We were going to Mombasa for a staff retreat next week, so needed to visit Syokimau Station in Nairobi, to purchase tickets in advance for 19 of us. It was expected that this would take us most of the day. Purchasing a rail ticket in Kenya is a complicated process involving long queues and you must also provide ID. Tickets for Mombasa can only be purchased at Syokimau station which is beside the airport, even though the train actually leaves from the centre of Nairobi.
We set off about 9.30am, with a mixture of original and photocopied IDs from all the staff and debating how long the queue would be. The last time Bonface bought tickets there, he had to queue for 4 hours.
The drive to the station was not bad and we seemed to avoid the rush hour snarl up at Rongai and Karen. It took less than 2 hours. As we arrived at the entrance to a huge (but mostly empty) station carpark, we are stopped by a policeman. There was an exchange in Kiswahili requiring Bonface to get out of the car. The conversation was loud and heated. Then the policeman took Bonface’s driving licence and refused to return it. Bonface shrugged his shoulders, returned to the car and we proceeded to park.
According to the policeman, Bonface had committed some unspecified parking offence and should pay him 5000KS. Bonface had refused and thus his licence had been confiscated. He decided that we would get the train tickets first before he figured out how to get his licence back. He was not even surprised by the policeman. It’s was a very common occurrence as corruption is still rife within Kenya.
There are security check before entering the station: probably due to a fairly recent terrorist attack in Westlands. We undergo a body scan, a bag xray and a bag search. I am mildly concerned when a sniffer dog stops beside me and seems very interested in my backpack. But it’s my emergency biscuits he’s interested in rather than a heroin stash! The policemen seem uninterested in the dog hovering by my bagpack. I am waved through – probably because I am white.
We make it into the station. Syokimau is large, modern, architecturally impressive, shiny and spotlessly clean. It was built by the Chinese. There are huge numbers of staff. Only four trains per day pass through it – two going to Mombasas and two returning from Mombasa. It seems a very large set up for such a limited service.
There is absolutely no queue to speak of – just one person ahead of us. This should be a dawdle! We’ll be back in the car in 10 minutes. Then I spot the poster. “Due to recent security measures, photocopied IDs will no longer be accepted when purchasing tickets.” Maybe not such a dawdle then………
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