A long, dusty train ride to Zaria

My first encounter with trains was in the ancient city of Zaria. But all we did as youngsters was climb into them as they sat idly in the train station. The very first time I rode in one was several years ago from Kafanchan to Kaduna and it took over four hours instead of a […]

My first encounter with trains was in the ancient city of Zaria. But all we did as youngsters was climb into them as they sat idly in the train station. The very first time I rode in one was several years ago from Kafanchan to Kaduna and it took over four hours instead of a maximum of two. A trip expected to be fun turned out to be a horrific experience when the train made stops like an intra-city bus. Added to this was the fact that it was virtually the same kind introduced by the British colonial masters in the 1990s, the one Walter Rodney described in his work How Europe Underdeveloped Africa as the means through which the colonialists perfected the exploitation of Nigeria. So when I prepared to begin my adventure, but this time from Kaduna to Zaria, I grabbed ‘Habibi’, my most-cherished graphic novel and other tools befitting a journalist about to hop onto a train.  
Beating time     
Information said the Zaria-bound train leaves every Thursday and Saturday at about 3pm. It was already 2:30pm when I flagged down a Keke NAPEP on a Thursday. Inside, the driver and a passenger were intrigued to learn my destination was the train station. “The train runs fast,” volunteered Aminu Sani, the passenger. “One day on my way back from Zaria, I made a quick stop at Rigachikun and saw the train pass by. When I arrived at Kawo in Kaduna, I was surprised to see the same train come into town. And believe me I drive fast in my Golf Three. I used to think the train doesn’t speed and wondered why people even bothered to get on it.” If only Sani knew the hope those words gave me.
At Station Roundabout I sprinted across the road, asked directions, was directed somewhere behind a fruit market. Still more fingers pointed and I found myself in the train station. My heart fell. Yes, they were the same old-fashioned locomotives, rugged and heavy. I dashed into a large hall where people queued up patiently to buy tickets. “The train to Zaria?” a young man responded to my question, “I’m not sure it’s for today.”
I approached the woman behind the tickets counter. “The train arrives sometime in the evening,” she mumbled.
“Isn’t there a specific time, madam?” I probed.
“Anything from 4:00 to 6:00 in the evening,” she replied. I was distraught.
“This is how it is out here,” a passenger offered. “You either wait till the train comes or you opt for a bus.”
Since 2011, trains have been running every week, Ahmed Tijjani, the Principal Traffic and Commercial Officer (PTCO) explained in his office. Every week, two passenger trains make their way from Lagos to Kano. There is also another from Ofa to Kano.
“The modern locomotives we‘re expecting between now and the middle of next year are diesel multiple units. They are to run between Sabo and Rigachikun,” Tijjani informed.
Business
While I waited, the Mass Transit train from Minna to Kaduna arrived. In this train, loads of goods, including food products were offloaded. To have access to the waiting area passengers were required to pay the sum of N50 each. Here the crowd was enormous. People needed access for three major reasons. To be able to display their products, to buy or to receive goods brought in by the train. This is where I stared in bewilderment.
As the train from Minna arrived, it revealed people huddled in-between coaches while some crowded amidst yams and other goods. Hadiza Sani, who had paid N50 to gain entrance, was one of those expecting to receive some items when the train arrived. She stood with a mate, patiently. Together, they hoped not just to offload, but to sell as well. Beside them a young man who had made uncountable trips to Minna via same train also waited because the train is expected to return to Minna. But by 4:30pm the train still sat while people made business transactions.
By 4:35pm the train for Zaria, said to have left Lagos at 12noon the previous day arrived Kaduna. From there it was expected to make a final stop at Kano. I made my way into the first coach from the control room. Passengers from Lagos were already sprawled within. Dirt, mainly made up of food remnants filled the floor. In the other coaches, it was the same story with people tired from a journey of over 24 hours.
Dust
There was no first class in the train I was told. I sat down then adjusted the crooked wooden slab that was supposed to be my table and looked around. My neighbour was a middle-aged man that lay with his feet on the two-seater opposite his seat. “Someone is there,” he lied to anyone that wanted to seat there. With his head resting on his back-pack and his feet on a box, he slept fitfully.
As the train began to move, I brought out my camera, laptop, pen and writing pad. My book could wait. Opposite me, two men also settled down. The trip had begun and I fixed my gaze outside the window.
It started slowly. Gusts of wind accompanied by dust. Then it became unbearable as it overwhelmed us. Looking out the window became impossible, keeping our eyes open too. My neighbour shut the window. But then breathing became a task. We had to slide it open again. Everything I had brought out to aid my journey went back to my back pack, in a hurry, with dust on it. Behind us children played without a care in the world. A few men went out to the corridor at the entrance. I followed. Two doors with the sign ‘toilet’ faced each other. What would a train’s loo look like? I opened the door, cautiously. Pieces of paper were heaped almost to the top of the toilet seat. I shut the door quickly. Tired of standing, I went back to my seat.
Dust now and again, blasted into the train while it lurched continuously. An hour later a man tapped people awake and asked simply, “tickets?” and clipped a hole into them. I had wondered while boarding why no-one at the entrance asked to see my ticket.
“People pack away the granite, that’s why there’s so much dust here. It’s not like this everywhere,” my neighbour offered. At that moment I recalled listening to someone who gave a theory for the death of the train transport system in Nigeria. He had said the wealthy did not want to see the system work because their expensive heavy duty trucks would be redundant. In other words, they benefited from its demise.
By 6:55pm the train crawled into the station at Sabon Gari, Zaria. Before it did, I had taken to standing at the open door feasting on the view the outskirts of the town offered, of huts and other shanty structures of ancient Zaria. But I was elated the trip had ended, as I had spent two hours on a journey that should last much shorter.