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I lived in Burundi, a tiny country in East-Central Africa, for about nine months back in 2009. Coming out of a decade of conflict, the country is under-developed and faces huge challenges.
The landscape, however, is incredible - where Burundi's more famous northern sister Rwanda calls itself "The Land of a Thousand Hills" Burundi one-ups that by labeling its state "The Land of a Thousand-and-One Hills." And the name is apt: paradise for a mountain biker like myself. I could ride out my back door and, in fifteen minutes, be on dirt roads that went up and up and up into a never-ending mountain landscape.
While I had lots of fun riding my bike in Burundi, I had just as much fun watching the thriving bike culture there. With the poor state of the economy, for many locals owning a bicycle is like owning a car. And so, bikes tend to fill the functions of a car: carrying passengers, acting as taxis, and bearing incredibly huge loads of cargo.
And, just when I thought I'd never see anything more nutty than four kids riding home from school on one bike, or a guy carrying a full-size wooden door on his rear rack, I discovered the daredevil, mountain-road banana bikers! They start at the top of the hill - 45 minutes of sloping curves if you're going up in a car - load their bikes with as many bunches of bananas as they can carry, and zoom down the hill to sell the fruits at market in the capital, Bujumbura.
So when my independent film maker friend Mike Vogel told me I should put something together for the Filmed By Bike festival, that Portland tradition dedicated to short films about bikes, I luckily had just enough footage of these crazy guys to make a short video.
You can watch the video on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTPAJTEVcYU&feature=channel_video_title
Or, for more about this video and about my biking adventures in Burundi, check out my blog from there:
www.lappjoe.blogspot.com (click here)
I've also got a post up on my blog from Ghana, my current home:
www.goinghana.blogspot.com (click here)
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