10 reasons why the Zanzibar dala dala is better than the TTC subway:
1. You can flag down a dala dala on any main street and it will drop you off anywhere. There is a main dala dala station in each town but no stops along the way, so you can get off and on literally on any main road.
2. The dala dala charges based on the distance you are traveling. 300 shillings if its within one town, 1500 shillings for the next town over and 2000 shillings to the other side of the island. Not TTC’s fixed fare of $3.00 if you're traveling one stop or to the other side of Toronto.
3. It is colorful and breezy – not red and white and hot. It’s pretty much a truck transformed into a bus. Sometimes, if you get lucky, some routes even have large buses imported from Hong Kong used as dala dalas.
4. It shows up. You might wait 5, 10, 15 or 20 minutes, but you know its coming.
5. It is used to transport not just people, but lots of cargo and items that are just thrown on the top of the truck, i.e. rice, flour, juice, a door. How resourceful – no 18 wheelers occupying the roads.
6. It always waits for you. The dala dala doesn’t budge until it is full, so they are always waiting for more passengers to get on.
7. There’s always room for 1 (or 3) more to squeeze in and the ticket collector just hangs from the doorway.
8. During stops, there are people selling snacks outside the windows – sugar canes, peanuts, corn on the cob. Sometimes, the driver might even buy you a treat :)
9. You can never tell how fast its going because the speedometer pin is always at zero. This one isn’t necessarily an advantage.
10. You have to share the load – lots of moms and kids on the dala dala; you just might have to carry someone’s baby.
So come on board, yall!
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