Rolex in Kampala

Our first sight of the old taxi park came from the fifth floor of a perimeter arcade building, the homogenous kind that dominates Kampala’s downtown with buildings that connect to each other through elaborate circulations and significant level changes. Traders know the routes between buildings owing to their expertise in moving from street to street via the arcades to evade street congestion and enforcement officers. Our sense of orientation was less known until the view opened up and located the taxi park. It looked heavy with masses of small minibus vehicles crammed into a large semicircular pit, lively on its edges.

The sounds of the park were distant and blended together into a faint, lingering noise. The visual impression, though, was strong: ragged edges, improvised structures, empty modern buildings and gigantic billboards all converging in a low area between Kampala’s hills. Across this undulating landscape, a century ago, hilltops were shrines whilst the land in between contained swamplands.

The park’s circumference is populated with a band of snack bars and mobile phone stalls, where airtime minutes are bought as de facto currency. Down on the edge, we sat in the “enforcers bar”, a compact space covered by a temporary canopy, a cold fridge stocked with sodas, and enough tables and chairs to seat 10 people. We coined the name for the venue as most customers are the council’s patrol officers wearing yellow polo shirts. Officer Emmanuel, #107, told me it gives him a “close but wide view of the park’s informal activities”. The confused sounds engulfed with muffled taxi and boda-boda (lightweight motorcycle taxis) revving engines. Between the masses, informal street vendors use the park as a competitive marketplace. A popular food stand next door sold “rolex”, a two-egg omelette with tomatoes rolled in chapatti.

In the park, and closer to the ground level, the popular economies are organised. The noise here was more tangible, vendors advertising their goods by shouting or using a pre-recorded sales pitch through megaphones. Vendors vie for space using a recycled “chart box” to sell their products. The chart varies in dimension depending on whether the vendor remains in position or in motion. When in-place the chart is generously proportioned and supported on a timber stand. The mobile vendors tend to affix the charts to themselves with a handmade back strap or carry them upright leaning on their shoulders, better for the quick getaway.

Charts come from old cardboard boxes, mainly from boda-boda packaging, dismantled and then re-assembled. The production line is fast moving and good business. Chart maker Baguma said: “Everyone is a broker and needs a chart.” A dimension of roughly 50sq cm becomes an important scale to the city and even Chokolo (bottle caps) are reused as flat washers for repairs and extend longevity.

Inside the charts anything goes. Mobile phone accessories and chargers, fruits, counterfeit documents, stationary, kitchen utensils, underwear, sandals, single cigarettes and artificial roses (it was Valentine’s Day). It also rained briefly, and umbrellas were at the ready. Vendor Richard said: “This chart you see has given me four wives and six children.”

Later, a handful of enforcers entered the park. Outnumbered and outmanoeuvred, they didn’t stay long. But already the traders are subletting their shop doors to vendors, following city convention that things must be well positioned and readily available. These interleaving economies – resilient and humorous – keep food cheap and make the city accessible for urban majorities. Even Emmanuel, with his yellow shirt at home, follows the rolex movement.

By Thomas Aquilina

RIBA Norman Foster Travelling Scholarship winner