I will call home for a year.

As we unload my bags from the bikes, I hear some commotion behind us. I turn to see that the entire population of the school’s Oratory—some fifty children from the ages of 6 to 13, have snuck up the road behind us to say hello. They look at me and giggle, standing back in apprehension. “Muli shani!” I say. In perfect adorable unison they respond: “Bwino!” Everyone devolves into laughing. I tell them my name and try to ask some of theirs. I ask how old they are, and when they don’t understand, I ask, holding up my fingers as I go: “How old are you? Are you four, five, six…” They completely misunderstand and start to count along with me: “seven, eight, nine, ten!” By the end of this I am in stitches.

As my bags come off the bikes the kids rush forward to “carry” them for me. Somehow, groups of four or five kids that barely come up to my knee manage to pick up and carry my 50 pound suitcases towards the gate of DBATC. As if with a flair for dramatic timing, Fr. Cao comes out of the front gate, and we greet each other with a firm shake and warm embrace. This is my introduction to Lufubu.