One of the most hilarious but true stories told about flying from Kisangani to Lubumbashi, two cities separated by a road-less jungle in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), is about aeroplane passengers clutching chicken, goats and dried fish especially on market days.
On these days, the plane is so full of people, animals and farm produce that some passengers have to stand because missing that one flight means missing the market day for that week.
So, the standing passengers squat during takeoff and repeat the ritual when landing.
In an ideal situation, aeroplane passengers must belt-up during takeoff and landing because this is the time the plane is most vulnerable to an accident.
But in the DRC case, the seated passengers are not lucky as well because they cannot belt. Even where the seats have belts, the three-seater row accommodates six passengers.
For those familiar with public road transport in Africa, wherein some countries, passengers are cramped inside a vehicle, it is no difference travelling on the air in some parts of DRC, Africa’s richest country by natural resources.
Such public road transport madness existed in Kenya for many decades until around the year 2002 when the government enforced a decent passenger transport system.
Kenya’s flying chicken nears DRC’s flying madness
Back to the tale of the flying domestic animals. If you are dying to witness this spectacle, you don’t have to burden yourself with travel to DRC.
For you might, if you are lucky enough, get a re-enactment of the same on the Kenyan soil, sorry, airspace.
I had my lucky turn recently while flying from Nairobi to Eldoret via Kisumu when I encountered an enthusiastic young man cradling a closed bamboo basket into the plane.
The basket was placed at the back of the cabin. Although curious, I couldn’t tell what was inside it until we had our stop-over at Kisumu Airport.
There, without the din of the roaring engine, I heard chicken clucking happily as they pecked the sidewalls of the bamboo enclosure.
A smell, of chicken droppings, which I had all along ignored, became more palpable. An in-flight attendant smiled when she realised that I had discovered about the chicken cargo.
In a fleeting moment, I could not help but ponder about the potential benefits that tourism, and of course the airlines, could draw from the ‘flying chicken’.
Many more domestic flights finally revealed to me that indeed, there are so many Kenya’s flying chicken.